Shylock, the highly anticipated Mammootty-starrer, hit the screens on Thursday. With the right ingredients that triggers a roar of applause from the start itself, Shylock sets the apt momentum required for a star-movie tailor-made for fans.
Mammootty plays Boss, a ruthless moneylender, who is into film financing. We do not have any clue on his background in the first half. Nor do two of his accomplices, Santosh and Harish Kanaran know much about his past.
The build up to the star's appearance starts right from the beginning and director Ajai Vasudev has got it bang on. The mass entertainer marks the third collaboration of Mammootty and director Ajai Vasudev, after the great successes of Rajadhi Raja and Masterpiece.
Mammootty has tried a comedy track successfully in the first half and spoof is the character's hallmark. Boss' tiff with producer (Kalabhavan Shajon) and the bad cop played by Siddique is the crux of the plot.
Mammootty's energetic screen presence is undoubtedly the biggest highlight and many of his dialogues have been sort of adapted from other movies, though this has been crafted well by the script writers.
So we get to have some punch dialogues even from a Rajni blockbuster, but it suits the situations unravelled in the movie.
The storyline is kept under the wraps in the first half but the director unleashes an energetic Boss to treat the fans.
Rajkiran, the senior Tamil actor essays a key role in Shylock, which features Meena also in a key role, though both of them get screen space only in the second half.
There is a huge star cast in Shylock, though movie has a relatively shorter runtime of two hours and ten minutes.
Director Ajai Vasudev himself dons a role with a villainous hue in the movie. The Mammootty starrer is jointly scripted by Aneesh Hameed and Bibin Mohan and the writers have done justice to suit the star value of the movie.
Gopi Sundar has composed the tunes for this flick with lyrics penned by Harinarayanan. Shylock even has an item number.
Renadive has cranked the camera. Joby George is bankrolling the venture under his banner Goodwill Entertainment.
The action scenes of Shylock have been tailored to suit Boss' mega halo in the movie. The movie has a comedy track but it often gets into thriller mode too.
The scenes to grab the attention of a family audience is weaved in the second half and it has a lot of bloodshed too as the director opens a window to the past of the lead character and scripts a dose of melodrama.
Shylock has probably succeeded in getting a right box office mix. Reading between the punch lines in the later half, the filmmakers drop hints that it would have a second part too.
That would depend on the commercial success of the movie, but the initial pull suggests that it would be a money spinner.