Friday, November 12, 2010

Review: Ramaa: The Saviour

After the busy Diwali holidays I was looking forward to watch Ramaa: The Saviour as I was very impressed by the publicity material especially the 3D posters of the movie, something that was never attempted in India before.  Another reason for me to look forward to Ramaa: The Saviour was because it is a movie made for children and it has been noticed more often that there are not many films made for children, unlike the West. In the West this genre has been explored many a times and apart from the kids it is also equally enjoyed and favoured by teens and adults.

Ramaa: The Saviour enters a zone where no Hindi film has visited in the past i.e. Video gaming. However every concept that looks good on papers might not always look good on screen. Few of the recent releases prove this point eg: Action Replay.

Ramaa: The Saviour tells the story of six kids - Rohan, Riddhi, Kunal, Komal, Sameer and Saanjh. The kids play a newly launched video game - The Last Battle - and while playing the game, they suddenly find themselves on an isolated island. The children, while exploring the island, run into trouble. Riddhi is attacked by a giant, Vali [Khali], but is rescued by Ramaa [Sahil Khan], who lives in this jungle all alone. Danger arrives in the form of a boat commanded by Kali with a small army of mercenaries and a scientist-assistant Samara [Tanushree Dutta]. The rest of the tale depicts the fight between the good and the evil.

The best thing about Ramaa: The Saviour is that the casting is perfect. Every character suits his / her role and the surprise element is Tanushree Dutta doing action sequences like a pro. Sahil Khan's role is similar to Tarzan or George of the Jungle and he looks apt for the role with his kind of physique and body language. All the six children are fantastic and so are the villians. However the screenplay needed a lot of polishing and explanations eg: I was not able to understand Vali's connection with Ramaa and the reason for them to fight with eachother. Moreover it is not explained properly if Vali is a demon or human or a ghost. Also Tanushree is shown as one of the members of the evil clan however she surprisingly joins hands with Ramaa without much justifications.
Debutant Director Haadi Abrar should be applauded for opting for an innovative plot, however the writing lets him down. The action scenes by Peter Hein superb especially the fight scene on the river which is purely fantastic. Sejal Shah's cinematography captures the forests with expertise.  Music is a huge let down by debutant music directors Siddharth-Suhas.

On the whole, Ramaa: The Saviour is not a promising effort although the concept was good and unique.