Mark Antony (2023)

I went to watch this film only for one reason – SJ Surya. This director turned actor has carved himself a nice name as scene stealer on screen. Though he started off directing the likes of Ajith and Vijay, he stepped in front of the camera to direct himself as a leading man. After few films, he started doing supporting roles which turned out to be a boon – birth of a great character actor.

In this film, he plays the second fiddle to the lead, Vishal, and ended up owning the entire film. The Entire Film. Here, we see overacting at its best, thanks to S.J. Surya's manic energy that brought back the glory days of not only Sivaji Ganesan, but also M.R. Radha, Asogan, Manoharan and so many colourful villains and supporting actors of the early era. S.J. Surya is a force to be reckoned with, there has never been anyone like him for a long time - the last time I saw a character so colorfully negative, and hillariously astounding was Rajini in Netrikann (1981). 

Using time travel as the premise, director Adhik Ravichandran crafted an engaging story that also deals with multi-verse (past and present) where one character can talk to the character from the past using a specially invented telephone (you float when making the call).

Skillfully moving to and fro so as to not to confuse the audience, Adhik brought a gripping and hilarious script live that never had a dull moment, chiefly thanks to S.J. Surya's scorching funny performance.

It was a huge relief for me, having still not recovered from the bitterness of watching another film that zipped to and fro past and present, Chandramukhi 2. P. Vasu should learn from the youngsters instead of making out-of-date presentation.

The film also makes no bones about showing everyone in dark light, there is no hero here. Everyone is after something or pissed of with somebody, or, in Surya's case, double crossing someone. I dread to think anyone else doing his role in this story – perhaps there were other contenders, but S.J. Surya owned this one – or two, as he plays father and son (the last time we had two characters with their own twins/triples was Bale Pandiya, a classic with which I personally like to compare this film, it's that good).

After a long time, I am extremely delighted to see a thoroughly entertaining fare to come out of the Tamil film industry. And in one scene, involving both dad and son S.J. Surya, I had never laughed that hard watching a Tamil film for a long time. It was thigh slapping-ly funny. I really dig this film. In fact, this might even be the first time I could tolerate Vishal, who was totally in S.J Surya's frequency, loud, dumb and self-deprecating. The rest of the cast all were in on the fun romp, and the only turn off was the exceedingly loud music - possibly trying to mimic the heydays of full orchestration, but G.V Prakash's ain't no M.S. Viswanathan. But its a forgivable offence. 

But it's S.J. Surya's show all the way. And I wrote in my What's App status, that S.J Surya is a national treasure and he must be protected at all cost.