I will be the first to admit that I know nothing about Indian cinema, except for the Bollywood stereotype. I did not know what to expect going in to see this movie, nor how to judge it in the proper context. Perhaps that is the reason why Sura has me utterly confused.
The movie starts out with some light hearted fishing village shenanigans, a bit of comedic romance, and a healthy portion of dancing. So far it all fits pretty well into the stereotype but then, without any transition, the movie cuts to some dark, really rather brutal gangster stuff involving a corrupt politician type villain. It's like an entirely different movie. After a few minutes, the movie sporadically jumps back to comedy relief character Umbrella engaging in some less than hilarious slapstick, then returns to the gangster stuff.
The movie keeps jumping between these different scenes, interlaced with some unmotivated dancing for about an hour, at which point there is a switch in tone again. Suddenly the brutal villain is more of an action comedy pathetic bad guy, and main character Sura has turned into a black clad,cool looking hero a la Neo from The Matrix. The random comedy bits featuring Umbrella are still there, but main story is different.
There is just such a disconnect between the different parts of the movie, the audience has little chance to understand what's going on. Besides that, the main character Sura seems to be a mix between Neo from the matrix, and Jesus. He is a cool looking, ass-kicking superhero, who also cares about his people, can predict the future and can do no wrong. It feels like he is the embodiment of actor Vijays narcissistic fantasy of himself.
What really gets me is not just the unbelievable main character or the confusing plot, but the length of the thing, at nearly two hours and forty minutes, it is about an hour longer than the subject matter deserves. By the time it ended (which took forever) I felt both frustrated and bored.
The movie starts out with some light hearted fishing village shenanigans, a bit of comedic romance, and a healthy portion of dancing. So far it all fits pretty well into the stereotype but then, without any transition, the movie cuts to some dark, really rather brutal gangster stuff involving a corrupt politician type villain. It's like an entirely different movie. After a few minutes, the movie sporadically jumps back to comedy relief character Umbrella engaging in some less than hilarious slapstick, then returns to the gangster stuff.
The movie keeps jumping between these different scenes, interlaced with some unmotivated dancing for about an hour, at which point there is a switch in tone again. Suddenly the brutal villain is more of an action comedy pathetic bad guy, and main character Sura has turned into a black clad,cool looking hero a la Neo from The Matrix. The random comedy bits featuring Umbrella are still there, but main story is different.
There is just such a disconnect between the different parts of the movie, the audience has little chance to understand what's going on. Besides that, the main character Sura seems to be a mix between Neo from the matrix, and Jesus. He is a cool looking, ass-kicking superhero, who also cares about his people, can predict the future and can do no wrong. It feels like he is the embodiment of actor Vijays narcissistic fantasy of himself.
What really gets me is not just the unbelievable main character or the confusing plot, but the length of the thing, at nearly two hours and forty minutes, it is about an hour longer than the subject matter deserves. By the time it ended (which took forever) I felt both frustrated and bored.