Movie Review: Lion

Given the election season in Kerala, this movie’s timing could not have been better. The movie is a “take -off” on former Kerala State Minister Balakrishna Pillai and his son actor turned politician, Ganeshan. In this movie, the Dad is portrayed as a crook, while the son is an up and coming conscientious politician with great commitment to serve the masses. The movie is all about the rise of the son and fall of the Dad. The hero’s brother-in-laws are thrown into the mix as corrupt accomplices to the Dad. As expected the hero rises from the grassroots, contests against Dad, exposes corruption and does a clean up job. In between he finds time to dance to a couple of numbers set in New Zealand with a desperately over-weight heroine, Kavya Madhavan. One of the songs sun by Hindi singer Udit Narayan is terrible to say the least. His Malayalam is horrible (not surprisingly) and the song just exposes him even more!

The movie in general is fast paced and an enjoyable watch. It has some typical underdog “pay-back” moments from the hero which are customary in most masala films. Dileep does a seasoned job for what is typically a Mohanlal role. The film is huge hit apparently. This is a good product for a re-make in one of the other languages. 🙂