Citizen Review

Dubbed movies are like moths on a rainy day - they come at you from all possible directions and then totally blind you with their overwhelming lunacy. Citizen, a Tamil film of the days of yore, is no different.

The opening shots show Ajit looking straight out of Planet Of The Apes, striding confidently as if heading for the 'Dracula' sets. We are then subjected to dialogue that informs us that he is no longer Anthony but is Abdulla, because he's supposed to be on a crusade of sorts. Yeah, right.

He goes undercover, working in the day as a mechanic and during his time off wreaking havoc on officials, which somehow reminds us of an obscure film called Indian. Nobody remembers Indian, anyway. So taking a whole tree out of the above mentioned book, Abdulla begins to don disguises, and then manages to abduct a collector, an inspector and other such specimens, all the while roaring "Citizen" feebly, so that the kidnappees know what address to give the cops. This is, of course, all part of the crusade campaign.

CBI inspector Nagma (with some misplaced machismo thrown in) is hot on his trial. She sniffs his village out, only to discover a mass grave. Where this grave came from, along with some bull and crow, constitutes the second half.

The flick is not shiny and new, but it does hold some interesting parts - like how the hell we are supposed to take Nagma seriously as a CBI officer when the whole of Hyderabad is strewn with her in skimpy clothes advertising the new year bash at a club. This is 'Face Off' coming to life. And like this other interesting part where they discover the mass grave. All the bodies are intact - dead, but miraculously intact. I guess they were embalmed before being bumped off. There are about 890 such other incidents splattered across the script, which will interest you if nothing else. And what was that Vampire scene all about?

Does anyone remember Vasundhara Das? She sets whole new records in frumpiness and amazes us as she plants and unplants wigs with a vigor that can only be termed as vengeance. Her main role is to act as a prologue to the songs, which are absolute rip offs of English numbers. It's painful to see "I feel lonely", and even Abba (nooooooo!), being torn to shreds in Telugu. Somebody get the number of that truck!

Like I mentioned before, the script is sorta silly, and at most times seems to be possessed by a retarded ghost. But then what isn't nowadays?