Sattam Oru Iruttarai (2012)

Since I started reviewing Tamil films, I have learnt to adjust my expectations. If it is a film by a top director, I would except a gimmicky mess, with stuff like 'echolocation' and 'conjoined twins'; if it is a low-budget film like Sembattai or Ariyaan, I would expect to be tortured. In the last 3 to 4 months, I have almost never had high hopes out of any movie, with the exception of Pizza- a movie which actually managed to deliver. But I hoped good things from someone like Sneha Britto- someone who is younger than I am. I expected her to have a taste in cinema after growing up with exposure to foreign films. I had severely miscalculated. 

While reviewing Tamil films, I tend to be careful when dealing with negative superlatives, but Sattam Oru Iruttarai is, without a shred of doubt, one of the worst films I have ever seen. Unlike other worst movies I have had the misfortune of watching, this one didn't make me furious. It did not drive me crazy. The thing is the film is unbelievably hilarious for all the unintentional reasons. In a perfect world, this movie will be revered by fanboys for its Ed Wood-ishness. 

Throughout the movie, which almost never had anything interesting to say, I kept noticing how the audience at my screening were reacting. I looked at this kid who was brought to watch the film because his teacher appeared in one scene. I was almost desperate to know if they realized that they were watching an extremely shoddy film or were totally oblivious to the fact. Thankfully, the crowd reaffirmed my faith in them by laughing out loud at all the lame scenes. Right now, I'm not even in a mood to bash this film. I confess I had a rather fun time, thanks to the awesome strangers I sat next to.

I don't want to point out faults with the placement of songs or bad acting or poorly written lines or the excessiveness of coincidence or logical inconsistencies. Many films get those wrong. Sattam is different. It is special. The extent to which things go wrong in this movie is indescribable. I am not going to be easy on Britto because she's younger than me or because this is only her first film. There are directors who in spite of making a bad debut show a hint of promise. But Britto's film clearly suggests she is bereft of even that quality. Tamil cinema doesn't need her. We have enough incompetence, thank you. 

I still keep wondering if it was intentionally bad. I mean, how can someone make such a bad movie with a straight face? It's a remake for chrissake. All she had to do was to not eff up. With a story which was pretty dated even in the early 80s, Sattam is a dinosaur in today's age.

Smaller filmmakers are not often blessed with good looking actors. Be it Reema Sen, who plays an unbelievably stupid Commissioner of Police, or Pia Bajpai who keeps saying, "What do you think of your self?", over 5-6 times.. I'm sure all the actors in this film are capable of doing a better work under a better director. I cannot but blame Britto for every thing that went wrong with the film. Yes, we all know how stingy producer SAC can be, but that's hardly an excuse. There's a song sequence where the lead pair dance in front of Chroma key-ed photographs of a few random places in Hong Kong, downloaded from Google Images.

As I walked out of the screening, I learnt that the lead actor and the director of the film were present during the final minutes of our screening. The guy, who looks like Ravi Krishna with bad hair, seemed very pleased with the audiences' response, which could be accurately summed up using the smiley :-| Playing out like a tawdry three hour long advertisement for Skullcandy headphones, Sattam Oru Iruttarai is an embarrassment to the universe.