Movie Review: Jana Nayakudu

Cast: C Joseph Vijay, Mamitha Baiju, Pooja Hegde, Bobby Deol, Prakash Raj, Priyamani, Nasser, Sunil, and others

Music: Anirudh

Cinematography: Sathyan Sooryan

Dialogues: Hanuman Chowdary

Producer: Venkat K. Narayana

Writer & Director: H. Vinoth

Before making his foray into active politics, Superstar Vijay thought that “Jana Nayagan” would be his last outing at the box office. Due to Censor issues, the film got delayed and final released today (July 23). The film got dubbed as “Jana Nayakudu” here.

STORY:

Vetri (Vijay) is a murder convict serving his prison sentence and shows huge respect towards their jailer. By the time he gets released from jail, as the Officer dies, Vetri takes up the responsibility of the jailer’s daughter, Vijji (Mamitha Baiju). She’s suffering from a mental condition, while Vetri thinks of making her selected to the army, to fulfil her father’s wish. Though she doesn’t like it, she gets trained for the sake of Vetri, but then gets struck in a major problem. With international don John Himler (Bobby Deol) threatening Vijji’s life, Vetri enters the scene to confront him. Who is John Himler and why he’s posing a threat to Vijji, and what’s Vetri’s flashback, and how their confrontation ends, forms the rest of the story.

NARRATION-ANALYSIS:

The moment when a film is tipped to be a remake, it’s disinteresting the audience. Whether a remake or freemake, a small promo is enough for the audience these days to dissect it. Due to heavy social media impact, all the tiny details in the originals are coming out. During these times, Vijay has picked up Telugu runaway hit Bhagavanth Kesari for his last film Jana Nayagan. However, rather than remaking it wholly, they changed the total film like Harish Shankar. From changing villains’ track to carving out political scenes that would help Vijay in politics, a lot was changed. However, all those additions don’t fit well in Bhagavanth Kesari’s story.

If we observe the spyverse movies of Yash Raj Films, all the villain roles follow a pattern. An honest officer in the armed forces turns against the system due to the injustice meted out to him, and starts behaving like an anti-social element. And that villain joins hands with enemy countries to exact revenge on India. To make Bhagavanth Kesari sound different, director H Vinoth followed the same pattern. Animal fame Bobby Deol is roped in to play the role of an international mafia don who is actually an honest police officer working in forest areas. After adding this villain track, the director tried to narrate the film with a new treatment. On the other hand, he forced lots of dialogues to help Vijay’s political career. Those lines might give goosebumps to the Tamil audience, but the Telugu audience won’t feel them natural.

Due to the changes made to Bhagavanth Kesari, the story took a new shape. However, the emotional bonding scenes between father and daughter aren’t strong. Excessive focus on building Vijay’s political image has hurt other elements of the film. Though elevation scenes and action episodes are stunning to the core, they might appeal to the mass audience and fans only. The film has a lot of elements that take Vijay’s political ideology to the people. The changes made to the script, after taking only a few core scenes from Bhagavanth Kesari, might not appeal to the Telugu audience, while the Tamil audience might like it.

PERFORMANCES:

More than Vijay’s acting prowess, his typical mannerisms and stylish presence are attractive in the movie. Especially in action sequences, he’s damn impressive. But then, there’s nothing special to talk about his performance, especially. In the role of Vijji, Mamitha Baiju is just okay. Though her role starts with importance, it fizzled out towards the end. Pooja Hegde appears like a side-character only, sadly. Bobby Deol’s villain role turns out to be a comedy, and we wonder why they carved it in the first place. Prakash Raj didn’t dub for the Telugu version, so it’s tough to connect to his role. The likes of Nazar, Priyamani, Sunil and others haven’t even got roles with potential.

TECHNICALITIES:

Composer Anirudh Ravichander gave excellent music for Jana Nayakudu’s background score. Especially in elevation scenes and action sequences, his work is top-notch. However, the songs composed by him failed to click. Satyan Sooran’s cinematography is impressive. Production values of the film are pretty good. Coming to director H Vinoth, we can’t blame him alone for messing up Bhagavanth Kesari’s story. As the film got moulded to match Vijay’s political journey, his creativity might have got dented. But then he should take the full credit for carving out such a poor villain role.

Finally: Jana Nayakudu’s action is good, narrative is unimpressive

Rating: 2.25/5