Synccinema Quickie - Paagal

 Paagal – It’s the “Crazy” romance that is in question.

Paagal is similar to a  biopic, that films the life of a man who broke the record of Sanju – not in terms of box office collections since Paagal was released only yesterday, but in terms of the number of girls the man hooks up with. Vishwak Sen’s Prem outnumbers Sanju with romantic (not sexually as latter) approach and association with 1600 girls (and also a guy, guess who?). Though he’s relatively on the softer and socially comfortable grounds, the overall arc is suffocatingly noxious, on par with Sanju. 

You’re entertained only if you wear the right mask. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find one.

Paagal is a revamp of the Youthful Entertainers this production house is promptly delivering since its inception. It is an uncanny successor to Cinema Chupistha Mava, Nenu Local and partly the 2018 smash hit Hushaaru. These films, at least the first two, completely rely on the energetics of a sprightly hero and his parables of achieving a girl. This time in Paagal, it’s only 1 ambition and many girls. The line is simple – “Just achieve a Girl!!”.

These entertainers always generate fun with a vicious cost. In the journey of the hero’s quest, the writers mince words and/or create space for romance, action, comedy, emotion and drama – not all of the same quality. If the Producer’s pockets are further heftier, Sringara (sorry GVM) is also stuffed, which of course might not be of quality worth rejuvenating. 

Not everything can be shaded over from a large casting shadow of craziness, such as the cheap jokes, the immature rendering of romance and the superficial, age-old mother sentiment. These, creating a list of problems, if made a movie on, might be controversial than Arjun Reddy/Kabir Singh. 

The Rom-com genre duo works perfectly for easy execution, but here in the name of romance, we get an increased level of toxic masculinity, body shaming, heterosexual mockery and childlike representation of romantic conversations (no matter it’s between 2 people of the same age group or different). The director’s hat-tip to Mani Ratnam was the last nail in the coffin.

In the name of comedy, we do get a similar pack as above, sprinkled with sidekicks used for flexing few muscles and getting few whistles for the hero. There’s an overall sense of unhealthy domination and feudal mentality. All these complaints and only me (or maybe a few more) felt restless in the screening.

If you see the movie with a light heart and are a sucker for this particular type of genre, everything might not just pass by, but actually, entertain you to the core. That’s the case with the rest of the auditorium - cheering for Vishwak Sen’s panache, bursting in laughter for the quirky jokes and vooting for the cute moments and expositional dialogues in the staple scenes of a-boy-meets-girl or a-boy-proposes-a-girl or a-boy-breaks-up-with-a-girl. 

What worked the best for me was the work of Cinematography (by S.Manikandan), Music (Songs by Radhan, RR by Leon James) and Editing ( by Gary B.H.) departments. The colour palette of the movie is so appealing and filled with vividness – never faking or overworking a realistic setup. Things adding verve to these shots is the foot-tapping, punchy music. The most lovable is the editing, which pours life into the movie at every level. There’s a certain tempo and movement in the scenes and the quality of transitions that stylize our hero is off the roof.

Also Read : Thimmarusu Movie Review 

Paagal is like sharing a just-out charcoaled corn kernel with your lover on a rain-soaked cool evening. If you savour on sharing those moments, along with corn, with your loved one – then anything is quixotic. I also savour, on the least basic level, for taste. So I will suggest rubbing another pinch of salt with the same charred lemon slice if that's what is missing. Or in other words, I couldn’t take the impoverished writing with a pinch of salt, as my taste for a romantic entertainer never exactly aligned with the maker or the enjoying crowd.