The much anticipated & eagerly awaited Priyadarshan's magnum opus "Marakkar Arabikadalinte Simham" opened to an unprecedented number of theatres across the globe on Thursday. However, the reviews that I have heard until now has been rather mixed. To be frank that didn't dampen my spirits, after all I rarely watched movies with preconceived expectations though I was curious to know the reason why there were a lot of brickbats despite being adjudged the best movie at the 67th National Film Awards. So as Ajaz Patel created history with the perfect ten, will "Marakkar" make waves at the box office???
Kunjali (Pranav) belonged to the lineage of the Marakkar family who traditionally led the naval force of the Zamorin. However, in one of the successful campaigns against the Portuguese; Kunjali lost his father, Pokkar Ali and his grandfather, Kutti Ali (Fazil) decided to relinquish the commandership position and took up trade for a living in a different land. But when Kutti Ali decided to stand up for the traders against the injustice meted out to them by the Portuguese, the latter decided to wipe out the lineage. They almost managed to do it except that Kunjali & his uncle, Pattu (Siddique) were lucky enough to escape from their grasps. As destiny would have it, they landed up on the shores of the Zamorins & Kunjali (Lalettan) became a Robin Hood like figure for the poor and oppressed when he realized that even the regional rulers were no better than the Portuguese. Soon enough he became the most wanted fugitive in the Zamorin kingdom & Portuguese saw it as an opportunity to wriggle their way into the royal court on the pretext of support.
After much hungama that resembled a soap opera, "Marakkar" released in theatres much to the relief of most of us after all it was a project mounted on a lavish scale that deserved to be watched on the big screen. On the positive side, the first half was impressive be it Thiru's picturization of "Kannil Ente' track rendered by Shweta Menon & Vineeth Srinivasan, the CGI & VFX effects in the naval warfare, Sabu Cyril's art direction etc. and even the pacing of the story was fine. However, the negatives kept piling up in the second half and the primary reason for that is the weak screenplay penned by Priyan & Ani Sasi. The dialogues were mediocre with some of the slangs being hilarious including Lalettan's whose role also didn't have the impact that was expected. As a matter of fact, despite the presence of some talented artists most of them didn't have well etched roles
Marakkar was known for their wizardry in naval warfare, but we hardly got a feel of his tactical brilliance except for a solitary sequence of the floating coconuts. Another aspect that could have be avoided or atleast treated in a different manner was the undeniable similarities of certain sequences to "Troy", Homer's Illiad, "Braveheart", "Bahubali" "Deewar" etc. Coming to performances, Hareesh Peradi as Mangattachan, Arjun Sarja (damn good) & Keerthy Suresh, stood out for their screen presence. Lalettan was fine but it was hardly a challenging role for a person of his caliber and he certainly struggled in the war scenes coz of his lack of agility while Pranav impressed. Nedumudi Venu & Siddique were reliable as always, Suniel Shetty gave an earnest performance but didn't understand why he was required and the same also goes for Manju Warrier. As for the rest of the cast, Prabhu, Ashok Selvan as Achuthan & Jay Jakkrit as Chinali were ok while the others were average.
Verdict: If only Priyadarshan had paid more attention to the script & screenplay rather than just focus on making the frames rich & exquisite. With a talented cast & crew at the director's disposal, he could have made this a truly fantastic movie in all aspects, unfortunately he didnt. Despite the shortcomings, it still had its moments especially in the first half and some good performances from Arjun etc which would result in some sizable numbers at the box office & maybe even challenge "Lucifer". In short, give it a try!!!
Rating: 2.5/5
Regards...Ben
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