RAAVANAN UK BluRay review

The one thing that keeps Mani Ratnam's Raavanan very good, rather than great, is that it sets up a love triangle but doesn't give the protagonists equal weight. A modern-day retelling of the Hindu epic the Ramayana, it casts the gods Ravana as a revolutionary village leader, Rama as the police chief dedicated to capturing him and Sita as the officer's wife.

Ratnam and his crew manage some breathtaking cinematography, and some terrific central performances from the Tamil-speaking cast make far more engrossing viewing than the alternate Hindi version. It's just the promised examination of the arguably problematic morality of the ancient text simply doesn't come together. By the final act Raavanan devolves into two men grappling, and the ending's never really in doubt. Despite its flaws, however, it's still a hugely entertaining film and a definite feast for the eyes.

We open on Veeraiya (Vikram) and his followers wreaking bloody retribution on a score of policemen across the region, with police chief Dev (Prithviraj) left fuming as he picks through the carnage. It gets worse: Dev's informed Veeraiya has kidnapped Ragini (Aishwarya Rai Bachchan), his wife, hauling her off into the wilderness.

Dev and his men head after the rebels, but over the course of the chase he finds himself sorely tempted to do whatever it takes to track down his enemy; Veeraiya ends up won over by the bravery and dignity of his captive, and Ragini slowly realises Dev might not be quite the saint she originally assumed.

While it's still essentially chaste, Raavanan is far more of a romance than the original epic, with much less emphasis on propriety. Ragini's markedly less content to sit and wait for her husband to turn up and save her, and while she's terrified of Veeraiya and his hair-trigger temper she can't bring herself to condemn him as wholly evil. The rebel leader styles himself a demon, but he's clearly a human being longing for something there's little chance he'll ever have.

Not to give the wrong impression! On the one hand, to be blunt, Raavanan is a cartoon. Even in its deeper, more reflective moments it embraces Indian cinema's love of amped-up, crowd-pleasing melodrama (Tamil arguably more so than Hindi) and probably won't convert anyone who dismisses the idea of musical numbers out of nowhere. On the other hand it's an exemplar of the form, with enough energy, spectacle and charm that though the ending largely disappoints it's still frequently fantastic cinema by any standards.

And though it may be a cartoon, it's still got depth and intelligence. Ratnam replaces Ravana's ten heads with multiple voices drowning out Beeraiya's thoughts, and while Abhishek Bachchan can't sell this in the Hindi version - too many one-note tics and jitters - Vikram makes him genuinely unhinged, consumed by anguished rage then wistful melancholy by turns.

Beneath the breathless fervour of the dialogue between him and Aishwarya Rai's Ragini there's real, complex emotion simmering away, with some tremendous moments in the first and second acts when (very unlike Sita) she begs for the strength to hate him though she clearly knows she shouldn't, or chooses to stay with him rather than escape. The obvious physical contrast between them - she, supermodel looks, he, far more stereotypical Indian male - also lends extra pathos to everything going on under the surface.

But Ratnam doesn't seem to have spent as much time developing Dev, and this is where the whole thing starts to fall apart. Prithviraj does his best, but Ragini's husband gets a single flashback establishing him as a deity in human form, and other than that it's one long descent into the heart of darkness. When we find out why Beeraiya and his village hate the police chief so much there's no attempt to excuse or excoriate him - we learn very bad things happened, but whether he joined in, let them happen or had no clue? No idea.

Again, it's still a wild ride, with some tremendous scenery filmed to jaw-dropping effect, some excellent set pieces and a lead couple who have the viewer hanging on their every word. But ultimately it's deeply frustrating that what feels like a richer, deeper, more thoughtful narrative fizzles out without resolving anything. The ending suggests Ratnam simply didn't know how to wrap things up without offending anyone (as in leaving people to assume he meant to say Hindu scriptures are flawed) and went for a predictable action finale instead.

THE DISC:

Ayngaran's UK BluRay of Raavanan gives the film a fairly bare-bones release, but one with a suitably stunning visual presentation. The menus are somewhat garish, and don't loop, but they're clear and easy to navigate. The film is divided into twenty-four chapter stops.

The standard 5.1 Tamil soundtrack is relatively clear, coping well with A. R. Rahman's booming score, the musical numbers and the more heated passages of dialogue, though it does occasionally come across as slightly distorted on lower quality speakers. A DTS soundtrack is also available. English subtitles are very clear and easy to read, though they do swing between seemingly poorly translated and startlingly eloquent.

The picture is a thing of beauty, an absolutely outstanding transfer. There's a slight amount of soft grain to the image, and blacks and shadows seem somewhat blurred in night or low light scenes, but this seems more an artistic decision than any technical shortcoming. Colour balance and levels of detail are excellent throughout, and sell the high-definition format admirably.

The one extra is a half-hour Making Of in standard definition taken from the DVD, which covers the usual areas - interviews with the cast and crew and behind the scenes - but does go into some surprising detail, revealing what went went into many of the design decisions and the logistical problems behind the dual shoot (Hindi and Tamil versions were shot almost simultaneously). Oddly while there are no subtitles, some interviewees speak in English for lengthy stretches.

Of the three separate versions of this film - Raavan, the Hindi release, Raavanan, the Tamil, and Villain, the Telugu dub of the Tamil version - it's not hard to see why Raavanan triumphed at the box office. It is a flawed effort that doesn't wholly deliver on its initial promise, but it's still a wonderful piece of entertainment, much of it thrilling, visually dazzling and deeply moving. For those with an interest in Indian cinema willing to make allowances for its weaknesses Ayngaran's UK BluRay of Raavanan comes strongly recommended.