The movie 180 will be etched in my memory forever not because of its excellent cinematography or beautiful picturisation and not even for two beautiful damsels one can die for, but simply because this is my first movie with my wife and because she said so :-).
180 is a nice romantic drama. Sidharth who looks unbelievably charming throughout the movie gets proposed by two "out of the world beauties". But because of his medical condition, he runs away from Priya anand who is his wife; and avoids Nithya menon who is his friend. The film title makes sense in two ways to me. One as per the movie and the second is as per me; what happens when the course of one's life changes by an angle of 180 degrees? Though the performances and the feel of the movie are good, it falls short of making a deeper impact.How does Sidharth react to his medical condition is what the movie is all about. But to my surprise I don't understand why a character like Sidharth who is a doctor could react the way he reacts in the movie. Had it been any common person it's understandable, but a doctor?
The movie in the second part simply takes the oft treaded path of trying to invoke pity and there it becomes a bit dull. Anyone who has watched Maniratnam's "Geetanjali" in telugu or "Idhayathai thirudadae" in Tamil could find similarities with this movie. It seems that Jayendra the director couldn't come out of his mentor's shadow completely.
I heard that there's one movie called "Ikiru" by Akira kurosawa. In that the protagonist comes face to face with his mortality and in his remaining days he struggles with bureaucracy & society to get a playground so that the children could play there. I want to watch it someday mainly because it's simple and hits the nail on the head without any paraphernalia. "180" inspite of good performances and visual appeal lacks this simplicity. Otherwise it makes a good viewing with your loved ones :-)
