DRAUPATHI MOVIE REVIEW CLICK TO RATE THE MOVIE

Actor Richard Rishi has joined hands with his 2016's political thriller 'Pazhaya Vannarapettai' director Mohan G, to deliver a revenge drama stained with casteism. The director has also organised crowd-funding for the film under his banner GM Film Corporation. 

The protagonist Rudra Prabhakaran (Richard) is believed to have killed his wife, the titular character Draupathi, and her cousin sister Lakshmi for his caste's honour. The film starts with Prabhakaran coming out on bail, uncovering truths behind the murders and starting his quest to fulfill his wife's wish. Draupathi is fundamentally a classic revenge drama where the protagonist, who is framed by the 'evil' men (who apparently belong to a particular community in this film), works his way in to serve his own justice to that list of men. But in Draupathi, Prabhakaran does it in the name of materialising his dear departed's final wish, and hence, the recurrent mentions of 'Draupathi  Sabatham', which is also the title of a documentary, which is being made by a YouTuber/Journalist (who is also an activist) in the film (played by Soundarya).

Whatsoever, there is no suspense in this overused plot-line, that is transparent from the very beginning. But the screenplay is presented in such a way that the filmmaker thinks the audience is in suspense of what's next, which might make the viewers restless and the writing too seems lazy at instances. Leaving out predictability, at least, the making could have been in such a way that it builds tension. 

Mohan G seems to have heavily derived from his own debut film in the essence of the screenplay, casting, and art design. But unline 'Pazhaya Vannarpettai', Draupathi's plot felt like it needed more detail, but the same is not there. There is also a song which is exactly similar to the hit song 'Unnathaan Nenaikaile' from the director's debut, with the same singer and choreographer on-screen. The minimal attention to shot composition and the bad on-screen and voice acting of the side actors is distracting in multiple scenes. Adding to this is the unstable colour correction between shots in a continuous scene and glitchy editing.

Jubin's background score works well at instances. Including Richard, actress Sheela, Karunas (extended cameo) and the antagonist (Karna) deliver believable, strong performances. The director could have extracted better from actors Soundarya and Nishanth, who play crucial characters. Nishanth and his accompanying cop do not look like cops. Period. The lack of budget is evident in many scenes that we can almost feel sorry for the director. 

On the brighter side, Draupathi can be found decently engaging IF the viewer can accept the ideas introduced in the film. The characterisation and the performance of the antagonist Karna are commendable. The character carries a good sinister vibe and the iniquitous morale of him is haunting even after the film. The idea of the film is not baseless, but lacks conviction. 

The film focuses on a serious problem of fraudulent legal marriages that is almost in the dark but fails to deliver the desired impact due to the wrongful stereotyping of a particular group. Overall, Draupathi is a passionate (note: not positive) attempt to deliver a film based on postulations that might trigger unpleasant reactions (based on the viewer). Apart from the frowned upon ideas, Draupathi falls short of a decent film due to the recurring loopholes and mediocre cinematic techniques used.