Review: Vellai Illa Pattathaari 2 (VIP 2)

Direction: Soundarya Rajinikanth; Cast: Dhanush, Kajol, Amala Paul, Samuthirakani and others

Film : Vellai Illa Pattathaari 2

Director: Soundarya Rajinikanth

Cast: Dhanush, Kajol, Amala Paul, Samuthirakani, Vivekh and others

Music: Sean Roldan

Cinematography: Sameer Thahir

Dhanush’s VIP 2 seems to have just about managed to meet the huge expectations caused by the humongous success of the first part of VIP.

In the sequel, Raghuvaran (Dhanush) is a content, successful engineer, who is married to the love of his life Shalini (Amala Paul). Shalini has now turned into a dutiful daughter to Raghuvaran’s dad, a disciplining sister in law to his brother and a demanding and loving wife to Raghuvaran. In short, she is the soul of the family.

On the work front, Raghuvaran is excelling at what he does. In fact, the film opens with him winning the prestigious Engineer of the Year award at a ceremony in which pretty much every other award is bagged by the members of a company called Vasundhara constructions.

Vasundhara Constructions, which we are told is South India’s largest construction company, is owned by Vasundhara (played by Kajol) , a wealthy, arrogant, ruthless business woman who takes immense pride in the fact that she, as a single woman, has risen to such a position of power in this society.

It is at the award ceremony that Vasundhara first takes note of Raghuvaran’s name as he is the only one who is not from her company to win an award at the ceremony. She makes enquiries from her staff about him. When she gets to know that he is the best, she asks her staff to make him an offer of employment, assuming that people will not say no to an offer from her firm.

When Raghuvaran calls on her the next day, she, without even raising her head, tells him to join her firm, absolutely certain that he would begin to take instructions from her like every other single person in her company. However, the lady is in for a rude shock when Raghuvaran not only declines her offer of employment, but also gives her a lesson or two in behaviour.

Vasundhara’s ego is badly hurt and she takes the insult a tad too seriously. She is determined to teach Raghuvaran a lesson by making him get on his knees and beg her for employment. She knows how to pull strings to get work done in her industry and begins to inflict huge losses on Raghuvaran’s firm. What she is unaware though is the stuff Raghu is made of. The two forceful characters choose to take each other on. What happens next is what the film is all about…

The film is thoroughly entertaining right from start to finish. The first half, in fact, is so enthralling and breezy that one doesn’t even realise that one has sat through one half of the film when intermission arrives. However, the same cannot be said of the second half. This is the part when things get tougher.

Soundarya Rajinikanth seems to have done a convincing job as director. She seems to have got everything including her casting right. Ritu Varma, who made a mark with her performance in the Telugu film Pellichoopulu, plays the role that Surbhi played in the first part.

The film has some stellar performances coming from Kajol, Amala Paul, Dhanush, Samuthirakani and Vivekh.

Kajol just lives the role of Vasundhara and hogs the limelight. She seems to have no problems delivering Tamil dialogues and looks every bit the part.

Amala Paul, as the devoted but demanding spouse, is just adorable. This is one of Amala’s finest performances and is bound to come in for a lot of appreciation from fans. Dhanush, who has written the screenplay and dialogues, has, through this film, cleverly highlighted the conflicts that exist between corporates and smaller firms on the one hand and the gender battle that exists in society on the other.

Samuthirakani and Vivekh do a fantastic job as always. Sean Roldan’s music is very apt for the film. However, Anirudh’s work in part 1 was so impressive that it overshadows Sean’s work. Sameer Thahir’s cinematography too is commendable.

On the whole, Vellai Illa Pattathaari impresses a second time!