Review of Unnai Ninaithu

Introduction

The story centres around Surya who works in a lodge as a receptionist come bellboy and anything else the place needs. The new managers` daughter, Radha (Sneha), falls for him once she gets to know a bit about him and the topic of love pops up where he tells her about his last love affair.

He helped his impoverished neighbour by buying food and helping to pay the bills. Over time the neighbours` daughter, Nirmala (Laila), and Surya fall for each other and you can tell that they`re on the virge of getting hitched. In walks in Selva (Ramji) who sweeps Nirmala`s family off their feet while Surya is out of town. The family then feel more gratitude to Selva for helping them out with nice new kitchen appliances and all the usual luxuries that they promise Nirmala`s hand to him. Talk about an ungrateful family.

Surya comes back and is aghast at what`s happening with his neighbours. He finds out that Sevla is now the favoured `son-in-law`. But Surya doesn`t trust Sevla and finds out that he`s a bit of a two-timing dodgy geezer, only concerned about himself. Nirmala, who`s still in the dark, doesn`t want to hear what Surya has to say about Sevla. He`s paying for her medical education and they should be grateful for this, so what right does Surya have to interfere? They banish Surya. The truth eventually comes out and the marriage is off. Not only that, but Nirmala`s out of college with no income. The family are now back at square one.

Surya comes across them quite by chance, and upon hearing what`s happened, wants to help out where he can. Again. Nirmala finally achieves her goal of being a doctor. In the meantime, he`s spending more time with her and this is putting the other girl, Radha`s nose slightly out of joint. Nirmula is forced to tell him, by her parents, how she feels, in the hope that there might be a future for them together. But what about Radha, the other woman that`s fallen for him? He has to make a choice.

Video

A cropped 2.25:1 anamorphic transfer is the order of the day here. I can`t answer the question as to why there are a lot of cropped transfers on Indian DVDs, but it`s what we get. The cropping doesn`t really affect any of the onscreen composition though and it`s only noticeable during the credits.

The quality of the print used isn`t so good and there are signs of wear, tear and print damage but you can still watch the film. What is distracting however is the Ayngaran studio logo. This seems to appear every few minutes in one of the corners of the screen and bores me to the point where I don`t want to really watch the film with this intrusion. This is the second DVD I`ve seen with this same logo popping up, and all I can say is that this won`t deter anyone from copying it if they want to.

Colours seem to be well balanced and detail isn`t too bad. Some scenes are better than others, while the editing could be improved.

Audio

The film was made with a mono soundtrack and is presented here as DD5.1, there are no improvements to the sound, it hasn`t been remixed and is the mono track is merely present in all channels (except for LFE). It`s clear enough and it`s a shame it`s not mixed into 5.1 where the music is concerned. Very little hiss too makes this very listenable.

Features

There are English subtitles, a song index and animated menus. The subtitles are poor. Not only is the timing of the subtitle so wrong that I have to constantly juggle what happens onscreen with words before they disappear, but I have to re-interpret the poor grammar to try and make sense of the dialogue. As an English only speaker, I`m not impressed and feel that more could be done.

Conclusion

Sadly, I think this is a dull film. It`s too long at 162 minutes and is a chore to watch until the film really gets started. Thirty minutes into the story I still had no idea what was happening or what any of the plot was and I was about to give up all hope. I thought that I must have missed something vital when I fell asleep, but I hadn`t. Some might argue that this is merely character development, but I`d argue that this is a tedious way to introduce characters that go nowhere. Storytelling is not Unnai Ninaithu`s strong point.

You`d be forgiven for thinking that I like nothing in this film. I liked one song, "Ennai Thalattum", and liked the concept of betrayal, ingratitude and love. I think it`s just poorly executed. At the end Surya delivers some very poor dialogue about love, honour and trust. It`s cringe worthy at best.

What`s the deal with the substory involving the astrologer and the musician? It doesn`t make any sense, even as comic relief, it`s just not funny or interesting. Cut it out and the film would be more bearable. Cut out a few of the other songs which seem redundant and the film would improve a bit more by shortening the running time. The pacing as it is could be improved in a few ways too.

The acting isn`t bad and I could happily fall for Radha (Sneha). However, good acting can`t hide a tedious plot. Anything else wrong? Sort out the continuity problems. It`s just not clear enough, perhaps because of the poor subtitling, when the backstory is being told. Or the fact that the medical tuition should take a long time and not be glossed over so liberally. I can`t believe that the main character of Surya is trapped in a love triangle for five years. I know this is an Indian film, but please credit us with some common sense! Maybe I`m a westerner expecting too much? Nope, all I want is a story that makes some sense with interesting characters. I don`t mind singing and dancing as long as it adds something to the proceedings and isn`t there for the sake of upping the song and dance count in a film.

I can`t in all conscience recommmend Unnai Ninaithu to you unless you`re a die hard Indian film fan that must see everything that`s out there. There are loads more interesting films to watch and perhaps you won`t feel so cheated out of 162 minutes of something else.