Review of Biriyani

Biriyani (2013)
5/10
A Fairly cooked Dish
29 December 2013
Warning: Spoilers
"BIRIYANI"....yep! the title is supposed to be spelt like that because an average south Indian pronounces Biryani like that.

The movie promises a laughathon right from the credits were you are subjected to things like "A Venkat Prabhu Diet" instead of "A Venkat Prabhu Film".

The movie starts with a car chased by a couple of police vehicles and taking a leap over an unfinished Bridge and that's where Parsu played by Premji Amareen takes over the narration. He is in the doomed car along with his friend Sugan, whom Parsu blames for the situation they are in, and starts telling us what led to their present situation.

For starters! this is a dark/black comedy and you have situations galore where you end up laughing at dead bodies, at life and death situations.

The movie is also a thriller with a rather unconvincing end where the director decides to connect a seemingly unrelated incident in the beginning of the movie to the main plot of the movie, the twist is clever but rather unconvincing, when you actually go over everything leading to the main incident but nevertheless, the movie did a good job delivering the laughs it promised through Premji Amareen.

Sugan and Parsu are two childhood buddies. According Parsu, whatever Sugan wishes for he gets it and whatever Parsu wishes for Parsu does not get it, but Sugan gets it.

Sugan shares an off and on relationship with a television anchor Priyanka played by Hansika Motwani. Parsu is always on the move to move in whenever Sugan and Priyanka break up. This is because Parsu was the one who had been in love with Priyanka and when he seeks Sugan's help to get the girl, Sugan gets her for himself.

On one of the many breakups the couple have, Sugan gatecrashes into an interview by Priyanka. The guest happens to be Vardharajan, a business tycoon who is now in the limelight for a supposed scam. Sugan with a huge help from Parsu gets into the good books of Vardharajan and gets invited to a boring business party along with Parsu.

Parsu leaves the party along with Sugan and they start looking for joints serving late night biryanis. They end up on a highway restaurant and run into a Maya,(Mandy Thakkar). Maya invites the guys over for what seems to be a one night stand. The party gets interrupted when Vardharjan comes over, apparently Maya is Vardharajan's concubine.

Parsu and Sugan hide in the washroom have a drink and get into a "hangover" kind of situation i.e. when they wakeup, they have Vardharajan's dead body in the boot of their car and the cops hunting them down for supposedly Kidnapping Vardharajan.

The CBI is also on their trail because they believe that Vardharjan has gone into hiding to avoid an arrest.

The movie has many twists and turns where both the guys go over various hilarious scenarios as to what to do with the body.

The movie keeps its promise of delivering the laughs, they are so good that you can actually forgive the pathetic climax.

It is Premji Amareen's show all the way, with his brother directing it, he has been given the maximum footage and succeeds in chewing up the scenery even with the presence of Karthi. He is so spontaneous that you can't take your eyes off him.

Karthi, though the main lead has been magnanimous in letting Prem take up the show and looks rather sportive about it without losing his own hold. He is good as the compulsive flirt and as a wise guy who turns every disadvantage into an advantage.

Hansika Motwani has very little to do, and you barely realize that she is in the movie, it does not make any difference to the movie even if her character was edited out.

Mandy cannot act to save her life, but she manages to look hot on the screen-well! thats what her character was for anyways. She was real good in the Missisippi song, the only hummable number in the entire movie.

Strangely! the soundtrack is very bad without any of the songs apart from Missisippi being foot tappers.

Yuvan Shanker Raja lays a turkey egg with the music.

Venkat Prabhu's direction is top-notch, though he falters towards the ending, but if you discount that, the movie is fairly enjoyable. This guy has become a synonymous with movies with "different" story lines. This one comes close on heels after "Mangatha"-which could be termed as South India's first Dark Thriller, way to go man-if anything! this guy manages to convince the paranoid south stars to do "this" kind of cinema.

Well! I would recommend the movie, if you are looking for some good laughs and please leave your brain back home, you would not need it to watch this movie.
2 out of 4 found this helpful. Was this review helpful? Sign in to vote.
Permalink

Recently Viewed