If it had been called "Raagini" instead.....!. Review on Raavan

Why is this movie called "Raavan" was the first thing that popped into my mind, an hour into the movie? Now had it been called "Raagini", with a bit more strength and backbone added to Aishwarya's character (other than the screaming and glaring that she does!), it could have been a good movie! This is the way I see the story of "Raavan"......

Plot (such as it is!):

Raagini (Aishwarya Rai)is a contented woman, married to a successful police officer Dev (Vikram). She has such faith in her husband that when they move to a small town that is run by a seemingly lawless goon called Beera (Abhishek Bachchan), she flippantly tells her husband to catch the goon and end his tyranny. Next thing we know, that very goon, Beera,is kidnapping her and holding her captive in a beautiful forest...with lush foliage and crystal waterfalls as a backdrop for her already perfect beauty!

While Raagini is treated quite well by the goon and his nurturing brother (Ravi Kissan), she is still annoyed at being held captive by the manic Beera with his strange incomprehensive speech and his unrhythmic dance movements (she is a trained dancer you see!). Raagini shouts at the mad Beera without fear (probably knowing thats her best bet to seduce him!), widens her emerald eyes at him, and when all else fails, she jumps in the waterfall...obviously rescued by her captor, coz nothing can quite harm her!

By and by, Raagini finds out that all is not as it seems..that in fact her captor has a good reason for wanting to hurt her husband.....she is not sure whether Dev is a bad man himself, but he is surely surrounded by some pretty bad men at the police station! At any rate, Dev comes looking for Raagini with a band of men, including simian like Sanjeevani (Govinda)....but for some reason,is unable to locate Beera and his huge tribe of people in the forest! Raagini figures out that she has no hope of being rescued by her husband, and finallycharms Beera into taking her to the incompetent husband Dev!

Then, to her outrage,Raagini discovers that all her efforts were in vain, and that her husband was never interested in finding her in the first place and.......wont go into the climax at this point!

My Take:

If it had been any other director other than Mani Rathnam, I would have atleast appreciated the director for giving us this version of the Ramayana. Ravana has always been an interesting character in the Ramayana, and Rama has always raised hackles in us feminists because of the whole agni pareeksha incident. So it was about time that someone gave us a movie where Rama is not such a hero, Ravana not such a bad man..and a strong Sita who looks at both men dispassionately and sees the shades of grey in BOTH men!

While the IDEA behind Raavan is great, the execution falls far short of the wonderful premise. With the exception of Raagini's character (to a certain extent),NONE of the other central characters (Beera or Dev)make any sense! Why is Beera so manic? If he is so out of control, how does he manage to successfully rule that region? For all his fearsome posturing, why does he leave all his enemies alive and well??? And then there is the ineffective Dev..how the heck did he get to be so respected in his job, if he cant even find his own wife with an army of men, especially when one of his men actually finds her, and still isnt able to lead Dev to her!!!

As both Raam and Raavan are shown to be either ineffectual or crazy, it all falls on Sita/Raagini to hold the story up..and she does to an extent. Aishwarya is given the only sensible character in the movie, and she does justice to her role. She comes across as dignified and comfortable in her skin, human enough to feel attracted to her captor (Stockholm syndrome), sensible enough to know it may not last, outraged when her husband questions her character, and finally despairing of what she has unknowingly caused...it all fits in adequately with Aishwarya's limited range of emotions.

But poor, poor Vikram (Dev)..what a fabulous actor, and what a terribly underwritten role! As for Abhishek, he is made to continue where he left of from Lallan in "Yuva"..... upping the beastly demeanor by quite a few notches!

Lovely visuals..but that need not even be stated in a Mani Rathnam movie. He has been giving us beautiful looking movies for the past two and some decades. The music adds nothing to the movie. The songs arent bad, but they arent exactly great either..no Chaiyya Chaiyya's or Tu Hi re's from Rahman this time...hear Raavan songs through one ear, letthem out the other!

Oh Mani Sir, stop giving us one disappointing movie after another......we dont want just a beautiful looking movie, we want to FEEL something, experience the beauty of the characters you have given us over the years.."Surya" from Thalapathi, "Roja" from Roja, "Velu Nayakan", "Anjali" ..the list is endless. Post "Bombay", you have stopped making movies that move your audiences the way they used to..and now your movies have become all about spell- binding visuals, a controversial (yet under-developped)central theme,and big actors who will do everything you say (to little effect because of your compromised vision). Wake up Mani Sir!!!