A thriller laced with cooked-up romance tagging on to a fragile plot. That would be an apt descriptor for Makkal Selvan Vijay Sethupathy's latest flick Puriyaatha Puthir.
The one-hour-22 minute movie also has the burden of expectations to meet after the stupendous success of Vijay Sethupathy's Vikram Vedhaa and that perhaps weighs in more against Puriyaatha Puthir.
But a weak plot more than works as a dampener, though director Ranjith Jeykodi and Sethupathy himself have tried the rescue act with some superb craft, albeit in tranches.
The message is more of a mix. The use and misuse of technology, bordering on cyber crime that can wreak havoc on lives, knowingly or unknowingly.
Fair enough. But then who would end up enacting a fairytale romance to seek salvation or revenge, or whatever you deem it fit as a natural reaction to a bizarre freak incident?
There are more such unanswered questions than answers to this Puthir (puzzle), which is best left to the collective wisdom of viewers.
The music and the background score are the highlights of the movie that can be clubbed in the genre of a thriller. A special mention due to the deft hands behind the stunning camera work, which does not hesitate to embrace heights too often.
Dinesh Krishnan's high-rise shots almost set the tone of Puriyaatha Puthir. And the camera eye indeed succeeds in creating an ambiance in which the viewer, as well as the protagonists, can feel a potential stalker at work.
The female lead's stoic expression perhaps camouflages her psycho traumatic angst.
Sethupathy's flashes of brilliance come up in his moments of distress when situation after situation is out of bounds for the protagonist. And that helplessness is personified with elan.
May be a better plot and a tighter script would have had given a different dimension to this puzzle.
Rating 2.5/5