Rating: ***

Robot, a film that is being touted as the most expensive Asian film of our times, has been directed by S Shankar.

Well expensive or not, the film is certainly path breaking in some ways in that it truly fits into the sci-fi genre and provides for a kind of entertainment we have not seen in Indian cinema before. You can expect some interesting action, a cohesive plot and a very young looking Rajnikant from this film.

Robot or Enthiran, revolves around a scientist Vaseegaran and his creation android robot, which he has designed to help the Indian army during combat. A few accident and mishaps forces him to program his robot with emotions adding to him many human traits.

But this would end up threatening Vaseegaran’s own love life as the Robot or Chitti as he is called falls in love with Sana who is Vasaagaran’s girlfriend.

Robot or Enthiran is certainly an intelligent film. It has a flowing plot and all elements of a typical masala film. The Hindi audience may find the quirks of South Indian films a little anomalous, but then I guess they are just a part of the package.

The film tries to do the sci-fi genre a lot of justice and incorporates a lot of stuff we have seen in international films. The CGI works very well with the character of the film. The fight sequences and the Robot’s idiosyncratic behavior are also interesting to watch.

At no point do you feel the urge to walk out mid way through the film  even if you’re watching the dubbed version. The film engaging, different and new.

Now the negatives. The love angle twist to the film spoils a large part of the fun. We wonder why the filmmaker would want to explore something so novel and then give it away by bringing in such typical elements.

Why Aishwarya Rai would play moll to a southern superstar without having a meaty role is also difficult to understand.