Naandgaam Pirai Movie Reviews

Malayalam director Vinayan oscillates between genres with the ease of a choreographer's dance moves. For a while, he was into ultra eloquent melodramas that often portray the relationship between a brother and a sister (one of them is always differently-abled, so there is enough room for your tear glands to be put to work). He is also known for his half-decent ghost movies such as Veli Nakshatram. With Nankam Pirai though, he is attempting another onscreen reprisal of the vampire story Brak Stoker's Dracula.

Firstly, there is no rhyme or reason why anyone would want to make a make of this stature in 3D. While Indian cinema is far from achieving perfection in creating breathtaking visual effects, any attempts at 3D will only look absurd. So it does in Nankam Pirai. And that's only partly the problem with Nankam Pirai. The movie is uninspired and lacks complete imagination.

The story revolves around Roy and Priya, who are newly married and who are honeymooning in Transylvania. Roy, in his search for some adventure, ventures into the fortress of Dracula and bham - he gets anointed with the spirit of Dracula. In this new manifestation, Dracula reaches Kerala after killing Priya and looks for more blood.

Vinayan's Nankam Pirai is unintentionally comic with ridiculous costumes of its lead that make them look like they are in a worst dress up school play and bimbettes in barely-there clothes. Probably, Vinayan wanted to stick to the flavor of the movie and hence did not alter the story? But that is not a convincing argument because he is presenting Dracula in present day Kerala.

None of the characters in the movie is written well and all of them are uni-dimensional. Let alone being one of the worst Dracula movies ever, this Dracula also signifies one of the lowest points in Vinayan's career as a film maker.