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Pasanga 2 - Haiku
Direction: Pandiraj
Cast: Surya, Amala Paul, Nishesh, Vaishnavi
Rating: 2/5
Pandiraj’s Pasanga 2 has a novel core plot — Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) — but the film takes an awfully long time to get to the point, and when it does, it spins out of focus, weighing us down with inane incidents and slapstick humour. It is once again a classic case of Tamil cinema starting with a remarkably interesting storyline, but messing it up with bad scripting and ideas liberally borrowed from other movies. One can see bits and pieces of Aamir Khan’s Taare Zameen Par and even Mani Ratnam’s Anjali.
The 127 minutes of Pasanga 2 often seem like a drag in a work where Tamil star Surya plays a child psychiatrist, Tamizh Naadan, and Amala Paul his schoolteacher wife, Venba. And into their lives, a boy, Kavin, and a girl, Naina, storm in, their parents and teachers foxed and frustrated by the kids’ hyperactivity.
Forced to quit one school after another and examined by innumerable doctors, the children’s parents finally run into Dr Tamizh, who waves his magic wand of kindness and comprehension to soothe the harassed and embarrassed parents and calm down the kids. Suffering from ADHD, Kavin and Naina ultimately get help from Tamizh, much like the dyslexic little boy in Taare Zameen Par who chances upon a fresh life with the arrival of a new teacher (Aamir Khan) at school.
Taare Zameen Par undoubtedly had a lot more finesse and far better story-telling than Pasanga 2, which gets into needless alleys (look at the way the secretary of the building complex is humiliated) before hitting the point it wants to make. Precious screen time is wasted in melodramatic interludes, and there is at least one wrong message which the film promotes — boarding schools are places of punishment where trouble-mongers are cast away.
And, of course, while both Surya and Paul may be credited with fine performances (easy and natural), the children appear to go overboard with their histrionics. And Pasanga 2 fritters away what could have been an excellent opportunity to be a gripping work.
