Cast: Arun, Genelia, Prakashraj, Shafi and others.
Banner: Just Yellow Cinema.
Cinematography: Andrew I.
Editing: Marthand K. Venkatesh.
Lyrics: Ananth Sriram.
Music: SK Balachandran.
Producer: Urmila Gunnam.
Director: Srinivas Raga.
Release Date: December 12, 2009
Okay, the above rhyme is super silly. But it's simply inspired from a really uninspiring movie, Katha. With Genelia in the posters and the Gunnam name tag, you think this might be something interesting. Different, perhaps. Entertaining, definitely.
The movie drags. All along. From the word go. Then there is a flashback, really sad and tragic after which the movie tries hard to pick up. The idea is to have a slow first half, a murder, a flashback, a pacy thriller post-break and finally a big twist. Yes, a good idea; the execution is flawed as ever. Chitra moves to Araku, stays in the Mantra house (literally, the same house as in the movie Mantra) so its supposed to be creepy. The girl gets agitated and acts a little mad whenever alone. She witnesses a murder, makes a complaint but the police and her boyfriend of sorts do not take her seriously. Her tragic past resurfaces and the fact that she spent an year in a mental asylum. Was the murder another hallucination or a reality?
The director does not use too many props, like loud banging noises or creepy music too much or too often. Which is a good thing. But the pace is so slow and the moments are dragged so much that any good is totally negated. Add to that juvenile jokes, old-world dialogue and a half-hearted side track which is somehow supposed to be integrated with the main story-this boyfriend of hers is a to-be filmmaker with his assistants/friends and an experienced co-director. This team is making a murder mystery and that's supposed to scare the girl back into hallucinating (which she claims to have been cured of, but sleeps with a knife in her hand, just in case).
The love story is touching, but again, very half-hearted. There is no real thriller element, red herrings, various suspects, nothing. Someone ringing the bell or putting shoes in the fridge hardly even scared the protagonist, therefore the audience remains agitated, trying to get their money's worth of edge-of-the-seat entertainment. Sadly, nothing happens. The direction and the photography do not meet standards. The names attached, including the production house and the main lead ensure that the audience expects a certain standard to be met. The movie fails in more ways than one.
Its good to have different genres and stories being made with mainstream actors. But Katha simply doesn't live up to expectations. Genelia delivers a decent performance, if you can ignore some of the hamming. Arun is good. Prakashraj does not look like a grandfather and nor is he a convincing one, but as a cop he's ok.
The two songs in the movie are not bad and the background is not too loud. But still, the movie ends up being a Teja TV *****y morning castaway, but with big names.
Rating : 1.5 / 5
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