Vattam Movie Review: A shoddy hyperlink drama that runs around in circles 

Director Kamalakannan's Vattam has a good-looking Sibi Sathyaraj in his most blitheful role, extensive drone shots of scenic Coimbatore, and a gorgeous car. These are probably the only few good things I will remember from this majorly disappointing piece of work. It doesn't take long for us to realise that this 'hyperlink thriller' has tracks that aren't actually related to each other and their point of convergence is so contrived that it leaves us furious and annoyed, instead of feeling amused. 

Cast: Sibi Sathyaraj, Andrea Jeremiah, Athulya Ravi, Vamsi Krishna 

Director:  Kamalakannan

Streaming On: Disney+Hotstar

Mano (Sibi) decides to get dead drunk on the eve of his ex-girlfriend's  (Athulya) wedding but gets thrown out of the wine shop. One might expect him to gatecrash the reception, considering he isn't a man of great values and on top of everything, he got cheated. But, he goes on to kidnap a random businessman named Gautham (Vamsi Krishna) he bumps into and eventually swaps Gautham's wife Parvathy (Andrea) as the hostage. Well, the randomness doesn't end there. Parvathy and Mano start arguing about true love, security in life, chauvinism, and feminism in the most inorganic, dramatic way possible. When I say 'drama' it is clearly not an exaggeration as Andrea switches to 'thooya tamizh' often to stress a point to her kidnapper! Oh, there is also a side-track involving a bunch of laid-off IT people, who are also in the mood for a kidnap. But their story barely develops as the maker himself chooses to focus only on the confused Parvathy-Mano conversation and the mundane flashback love story of Mano. Thinking again, the title Vattam feels largely like a self-mockery by the makers of the film, as the story leads nowhere and only goes around in 'circles'.

The film wouldn't have been such a tough watch if director Kamalakannan had decided to have fun with the limited story and write characters that don't take themselves seriously.  But what is in the offering is just the opposite. Almost all the characters firmly believe that they are crusaders of social justice, but all they do is succumb to the evil they are posing to fight against.

Why doesn't Andrea take a cleverer detour and escape even when she had the car under her control? How does Gautham's family remain asleep all the while during the kidnap episode? Why doesn't he try getting help from the police, especially when he knows the location of the kidnapper? If one had to complain about the loopholes in the plot, then it would potentially turn into a bigger rant session than the ones we see on screen. 

Sibiraj's Mano is a man who is keen on getting his closures. Be it a relationship or a simple conversation, he gets furious when he is left in the dark. But I guess, we the audience have more reasons to be enraged than Mano, as the whys and hows on our end clearly outweigh his struggles.