MASTER Review

Master is a 2020 Tamil Commercial, mass entertainer, written and directed by Lokesh Kanagaraj, starring Thalapathy Vijay and Makkal Selvan Vijay Sethupathi in lead roles. The movie also has a huge star cast of Malavika Mohanan, Arjun Das, Andrea Jeremiah, Shanthnu, Gouri Kishan and others. Master is the first big movie from south to release after this theatre shut down for the past ten months. Master had a lot of reason to be the most anticipated movie. Primarily, a Thalapathy Vijay movie will have huge expectations all over. Then, Master is the 1st movie Vijay and Vijay Sethupathi has seen together on screen and a Lokesh Kanagaraj directorial after the brilliant Maanagaram and Kaithi.

Master is about an alcoholic professor John Durairaj aka JD (Thalapathy Vijay), who is out of control due to his regular alcohol consumption. JD is not a typical professor. He is always approachable before 6 PM 😀 and friendly Master to the students. JD used to stand for the students and talked on behalf of them. When he required to work for a few months in Juvenile home where they send the culprits under the 18 years, he came to know about Bhavani (Vijay Sethupathi) who use these kids over there for illegal activities. An incident that happened in prison makes JD’s life different. The first half highlighted the characteristics of JD and Bhavani. And the second half was the clash between both of them.

Would say JD is one of the best characters from Thalapathy Vijay. The way he portrayed an alcoholic professor was extraordinary. Unlike his other characters, JD is so simple and human. His mannerisms and humour were so glad to see. As a man of mass, the action sequences were terrific. Those stunt scenes in Metro, Vaathi Raid and climax was top notch. The Kabaddi Ghilli scene lifted it more. As Lokesh said before, Thalapathy Vijay has done most the things from his previous movies in Master, but differently. Makkal Selvan Vijay Sethupathi did a fabulous job as Bhavani. He remained equal to JD as the Villain. A villain we might have never seen before. At the same time, he is deadly, evil, cruel and funny. Vijay Sethupathi has got equal space as Thalapathy Vijay in Master to perform. His character as Bhavani over shadowed JD at some points. Hats off to Thalapathy Vijay for giving that space and freedom for all. With versatile characters and irrespective of the importance, Vijay Sethupathi is doing great in his performance and selecting his movies.

Master had a lot of characters. Malavika Mohanan as Charu is the female lead in the movie. She did her part very well. Even though, others like Shanthnu, Gouri and Andrea didn’t have much to do in Master. Still, their portion in the movie was highlighting. After JD and Bhavani, Arjun Das‘s Das will be the crucial character in Master. His streak is growing. All the others who acted as juvenile home inmates did their part well. Liked Poovaiyar as Undiyal, it was so fun to watch that kid.

Anirudh‘s songs and BGM were superb. The theatre experience for Vaathi Coming and Vaathi Raid was excellent. The tracks were matching to the movie’s situations. That Ghilli Kabaddi remix was a show-stealing one. However, in his association with Thalapathy Vijay, felt Kaththi was superior. Sathyan Sooryan‘s Cinematography deserves a good appreciation. Every frame in the movie was beautiful and mass, especially during that Lory chasing scenes, Vaathi Coming and climax. Lokesh Kanagaraj‘s hands on to the commercial mass genre movies after Maanagaram and Kaithi did well. The audience who watched both the above Lokesh movies and expected huge will not be happy as Master is plain and commercial. Those wow moments or twists and turns are missing in Master. When Lokesh said Master is 50% his movie and 50% Vijay movie, it felt like it is just 25% Lokesh touch. That too the character of Bhavani and showing Thalapathy Vijay fully as the character JD. He could have written Master well in a way it more engages viewers. The major drawback of Master is its duration and the second half. It felt the 1st and 2nd half of the movie has no relation. We can see a lot of unwanted scenes forced in the film. Trimming all those and the songs Kutti Story and Andha Kanna Paathakka will be reducing the duration of the movie by 20 minutes. It is surprising even after all these delays, the team could have more focused on the editing. Also, the director has promised there won’t be any cliche scenes from previous Vijay movies. People have done with those bubble gum throwing scene from Theri and I am Waiting from Thuppakki repeatedly in his films. Wonder why Lokesh included those in this film. Master is weak in writing and film making department.

When a star like Thalapathy Vijay ready to associate with the young directors nowadays, it disappoints to see the directors go back to him again with the commercial masala scripts. We saw his calm characters like Joseph Kuruvila and Jeevanantham, challenging characters like Rayyappan and different character like JD. Vijay is an actor who can manage all character types easily. That’s the reason he is one of the top followed person. The directors should more write such characters for him. Also, it is enough for Thalapathy Vijay doing such movies. He should focus on the content and character-oriented movies than the commercial movies which only impress his fans.