Naane Varuvean

A review by Rajesh Puvvada

Selvaraghavan and his brother came together after a decade. I thought it would be a psychological thriller, but this time he went paranormal. They went out of their limits and stepped into a wrong territory.

The movie commenced well, but the moment the audience it's paranormal plot, the expectations dilute like solid ice in a hot iron pan!! These kind of movies should leave the audience into believing that the paranormal things may mostly exist. But in this case you will realise that you are getting into a illogical paranormal stuff.

The score from Yuvan Shankar Raja is very good and that holds the movie to some extent.

Dhanush delivers well, especially as the mischievous twin. I could see that there was some yester year style statements in it. It's a decent performance on a weak plot.

When the plot is weak, what ever you do will be like applying lipstick to a grannie!!

If you have time to kill you can watch this. If you are keen on a good movie, avoid.

I am going with a 6/10, and the score is only for Danush and Yuvan!! Rest scored a zilch!!

Decent story...expected more from Selva and dhanush combo. Started off as horror then moves onto thriller. Dhanush as usual acting was superb. Story was very thin. Both dhanush as in why they are the way they are was not explained leading to some weak screenplay. Music was absolutely garbage yuvan has lost it. Can watch one time. The kids acting was great. Overall would say it can be watched once. Disappointing as expecting much more with selva dhanush yuvan combo. Lead actress did decent with what ever limited role she had. Yogi babu comedy was a relief in the very serious movie. 6/10 average.

The first part of the film was captivating until the revelation of the 2nd character's introduction & rather its wrongdoings.

2nd half started with a backstory followed by a vengeance seemed so usual and felt a bit dramatic.

There are a few good things in the film especially the father-daughter relationship if you're in that zone, you might probably like this film to the core.

I realised lately that the story was written by Dhanush and not Selva, that's when all the dots were connected for why this Selvaraghavan's make was lacking that tingling touch of the maker, looks like Selva got carried away & trapped by his brother's charm of story-telling and thus agreed to put his legendary tag to the film.

And I hated the idea of bringing in the kids to this kinda vengeance plot as it has the potential to exploit & corrupt the smaller minds.

And I don't think, U1 scored music for this film since it is just way below average, nothing mentionable.

And Dhanush's acting was something that keeps us engaged & holds us together till the very end.

Story is very simple and watchable mainly for the menacing persona of Dhanush's kathir character. First half travels as a supernatural touches slowly alters as a psycho thriller in the backstory ( 2nd half). Special mention to the psycho path role of dhanush offers a threathening feel to the audiences. Female leads are seen in less scope which is a small loophole in the film, also yogibabu and prabhu had weightage. This naane varuvean is a sure treat for thriller genre fans and also for the psycho horror thriller fans. The eerie scenes in the 1st half is so intense and doesn't follow the routine creepy touches. This film is mostly inspired from hollywood flicks like insidiuos and conjuring, Overall - this outing a definitely a decent movie with good thrills and emotions!

Take Away actor Dhanush and Yuvan Shankar Raja, you are left with nothing in this film. I agree that this is rather poor for an attempted 'COMEBACKS', director Selvaraghavan is only person to blame in this project. There are couple of problems with this movie, main thing is that it fails to convince on psychological metamorphoses that turn twins into enemies nor makes up its mind what it's trying to convey as most of the interesting things in the film are in the first half. Whilst I knew from the beginning that it was going to be a predictable fare and it did. Right from the opening i knew where this Selvaraghavan was taking the film, i just hang in there because to see more of villain Dhanush. It gets draggy and crumpled in the second half, not what I came for, but does right by it for the current (actor>director) Selva's standard and the ending feels like a rushed cap off to a film such as this. But the film boils down to a simple parable about good and evil, actions of the past and generic revenge angle.

I am not gonna say this is horrid, the paranormal and psychological angle is riveting which is explored well in the first half. The second half with the supernatural revenge thriller inspires little interest. Even the father-daughter relationship parts were pretty good and doesn't come across as a yawn.

To sum it up, it's atmospheric with all the authority of the lead, supporting child artists, it looks like a creative experiment. Kudos to Dhanush for trying out new narratives but the plot had lot of interesting possibilities doesn't mean it is bad movie, it will hold your attention. For Dhanush, every work with Selva is an undoubted success commercially and critically. In this film, he has done two polar opposite with brilliance accentuated by background score of Yuvan and there is nothing more to add here.