David Billa lives up to its generic title. Though there is little punch to the proceedings, the director makes it a reasonably engaging watch. While Billa is about the established don and his fight with the rest to keep his supremacy afloat, David Billa is the prequel showing his debut in crime, the reasons that lead him to it and how he grows systematically, falls and rises till he announces that the journey to his goal has just begun. Don’t expect the film to have style and Billa to wear neatly tailored suits, remember this yarn is about his origin, and how he as a Sri Lankan refugee in India gets into a fracas with the security official for ill-treating his fellow mates in the camp. One encounter leads to another and soon David Billa is seen smuggling diamonds, drugs and weapons for his bosses. The underworld business opens up new vistas for him and Billa becomes an object of envy for both his bosses and fellow employees. Result — politics and plot to eliminate him. In the process, his niece is killed. In between he is jailed and also bailed out and in his flight to freedom, what he displays is his steely resolve and hunger to become the biggest kingpin and the most feared gangster the world has ever known.
Ajith is not shown as a macho chest-puffing warlord.. instead he sports a stubble, looks fatigued, yet he maintains a consistent expression and refuses to show heightened emotions in the most testing circumstances. While he is a cool dude in the sequel, here he is serious and maintains a disturbed look. He remains unaffected even when his niece, old enough to be his wife sleeps on his lap in the shortest of costumes showing off her beautiful legs. Parvathy Omanakuttan has an enviable height and figure but wish the director gave her something more interesting than ice creams. Her uncle who is meeting her after ages knows her weakness for ice creams but he cannot make out her growing fondness for him. Bruna Abdullah as Sameera has got undue publicity but all she does is flash a smile, walk around a bit and get wet in a pool. Janaki Sabesh as Billa’s sister asks him why he brought a gun to the church instead of the Bible and disappears into the grave. Abbasi (Sudhanshu Pandey) and Dmitri (Vidhyut Jamval) add credibility to their roles. Chakri has given minimalistic dialogues and got the narration moving swiftly. There is a lot of stabbing which is normal in this genre but wonder why most of them stabbed each other specifically in the throat. The gore goes unnoticed due to the racy screenplay. What is the point in going to Georgia and the cinematographer not showing some of it, music not palatable enough but dialogues sparkle sporadically. Ignore the talk of Billa appearing aged, how many young heroes can we see pulling off a gangster’s role with ease?
DAVID BILLA
Genre : Action
Cast: Ajith, Parvathy Omanakuttan
Direction: Chakri Tholeti
Music : Yuvan Shankar Raja
Plot: Humiliated gangster decides to take total control
Bottomline: The most hyped chopper scene fails to impress
