Virundhu Movie Review : Barring Arjun’s Style, This Wannabe Thriller Is Messed Up

The best thing about Virundhu (also released as Virunnu in Malayalam) is Arjun Sarja. The actor, at 62, looks and moves like a dream, and he has a screen presence good enough to uplift even the most senseless scenes. For example, in an unintentionally cartoonish portion, he’s made to wear a black Satanic coat resembling the raincoats we used to wear during school days, and infiltrate a cult. But he exudes a sense of style even as the material remains bemusing and as he delivers bland lines that go like “My message to today’s youth is this...” while looking straight at the audience. He’s ably supported by Nikki Galrani, who, despite playing a character whose motivations seem unclear, manages to bring about a sense of sombre intensity. However, their spirited performances are hampered by a screenplay that is a total mess, to say the least.

The suspenseful moments are all shown beforehand, while the reveal about the villain comes way too late into the narrative. There are long portions of the first half that have no bearing on the plot. None of the character motives are established well, and none of their actions seem to make sense. An auto driver leaves his family to accompany a stranger on the run. Five minutes into meeting her, he pledges to save her with his life. The screenplay’s explanation seems to be: He’s a helpful man. A character delays a crucial explanation to two people he’s hosting and instead behaves rather suspiciously with them. The screenplay’s explanation seems to be: He’s a mysterious man. Instead of organically uncovering the threads of the mystery, the film abruptly jumps from one hyper-cut scene to another, and it's very hard to get into the proceedings. None of the moments are allowed to linger, and none of the emotions are established. Fast-paced thrillers are fun, yes, but without having anything to hang on to, what are we supposed to be invested in?

Adding to this, in what is probably an attempt to make things more racy, we get a background score that is relentless, loud, and haphazard. Every second of the 125-minute runtime is underlined by deafening music, without a single breather. It becomes exhausting after a point, drowning out any chance for the audience to connect with the film's narrative.

There are some gripping moments, though. There’s an action segment in the second half that springs a surprise in the way it is set up. A sequence in the end, albeit campily staged, has good production design in an 80s-style villain's den manner. Some of the action, despite being typical one-versus-many fights, is choreographed well. And Virundhu is filmed in a saturated tone that suits the locations. But these don’t do enough to save the hastily-put-together film where there are more questions than answers. What was the point of giving Aju Varghese’s character so much screen time at the start, given that he doesn’t even appear later on? What is the reason behind giving Gireesh Neyyar so much ‘good samaritan’ backstory, other than him being the film’s producer? Did nobody in the crew point out that Kathipara Junction in Chennai is not in a hill station? Why not introduce the concepts related to Arjun’s audience-looking speech earlier on instead of abruptly introducing the themes in the climax? There is a line in the film that goes something like, “There is no other case more confusing than this." Well, there you have it.

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