Sarkar Review: Thalapathy Vijay's classy mass saves ARM's preachy socio-political drama

RATING - ⭐⭐✨ 2.5/5*

Sarkar Review Movie Talkies:

Thalapathy Vijay can be seen performing those same signature poses and steps from his previous films like Thuppakki, Kaththi, Theri, and even Mersal in Sarkar, making you fully believe that he is not creating an original flick, but a mashup of his own celebrated hits.

This is quite similar to ARM and Vijay's previous attempts, becoming overly dramatic at times, yet still delivering a fair amount of entertainment. The action scenes are classy, with all those slow-motion visuals and sound design making it heart-thumping.

Vijay's classy mass hits perfect notes in those scenes, whether it be the Chennai metro fight sequence or the meeting with the political giant at his own office. The climax scene fails to make it worthwhile and feels too dated. The film suffers from its outdated themes of poor people's issues, election scams, and the power of one "vote." For a change, the protagonist is rich and powerful, instead of being a common man.

Vijay was fine throughout the film, and although he was loose in some regular scenes, he excelled in emotionally challenging moments. Keerthy Suresh was made into a typical heroine with no substance. Just because it's a commercial mass entertainer, the hero must have a heroine, and that's why she's included. Varalaxmi Sarathkumar looked deadly but didn’t truly maintain that fear until the end. Pala. Karuppiah and Radha Ravi did a decent job, while Yogi Babu felt overly typical, yet again.

Expectations for AR Rahman's music were high, but this was a subpar album. The cinematography and editing are both average, while the background score in the action scenes was better. AR Murugadoss brings some of those "I have seen it a dozen times" elements back and, despite that, manages to convince you. It's just that after a while, you get bored of it and start predicting every single thing. So, in short, it's predictable but not boring—a typical fan service.