Super Star Rajnikanths new movie(the costliest movie made in India) Endhiran/Robot is getting very good reviews.

Hope it will be the first Indian movie to rake in INR 1000 Crores and it has already raked in INR 205 Crores prior to release.

http://movies.indiatimes.com/Robot-Movie-Review/moviereview/6652167.cms

Robot: Movie Review
1 October 2010, 12:00pm ISTlGaurav Malani/INDIATIMES MOVIES

Director: Shankar
Cast: Rajinikant, Aishwarya Rai, Danny Dangzongpa
Rating:


For anyone and everyone who has ever complained that Rajnikant's onscreen antics are overblown of heroism, director Shankar this time justifies his larger-than-life screen persona by making him a robot and imbibing him with fanciful superpowers.

Unlike every Rajnikant film where he has a very flamboyant and gimmick-oriented entry, the superstar makes a very casual and unassuming entry in this one. But before you start assuming that Rajni has gone reticent in Robot , director Shankar introduces Rajnikant's prototype in the form of a mechanical andro-humanoid who is the real hero of the film. Post that Shankar starts his blitzkrieg technique of nonstop bombardments of eventful episodes through its runtime and there's no looking back.

Dr Vasi (Rajnikant) is a scientist who has created an andro-humanoid robot named Chitti (Rajnikant again) who is programmed to fight, dance, drive, speak and do everything that humans can. Vasi has designed Chitti with the intention of offering it to the Indian Army as a machine which can fight wars in place of humans and avoid casualties. However his invention is rejected by senior scientist (Danny Dangzongpa) for the machine's inability to understand human emotions.

So Vasi upgrades Chitti's processor and simulates human emotions in it without realizing the implications. With its new acquired human ability, Chitti discovers the feeling of love and falls for Vasi's girlfriend, Sana (Aishwarya Rai). As sentiments of jealousy and revenge corrupt his assessment, he becomes uncontrollably wild and violent, wrecking havoc on the city.

For a pleasant change, director Shankar doesn't delve into his favourite theme of bureaucratic corruption like he has been doing over the years in Sivaji, Anniyan, Nayak, Mudhalvan and Indian . However by means of the mechanical robot, he almost creates a superhuman alter-ego in compelling contrast to the vulnerable scientist, like he did with the split-personality protagonist in Anniyan . And then he makes his superhero so strong that you start idolizing him over his creator, even if it turns endlessly evil. Interestingly through the first half the Robot remains the best buddy of the scientist and very soon in the second half the two are pitted against each other.

Whether it's the storytelling, stunts, special effects or song picturizations, Shankar exactly knows how to keep the audience engaged. The story gets to the point from scene one without straying into unnecessary subplots. The romance between Rajni and Ash is already established and not much screen-time is expended on their love story other than the customary song-n-dance ritual which the director can't do away with. The screenplay has a lot to offer with the major highlights in the first half being an extended fight sequence on a local train and another derived from Spiderman where the Robot rescues humans trapped in fire. And perhaps this would be the only film other than 3 Idiots where a delivery operation on a woman in labour pain earns as much applause from the audience, if not more.

The second half is no short of excitement with a hilarious sequence where the Robot has a negotiation with (believe-it-or-not) mosquitoes and another extended freeway action sequence. The climactic combat where a hundred Rajnikant clones attack, assuming different colossal contours (like in the Hollywood flick Transformers ) is visually mind-blowing. The visual effects take a cue from Hollywood films like Terminator, Spiderman, The Mask, Godzilla and many more but amplify it to gigantic proportions and full-blown sequences.

Shankar used the expertise of Hollywood technicians like Vance Hartwell ( Lord of the Rings ) and Allan B. Holt ( Terminator Salvation, Iron Man 2 ) for makeup, Mary E. Vogt ( Men in Black series) for costume designs, Woo-Ping Yuen ( Kill Bill, Matrix ) as stunt coordinator and Stan Wilson Company ( Avatar, Terminator, Jurassic Park ) for animatronics technology and ensures that the visuals don't look corny or tacky at any instance. And despite the action and effects, the movie never gets too intense and keeps amusing you through its amazing and unusual sense of humour. R. Rathnavelu's cinematography is magnificent, Anthony's editing is flawless and Sabu Cyril's art direction is impressive. The scale at which Shankar mounts his film and the outcome that he achieves is simply unmatchable.

On the downside, the song picturizations, like in any Shankar film, are spectacular but act as major distractions from the plot and even A.R.Rahman's music can't pull you back. Rahman's score is absolutely uninspiring this time and there is no single chartbuster in the entire soundtrack. While the dubbing isn't bad, Swanand Kirkire is so chaste with the Hindi translation of dialogues that at times the dialect sounds heavier than in a normal Hindi film. The pace of the narrative drops intermittently at the start of the second half with the Robot's romance track but soon picks up. And Aishwarya's seduction song in the climax is the most clichéd pretense for the hero to intrude the villain's den.

But all these inconsistencies are overshadowed by Rajni's aura. Not only is Rajnikant a superstar in every sense, he comes up with a superlative act. He immaculately adapts the body-language in the grab of Robot. His action, dance, style, grace and histrionics need no substantiation. You love to watch him as the good-intentioned robot and adore him as much in his villainous act. His vicious laugh reverberates his evil intentions. Aishwarya Rai is supposed to look gorgeous, which she ably does throughout the film. Danny Dangzongpa is able to hold his own in front of Rajnikant which is commendable.

Beyond all the visual extravagance, Shankar succeeds in ending the film with a simple message on how human emotions can manipulate a machine. Thankfully he conveys it effectively without getting preachy, lending a lot of heart to his heady science-fiction.

Robot is the flawless combination of biggest superstar and best special effects ever on the Indian screen. Watch it and watch again.

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Sunny Leone a true Canadian DESI now back in India !.

http://movies.rediff.com/report/2010/oct/01/review-robot.htm

What Rajni can't, Rajni and the Robot can!
Last updated on: October 01, 2010 19:05 IST
Tags: Rajni, Chitti, Danny Denzongpa, Shankar, Moondru Mugam


The Bad news first: There is no Rajnikanth [ Images ] 'entry' in Robot.

The movie cuts to chase directly, opening with Rajni working in a laboratory on a robot and gets on with business.

The Good news: The film more than makes up for it with the mother of all Indian movie climaxes, where Rajni is King Kong, he is the Incredible Hulk, he is Iron Man, he is a Transformer, and he is the Anaconda. He is everything you have seen in special effects laden Hollywood flicks. Heck, in one scene, pinned to giant magnet with his arms stretched, he even does a menacing Hannibal Lecter lunge.

Neatly bookended between these two scenes is Rajnikanth's biggest ever movie.

When regular hits became the norm, Rajni recalibrated his own benchmark for stardom with Baasha in 1996. In the 14 years since, directors have tried everything to make Rajni bigger than he already was. There was Baasha itself, where he had his greatest backstory unraveled after much intrigue. There was Padaiyappa, which pitted him against the most memorable lady villain in Tamil cinema. And then there was Sivaji, where he comes back from the dead. There was nothing more to be done, or so we thought.

Then comes a movie like Robot, where Rajni is the hero, villain, comedian and a multitude of henchmen. He even appears in drag in a song. Muthalvan/Nayak was said to be the greatest Rajnikanth movie in which he did not act in. Shankar rectifies that in Robot, which is the greatest yet for star and director. This is the first time in many years that a director has brought something to the table that enhances a Rajni movie. Along with it, he also proves that if you want to make a Rs 150 crore film, he is the go-to man.

The movie is not so much science fiction as much as it is about finding the right excuse to enable Rajni do what he usually does, and make it look plausible.

Dr Vaseegaran (Rajni) creates a humanoid robot, Chitti, (also Rajni) after 10 years of labour, during which he has hardly has any time for his parents or girlfriend Sana (Aishwarya Rai Bachchan [ Images ]). Attempting to plant emotions into the robot backfires as the robot takes a liking for Sana, at which point the good doctor decides to destroy it. In steps the evil scientist Dr Bhora (Danny Denzongpa [ Images ]) who not only resurrects Chitti but also turns him into a killing machine.

The film's first set piece takes some time coming, but is well worth the wait. From then on it is relentless action, culminating in a climax that will be hard to better for some time to come.

It is so much of a Rajni show that even regular characters that usually get some screen space like parents (we see them in two scenes), friends (Karunas and Santanam are completely overshadowed by Rajni even in the comedy scenes), heroine (every director in the past decade has tried in vain to pair Rajni and Ash, but she still does not have much to do) and villain (a powerful actor like Danny hardly registers his presence) are marginalised.

But in what little screen time they get together, what these two stars share is an easy camaraderie more than any great chemistry. It works in this case.

In retrospect, it is hard to imagine who else could have done this movie, and -- forget doing it so well -- merely even pulled it off. There are things in this movie that Rajni the villain does to Rajni the hero, which had any other actor done, would have seen theatres going up in flames.

In the end, this movie is as much about special effects as it is about Rajni. Overall, they may not be Avatar good, but they will definitely hold their own when compared with regular Hollywood action movies. And remember, while a Matrix cost $200 million, this was made for $30 million. But the effects are by a distance the best we have seen in Indian cinema.

On the flip side, there are enough bloopers for the movie to deserve its own section in our series. It is a tad too long, and the music is not exactly A R Rahman's [ Images ] best work. But these things seem to have been deliberately overlooked. The intent is clear from the beginning: To make a Rajni showcase like no other. By pitting him versus himself, Shankar has found just the right way to make Rajni just that much more larger than life.

While it is a given that we all like good vs evil, there is a visceral pleasure when both look the same -- like Rajni. There are places you root for the deviant robot to triumph over its creator. As he lusts after Sana and bays for his creator's blood, Rajni channelises some of his best badass acts from the past, chiefly Alex Pandian in Moondru Mugam.

So, if there is just one Rajni movie you will ever watch, this is it, this is it, this is it.

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Sunny Leone a true Canadian DESI now back in India !.

http://www.thehindu.com/arts/cinema/article807284.ece?homepage=true

Unabashed entertainer
Karthik Subramanian

MAGICAL ENTERTAINER: ENTHIRAN
Watching a Rajinikanth movie is not a cinematic experience that falls strictly within the dictates of a good story, a racy screenplay, great music or whatever else that conventionally makes movies click. The iconic Superstar contributes a certain magic that is hard to explain.

It’s more like a mother’s touch to home cooking that simply makes you want more.

With “Enthiran,” this magic is unabashed and unrelenting from the first frame to the last. Director Shankar not only deviates a great deal from the tried and tested ‘Superstar’ formula by putting the story firmly in the centre, but also presents Rajinikanth in an avatar not seen in a long while.

It’s no secret that he developed his highly-stylised mannerisms to play the antagonist. He excelled in negative roles early on in his career - in classics like ‘Avargal,’ ‘Netrikann,’ and ’16 Vayathiniley,’ but his transition into a mass hero meant toning down all those shenanigans on screen. The audience did get a glimpse of it in ‘Chandramukhi’s ’Vettaiyan Raja’.

But now, in the second half of “Enthiran,” Shankar unleashes a villain of such megalomaniac proportions that only Rajinikanth could pull off. It ends up being a master-class in theatrical over-expressive villainy that is almost a throwback to the days of M.N.Nambiar and Asokan.

Shankar has managed to successfully walk the tightrope of making the story accessible to the masses and yet not dumbing it down. The narrative of Dr.Vaseegaran, a dedicated robotics scientist, and his humanoid robot Chitti (short for Chittibabu), both vying for the attention of the medical college student Sana, is brought out with some soul. In between all the song and dance sequences over the love triangle, Shankar manages to capture the inner turmoil of a robot coming to terms with the rather complicated human emotions of love, hate and betrayal.

There is a parallel storyline of Dr.Vaseegaran’s running feud with his mentor Professor Dr.Bohra (played by Danny Denzongpa), who is clandestinely interested in getting the technical know-how of Chitti to sell his commando bots to an illegal foreign arms dealer. He keeps sabotaging Vaseegaran’s plans of getting Chitti approved for mass production for use by the Indian Army.

The movie does take time to warm up a bit in the first half in introducing the concepts to the audience. But the struggle between a ‘re-programmed’ Chitti and Vaseegaran gets the pulse racing right through the second half, all culminating in a rambunctious climax that is beyond all expectations. There is also a poignant epilogue.

Nearly every technician involved in the movie has brought in his A-game and seems to have set new benchmarks for Indian cinema in general - cinematographer Rathnavelu, editor Anthony, set designer Sabu Cyril, stunt choreographer Peter Hein, music director A.R.Rahman, lyricist Vairamuthu and sound engineer Resul Pookutty. The association of the world-renowned Stan Winston studio for special effects has had a profound impact on the visuals. The effects are on a par with the best in the industry.

Actors tend to get lost in special effects movies. But not so in Enthiran. Rajinikanth and Aishwarya Rai Bachchan carry the movie on their shoulders, and considering the fact that much of the acting must have been in front of green screens, one has to say that nothing looks artificial right through. Actors Karunas and Santhanam try to evoke a few guffaws in a comedy track that sadly fails. But that is hardly an issue here.

The song sequences are the centrepiece of the movie. “Irumbile oru Idhayam poothatho” and the climax song “Arima Arima” stand out for their execution.

Billed as India’s costliest film ever, Enthiran is also Sun Pictures’ first home production. It hits the bulls-eye as an entertainer.

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Sunny Leone a true Canadian DESI now back in India !.

Another good review by Taran Adarsh -

http://www.bollywoodhungama.com/movies/review/13989/index.html


I am very surprised with good reviews for this movie
Exactly same thing happened with "Dabaang"

Hope this gives lessons to Chopra, Johar's etc...
Who always make MNIK kind of movies..

Its Endhiran mania in the south. Tickets sold out for a week. Robot is also doign well in Mumbai etc. The victim here is Anjaana Anjaani. They could have released on Sept 24 itself rather than pushign to Oct 1 clashing with Robot/Endhiran.

It is a fantastic movie ever made in Indian cinema.

Had watched this movie and 90 minutes passed with great joy. Comparable to a hollywood movie.

Full marks to director shankar, rajnikanth and technicians.