Movie Review : Diesel
Vasu, aka Diesel (Harish Kalyan), the adopted son of an activist Manohar, is a powerful figure who like his father, fights for fisherman's right in an ongoing struggle against corporates and the government, which involves an oil pipeline which for decades has been creating havoc in their quality of life.
Things get further heated up when arch rival Balamurugan ( Vivek Prasanna) and violent cop Mayavel (Vinay Rai) team up with corporate honcho and are out to destroy him and the cause he is fighting for.
Who are the powerful men behind it all ? Is Diesel able to win this struggle?
The director, through his characters and the film has put forth a detailed overview of the crude oil issue which affected the lives of the people few decades ago. The making is grand, with a solid supporting cast of actors like Karunas, Sachin Khedekar, Vivek Prasanna and others, adding to the film.
Vinay Rai as the menacing, biased cop delivers a noteworthy act, acing every emotion as the frustrated cop.
It's Harish Kalyan who dominates the screen in a stupendous action avatar, and later as the emotional son, lover and people's saviour. He is also convincing as the thinking man who rises to the occasion, conducting planned out mass protests on land and also virtually on social media, to achieve his goal of public good against power centres. He scores big time in the elaborate and effective action blocks.
The beautiful and poised, Athulya Ravi is impressive in the screen time allotted to her.
The scenes detailing the siphoning off of the crude oil by Diesel and his men, pique your interest. There are 3 songs by Dhibu Ninan Thomas that make their mark, with Harish Kalyan's energetic dance moves raising the bar. His face off scenes with Vinay Rai also are tension filled and gripping.
On the flip side, the movie moves at such a frenetic pace that it gives the viewer hardly any time to absorb, process and start feeling for its characters. There are so many characters who come and go (Karunas, Rishi Ritvik for instance) which makes it tough to process their contribution to the proceedings. A consummate actor like Vivek Prasanna is not adequately presented as a menacing arch rival, and so the face -off scenes with him dont leave the grand impact they should have.
Overall however, Diesel is a next level film for Harish Kalyan who shoulders this socio-political action drama with a terrific, high voltage, impactful performance. Diesel succeeds in its attempt to elaborate on a different subject from the usual, in an engaging format of a grandly made, gripping, commercial entertainer.
Rating 3.5/5
