[SPOILERS AHEAD…]

Official trailer:

It is a great fun to see vintage Rajni walk the screen with his signature swag, and hear his magnetic and mesmerizing voice and dialogue delivery. After a long gap, we get a Rajni who is fully relaxed and he rocks us with his mischievous streak. Add to this peppy BGM that elevates the mood of the film, the first half just zips through. Director Karthik Subbaraj succeeds in creating the Rajni magic generously borrowing mass moments from Rajni’s earlier movies, from his first Apoorva Ragangal to latest Kabali. Rajni is an uncaged lion when he plays a bad guy, remember Avargal, and here we have Romba Ketta Paya Kaali masquerading as hero. He is hero, alright, but he is bad. How bad is he? He is a John Wick, shoot them up guy. He is willing to use tactics from mythology to eliminate his enemies. This mischievous bad streak of Rajni makes the movie entertaining hiding the flaws and half-baked story.

First half is just a Rajni fan paying tribute to Rajni, The Super Star. Did I already mention, first half is a great ride and entertaining? It will make the fans to go on a high. Second half does work, but drags a bit. Drag happens due to half-hearted story development. Director should have spent the time to build depth in to Singaram, and Jithu characters. We need scenes to show how ruthless VJS is rather than just mentioning it over dialogue and rushed Valentine’s Day and anti-Indian scenes. We get multiple half-hearted story threads in the first half, canteen contract, Bobby Simha love triangle, ragging, love angle between Simran and Rajni. None of them are taken forward in the second half. We get a flash back in second half, but that also seems rushed with sand mafia, Muslim-Hindu love marriage and revenge. We are just told about Malik and Petta strong friendship not shown how and why, say similar to Devraj and Surya bond from Dalapathy. With good character development of Nawazuddin Siddiqui, VJS, and Sasikumar, movie would have worked much better, giving the required emotional connect to root for Kaali. We connect with Kaali / Petta because of Rajni not because of the story. We still remember, Malaida, Annamalai, mass scene from Annamalai, mainly because of the emotional buildup that leads to it. While we have mass scenes in Petta, none of them gives the goosebumps and head rush similar to that Annamalai scene.

Karthik Subbaraj does leave his signature touch in few scenes. Staging of Plot and execution of a murder during a funeral is crafted beautifully. Final twist has its plot holes, but it worked to showcase Kaali’s character. Liked the way he uses memorable old songs that gets the audience in to the story and paying homage to Clint Eastwood and $$ westerns with theme music and dialogues from Good, Bad, and Ugly, and Unforgiven. Thanks to him for giving a good entertainer with Rajni. After a gap of 20 years? I hope next time he will make it much more memorable by adding depth to the story.

Aside: In both Kaala, and Petta, villains are from Hindutva ideology background. Is Rajni trying to convey to TN people that he will not align with Hindutva parties contrary to the perception, in case he enters politics? Hmm…