First, a word of caution: Keep your brains at home before attending a screening of Tamil film, Vallavan.
Silambarasan's love-flick is named after the lead character, Vallavan, played by Simbu, who is also the director! The film is about a college student (Simbu) who falls in love with his lecturer Sapna (Nayantara). He becomes a fake teacher in order to impress her but then, inexplicably, begins to act as someone mentally ill.
The film moves into extremes when he does things to impress her -- like getting beaten up by rowdies, selling his bike to book an entire cinema hall for her, and getting beaten up by police for stealing a pair of sandals for her. Finally, his extreme efforts pay off, and she falls in love. Unexpected, isn't it?
Sapna finds it embarrassing to have an ill-mannered and poor lover among her friends though. So, right then, our man arrives all dressed up in his SUV, sweeping her off her feet. Matters take a turn for the worse when she finds out that Simbu is actually a student in the same school where she teaches. This seals the fate of their relationship. Vallavan is shattered and looks for the person who has revealed the truth to Sapna. With 10 minutes left for the interval, the story starts to build up.
However, by the time the interval is over, you are still clueless about where the story is going. A sad, depressed Vallavan goes into flashback mode. We suddenly see him dancing in a school uniform with 1,000 children, when we expect him to find out who messed up things for him instead.
The director deserves applause for his realistic projection of school activities. During one of the cultural activities, we are introduced to the surprise package -- Reema Sen. She plays a psychotic young girl and looks like someone who either hasn't slept in a while or has been on narcotics. She makes life hell for Vallavan by pestering him to do all kinds of nasty things to prove his love for her. Again, the movie goes into extremes -- he even handpicks Reema's vomit to prove his love. Yet, Sen's performance stands out.
By now, one actually forgets the first half as the two stories seem completely disjointed. With just 20 minutes to go, we are brought back to where we were in the pre-interval period. And yes, the climax is very clichéd.
The movie has some nice comic touches that give it good commercial value. Sandhya, who plays Simbu's friend, puts in a commendable performance. Nayantara is also convincing. Songs spring up from nowhere, but Yuvan Shankar Raja offers a couple of really good numbers to compensate for their bad timing. With the music being so popular pre-release, audience had high expectations from the visuals. Sadly, except for Loose Pene, the others disappoint.
One struggles to find any substance in the story and first half is a bit boring. Watch this movie for its time-pass value alone, coupled with Reema Sen's performance.
Finally, after frustrating us for three and a half hours, the director has the guts to end with the words, 'To be continued "
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