Vishal reviews Kara, the Vignesh Raja-directed Tamil heist thriller starring Dhanush as a thief constantly at war with morality. Set in the 90s, the film places Kara in a three-way contest with a corrupt bank official played by Jayaram and a police officer in pursuit, with Mamitha Baiju as Selli — whose first interaction with Kara has him literally hung upside down, a symbol of their opposing moral values. The first half is packed with brilliant decisions, from Theni Eswar's camerawork that insists on casting a shadow over Kara even in daytime, to a tractor speeding past in a single insert that becomes a quiet comment on power returning to where it belongs.
Vishal digs into why Kara, with so much going for it, settles for so little in the last act. The interval sequence — written like a visual demonstration of Murphy's Law and framed through the holster of a police officer's pistol — sets a high bar that the film abandons as it slides into Robin Hood territory, whitewashing Dhanush's character and rewriting Jayaram's into a uni-dimensional villain without motivations. The clever symbols give way to shouting where the film once whispered, and a complex tale of morality ends up content to be a message movie. Watch the full review for the THR India bottomline.
