Kirubhakar Purushothaman
Indian Express·India Today·News18·TheFederal
Most Divergent Takes
- Pichaikkaran 2 (2023)2.0 vs TRM 4.8-2.8
- Kaala (2018)8.0 vs TRM 5.8+2.2
- Rathnam (2024)3.0 vs TRM 5.1-2.1
- Ponman (2025)8.0 vs TRM 6.4+1.6
- Captain Miller (2024)7.7 vs TRM 6.2+1.5
I'm Game
2026 · TheFederal
The plot of I'm Game, in which a transplanted hand with a mind of its own uses the protagonist to seek revenge, is reminiscent of the Tamil film Maaveeran and Japanese anime Parasyte, but lacks both...
Michael
2026 · Indian Express
Ranjit Jeyakodi's Michael has brilliant frames and music, which fail to save the wafer-thin story.
Idhayam Murali
2026 · TheFederal
The Atharvaa, Kayadu Lohar, Preity Mukhundhan-starrer is frivolous and proud of it; a Gautham Menon-flavoured romance that trades depth for charm and heart
Game Changer
2025 · News18
Shankar keeps betting on his usual socio-political conscience to work wonders like it did with Mudhalvan and Anniyan. However, Ram Charan's Game Changer doesn't live up to its name. That said, Game Changer, at the end of the day, is a dated film that would have probably been fresh a decade back.
Kannappa
2025 · News18
While the core story of Kannappa occupies only about one-third of the film's runtime, the war and the romance take up the rest, and the film loses out on novelty by echoing Baahubali. Though the production design and technical brilliance work in its favour, Kannappa could have relied more on visuals and trimmed down the long monologues that feel like straight lifts from past iterations of the story.
Identity
2025 · News18
Identity is neither a film about an eccentric personality solving cases, nor purely about identifying a serial rapist, nor about a person with face blindness solving a murder—it keeps turning into a different film every 20 minutes, giving it an identity crisis. While the engaging screenplay and strong performances keep one invested, the film suffers from contrivance and the underexploration of its many compelling ideas.
Maharaja
2024 · Indian Express
The overarching problem with Maharaja is its 'wannabe' nature to come across as a gritty, dark, and emotional rollercoaster. It is more concerned about how it wants to come across than what it really is. Maharaja has been engineered with contrived twists and turns that make it more of a visual puzzle than an engaging film.
Captain Miller
2024 · Indian Express
Dhanush's Captain Miller is a brilliant political drama in the guise of an actioner. There's not even a single moment in the entire 160 minutes of runtime where Arun Matheshwaran's script meanders.
Rathnam
2024 · Indian Express
Director Hari's recent release Rathnam invokes a feeling of watching the rehash of his old blockbusters. As far as filmmaking goes, Hari has tried to be fresh and inventive, but the soul of the film is dated. One can argue that Hari is old school, but there's a difference between being a prized antique and obsolete.
Star
2024 · Indian Express
Star only twinkles and fails to shine bright–it's more about the parts and less about the whole. The film wallows in the suffering of its lead character, who misses success by a whisker, with a protagonist who often comes across as selfish and at times unworthy of empathy.
Jigarthanda DoubleX
2023 · Indian Express
Karthik Subbaraj's film tries to be a lot of things at once. It's Jack of all and King of one -- deliciously entertaining meta cinema.
Pathu Thala
2023 · Indian Express
Silambarasan is the only redeeming feature of the film, directed by Obeli N Krishna.
Por Thozhil
2023 · Indian Express
Despite following all the tropes of a buddy cop movie, debutant Vignesh Raja has come up with an enjoyable genre film that manages to hold your attention throughout.
Pichaikkaran 2
2023 · Indian Express
Vijay Antony fails to pull off a silly and dated Shankar film. For some time now even Ajith and Vijay have been steering clear of these one-man-saves-all films, and there was a respite from the nonsense. The break is over with Pichaikkaran 2.
Kara
2026 · TheFederal · Apr 2026
A heist film with lot of heart, 'Kara' has more thought than thrill and that's probably why it's worth watching; yet it's not a film that will stay with you.
With Love
2026 · TheFederal · Feb 2026
The film attempts to swap macho heroism for a vulnerable 'green flag' hero, but lack of depth and low stakes storytelling make it a forgettable experience.
3BHK
2025 · News18 · Jul 2025
3BHK lacks that. We needed to get a bit of Vasudevan's good moments to feel for the bad ones, which is basically the whole movie. Instead, what we get is a series of failures. It is not suffering that makes life bearable, but happiness, even if it is infinitesimal and sporadic.
Kuberaa
2025 · News18 · Jun 2025
Kuberaa is a predictable but engaging tale that, despite its familiar scenarios and lack of nuance, succeeds through solid craftsmanship and performances. While it carefully steers away from generic commercial entertainment, the film's shallow treatment of poverty and underwhelming climax undermine its desire to be unique.
Vidaamuyarchi
2025 · News18 · Feb 2025
Ajith Kumar Takes A Lot Of Punches For The Film To Win
Ponman
2025 · News18 · Jan 2025
Ponman, written by GR Indugopan and Justin Mathew, is yet another story about everyday people in the port city of Kollam. The story, the conflict, and the stake of Ponman are small. But the film leaves one pondering about big things of human resilience, grit, and ethics–typical of good Malayalam cinema.
Kaala
2018 · India Today · Jun 2018
Pa Ranjith keeps talking of ideologies. Kaala seems to be the personification of his ideas. The dialogue "Ellarum Kaala thaan (Everyone is Kaala)," which comes at the tail end of the film, sums up the entire film. And it takes some serious guts to make an ambiguous and abstract climax like this one in a Rajinikanth film.
24
2016 · India Today · May 2016
Making a film about time travel (or anything on sci-fi, for that matter) is like attempting a question in an interview which you don't know the answer to. The more you blabber, the more you get yourself into trouble. It is better to keep it low, and that's exactly what Vikram Kumar has done with 24
Oopiri
2016 · India Today · Apr 2016
With the right cast and the perfect team, Vamsi has pulled off a decent drama, which retains the soul of the original.
Kanithan
2016 · India Today · Feb 2016
TN Santhosh's Kanithan resembles his mentor AR Murugadoss's Thuppakki in a lot of ways. The heroes and the villains of both the movies keep playing mind-games. They don't confront each other till the climax. The pub songs - etc., etc. - look similar. But Atharvaa's film is not as grippy as Thuppaki due to the badly-written screenplay.
Miruthan
2016 · India Today · Feb 2016
A potential script and actors are wasted because of an indifferent treatment in Miruthan.
Bangalore Naatkal
2016 · India Today · Feb 2016
After watching Bangalore Naatkal, the first question that pecks the mind is that what is the need for remaking films like Bangalore Days and Premam?
Thoongavanam
2015 · India Today · Nov 2015
Thoongaavanam, which should have been done and dusted in 90 minutes, is dragged to fit the conventional time-expectations of the Indian audience. The French film's script doesn't stick with the three-part film grammar, which is prevalent here. The interval block becomes fatal to the flow of the film.
Rudhramadevi
2015 · India Today · Oct 2015
The problem with making a film based on history is the amount of liberty the filmmaker can afford to take, in order to tweak the history so that the film appeals to a wider audience. If the story and the characterisation breach a certain boundary, and if the infused fictional elements overshadow the facts, then the film fails to do justice to the genre. Rudhramadevi seems to have bumped into a similar problem.
Thani Oruvan
2015 · India Today · Sep 2015
If you are ready to overlook the logical blunders, the fat-less movie is sure to entertain.