But first: Spoiler Alert! and all that. Meh.
1. Aishwarya Rai (blecch)
She's fantastic, made of plastic.She plays Sana, who is Vaseegaran (human Rajini) and Chitti (robot Rajini)'s love interest.
Shallow female characters are hardly unusual in Tamil cinema, but Sana is so shallow she couldn't drown an ant. The one and only character trait they give her in the movie (apart from her plastic bimbotude) is that she's a medical student who cheats on her exams given the slightest opportunity (which she gets in the form of Chitti/Robot Rajini). It's a small mercy that we don't see her trying to treat anyone later on.
She's friggin annoying. Even thinking of ways to describe how annoying she is in the movie is making me annoyed.
All I know is that during the second half I was praying for Chitti to get enraged with her refusal to reciprocate his love and just explodify her head. Seriously. That would have made this the best movie of all time.
2. Rajinikanth
Don't get me wrong, Rajini is usually ozum. It's just that Enthiran was more of a film with Rajini in it than an actual Rajini film.
The director, Shankar, initially proposed the film Robo in 2001 as a project starring Kamal Haasan and Preity Zinta. Since then the project shifted from one production house to another, most notably to Shah Rukh Khan, who was, before he dropped it, to be the star of the film. Rajinikanth entered the film much later. In short, it wasn't a movie written with him in mind - and if they changed the script once he entered the film, they didn't change it enough.
The director, Shankar, initially proposed the film Robo in 2001 as a project starring Kamal Haasan and Preity Zinta. Since then the project shifted from one production house to another, most notably to Shah Rukh Khan, who was, before he dropped it, to be the star of the film. Rajinikanth entered the film much later. In short, it wasn't a movie written with him in mind - and if they changed the script once he entered the film, they didn't change it enough.
How does this matter? You go to watch a Rajini film for the Superstar Rajinikanth, not so much the character he's playing. In other words, you expect to see the larger-than-life, superhuman-yet-still-totally-relatable-human do-gooder and villain-basher hero. Enthiran confuses the hell out of anyone with such expectations.
Rajini plays two roles, Vaseegaran, the scientist, and Chitti, the robot. For a substantial part of the film, Chitti is the villain, and the creator, Vaseegaran, has the task of shutting him down. This leaves one confused about which Rajini to root for.
That's some next level sideburns
On the one hand you have Chitti, the awesomely super-powerful android robot who goes rogue after his creator decides to give him feelings. But then, Chitti is clearly not the Rajini - he's a robot, with about as much charisma and style as you'd expect from a robot. As if having Rajini act robotic isn't alienating enough, you are shown Chitti multiple times in the movie without his flesh mask, allowing you to see a steel face that looks nothing like Rajini. Besides, Chitti is decidedly evil in the second half of the movie, leaving a wanton trail of death and destruction wherever he goes (but even more despicably, falling in love with Sana).
That's some next level beard
On the other hand you have Vaseegaran, the human scientist and creator of Chitti. Could this be the Rajini? Afraid not. Yes, he's the good guy throughout, he's got the girl, and quite a wicked beard too. But he's a wuss. The biggest flaw of Enthiran (apart from Aishwarya Rai) is that human Rajini doesn't get to beat up any bad guys. The most he does in this department is fling some sand into a fisherman's face and rescue Sana from a situation she damn well deserved to be in (Ask a random stranger to be your boyfriend for a day and try not to expect trouble.).
If at least the character of this scientist were played by someone else, we could have unashamedly cheered on the robot Rajini as he cloned himself and tore down the city. But no, we have two Rajinis to choose between. Something about the robot Rajini is not real, and the 'real' Rajini gives us very little to cheer him on for. When Vaseegaran infiltrates Chitti's lair by dressing up and acting robotic, he loses what little Rajinific charisma and style he had, which, sadly, wasn't much to begin with.
Also he loses the beard.
Who is the Rajini in the film, then? There isn't one. Which is why Enthiran isn't a Rajini film, it's just one with Rajini in it.
3. The Script
For all that budget and hype they could have put a little more effort into the story. Even leaving aside the camp and the many logical inconsistencies, which are only to be expected, the script is bad. It's not very original, 'pays tribute' to a number of Hollywood robot-themed films (Terminator and I, Robot come to mind, and I'm sure there are others I can't remember right now).
The movie doesn't deliver much in the way of (intentional) laughs. I didn't even realise that Sanatham and Karunas, who play Vaseegaran's assistants, were supposed to be the comic relief until I read the Enthiran wiki later.
The villain for the first half of the movie, played by Danny Denzongpa, is hardly threatening. He's incompetent (his robot picks up a bun when told to pick up a gun), and not really very malicious at all - he's just a little jealous that Chitti's better than his own robot. Plus, his only real act of evil is giving Chitti some destructive capabilities, which allow him to promptly be killed off by Chitti, who then takes over as the villain.
And then there's the most insane, as my friend sitting next to me in the theatre put it, "messed up", scene in the movie, where Chitti saves a number of people from a burning building. The last person he saves is a girl who happens to be naked and in the bath when he rescues her. This act of being rescued in the nude so traumatizes the girl that she runs in front of a truck, effectively killing herself. This brings much ire upon Chitti, for not having the sense to save the modesty of the girl while saving her life. Did he have any clothes on to cover her up? No. Did she have any lying around that hadn't been burned in the fire? Not that we know of.
There seem to have been no options available to Chitti but to rescue this girl as she was, and yet this "unfeeling" act of his is what prompts Vaseegaran to programme emotions into him. This creates the situation for the main conflict of the film to unfold.
It's ridiculous, but sadly not the kind of ridiculous you can laugh at. It's just messed up.
As a result of these things, I was disappointed by Enthiran. In other words, it was disappointing. It was gen bad.
Rajini plays two roles, Vaseegaran, the scientist, and Chitti, the robot. For a substantial part of the film, Chitti is the villain, and the creator, Vaseegaran, has the task of shutting him down. This leaves one confused about which Rajini to root for.
That's some next level sideburns
That's some next level beardIf at least the character of this scientist were played by someone else, we could have unashamedly cheered on the robot Rajini as he cloned himself and tore down the city. But no, we have two Rajinis to choose between. Something about the robot Rajini is not real, and the 'real' Rajini gives us very little to cheer him on for. When Vaseegaran infiltrates Chitti's lair by dressing up and acting robotic, he loses what little Rajinific charisma and style he had, which, sadly, wasn't much to begin with.
Also he loses the beard.
Who is the Rajini in the film, then? There isn't one. Which is why Enthiran isn't a Rajini film, it's just one with Rajini in it.
3. The Script
For all that budget and hype they could have put a little more effort into the story. Even leaving aside the camp and the many logical inconsistencies, which are only to be expected, the script is bad. It's not very original, 'pays tribute' to a number of Hollywood robot-themed films (Terminator and I, Robot come to mind, and I'm sure there are others I can't remember right now).
The movie doesn't deliver much in the way of (intentional) laughs. I didn't even realise that Sanatham and Karunas, who play Vaseegaran's assistants, were supposed to be the comic relief until I read the Enthiran wiki later.
The villain for the first half of the movie, played by Danny Denzongpa, is hardly threatening. He's incompetent (his robot picks up a bun when told to pick up a gun), and not really very malicious at all - he's just a little jealous that Chitti's better than his own robot. Plus, his only real act of evil is giving Chitti some destructive capabilities, which allow him to promptly be killed off by Chitti, who then takes over as the villain.
And then there's the most insane, as my friend sitting next to me in the theatre put it, "messed up", scene in the movie, where Chitti saves a number of people from a burning building. The last person he saves is a girl who happens to be naked and in the bath when he rescues her. This act of being rescued in the nude so traumatizes the girl that she runs in front of a truck, effectively killing herself. This brings much ire upon Chitti, for not having the sense to save the modesty of the girl while saving her life. Did he have any clothes on to cover her up? No. Did she have any lying around that hadn't been burned in the fire? Not that we know of.
There seem to have been no options available to Chitti but to rescue this girl as she was, and yet this "unfeeling" act of his is what prompts Vaseegaran to programme emotions into him. This creates the situation for the main conflict of the film to unfold.
It's ridiculous, but sadly not the kind of ridiculous you can laugh at. It's just messed up.
As a result of these things, I was disappointed by Enthiran. In other words, it was disappointing. It was gen bad.
