Kalki movie review: Tovino Thomas fits the bill as fiery cop

Kalki is the tenth avatar of Hindu god Vishnu to end the 'Kali Yuga'. When you walk into a film with the same title, you would know exactly what to expect. So a movie that has Tovino Thomas – that too as a cop – can tread towards one's expected notions. 

The movie opens with Nanjankotta village and an election that will decide its fate. Having more goons than ordinary people, Nanjankotta, is ruled by a political party - DYP - and its head Amarnath (Sivjith) and his brother Appu (Vini Viswalal). Hence the policemen at the 'janamaithri' police station do not have much work. When the Sub-Inspector at the station commits suicide, there arrives another cop – K - played by Tovino Thomas.

Unlike other cop movies, Kalki doesn't reveal Inspector K's whereabouts. Debutante Praveen Prabharam's making style has a freshness over the storyline. The screenplay, written by Praveen and Sujin Sujathan, resembles that of typical mass movies but had ample entertaining factors.

Well, the highlight here is the performance and technical aspects. Jakes Bejoy's background score is excellent and cinematographer Gautham Shankar holds his frames at a fast pace.

The K Swag teaser, which is available online, may bring back the memories of Duraisingam from the 'Singham' series. "Everybody rejoices, man on a mission”, a line from the song and you see, it takes sometime for Inspector K to get there. The colour pattern and pumping background score elevated the mood each time the protagonist did something.

This is the first time that Tovino is seen in a complete action avatar and he does justice to it. His looks and his stunts are commendable and he has a charm in uttering those furious dialogues. Tovino can set his own swag style and it is quite evident from the cheers he received in the theater. 

Though the cops - Sudeesh, James Elia and others – performed well, Dheeraj Denny's performance needs special mention. Saiju Kurup, KPAC Lalitha, Aparna Nair, Samyuktha Menon, Shivjith, Vini, Harish Uthaman deliver neat performances. Even as Samyukta is mentioned as the female lead, her character as Dr Sangeetha is barely explored. But there seems to be a struggle with the dubbing and dialogue delivery of the villain gangs giving an artificial treatment to the whole scenario. The scene where the villain arrives in shirtless six-pack may even remind one of Unni Mukundan from Michael.

The script threw light on several humorous situations and it could have been more interesting if it is weaved well into the storyline. Though entertaining, Kalki did had the potential to be the best provided it was made more engaging.

It's just once in a while that a Malayalam movie comes in this genre and Kalki gets a thumps up in that aspect. As Singam had part 2 and part 3, we can't help but wonder if there will be sequels to Kalki!