Entertainment is a major factor in India; anything that entertains you draws your attention. Passing time and increasing curiosity are few of the reasons apart from entertainment why theatres in India are flooded with people. Well, if you are among those souls who step into the cinema hall for one of these reasons, then Viacom18’s animated feature film Motu Patlu: King of Kings can be a good entertaining pastime fulfilling your curiosity about animation.
It’s a simple story with nothing out of the box or sci-fi fantasy that exploits the liberty of animation. Yet more than the story, the characters keep you hooked on to the film. So, you don’t anticipate what’s going to happen next because predicting the plot is easy but, you just simply go with the flow and have fun. It is one of those movies where you leave everything behind and just want to have some fun and get nostalgic about the comic characters.
If you are familiar with the LotPot comic strip or the Nickelodeon television series, you will connect immediately to the characters Motu and Patlu. Motu being the one who is ready to get in a muscle fight and Patlu being the one solving the problem with his wit. But in this film, there are multiple problems like reintegrating a circus lion Guddu Galib back to his home, encroachment of the jungle, protecting the animals and the jungle, defeating the antagonist Narsimha and his gang of hunters and teaching a lion to be a ‘lion’.
Wrapped under these major events are life lessons that the movie aims to impart in an entertaining way. The characters with their silly tricks and well attained glory make the plot interesting. And, Motu overshadows Patlu by causing trouble and then solving it too.
The animation looks decent. All the human characters are well created right from police inspector Chingham to Dr. Jhatka. But the animals lack a touch of perfection in some sequences (especially the bear and rabbit). The lion, his roar and his circus pull you into the movie and so do the beautiful sceneries of the jungle.
A number of sequences of the film like the waterfall, the lighting birds in the night, the lion roaring with the rising sun in the background and the image of the lion formed in the water by the fish are phenomenal. These sequences transcend you and for a moment make you forget that you are actually watching an animated film.
The long, overview/bird’s eye view or even wide shots for that matter display loopholes in animation with blurred background and unclear models in the frame at some points. But again the characters shift your attention and indulge you in the plot. (One of the beasts looks like a gaming character) Cosmos Maya Digital Studios has produced the animation for the film.
With lyrics penned by Gulzar, music composed by Vishal Bhardwaj, Sandesh Shandilya and Raju Singh and sung by Sukhwinder Singh and Kunal Ganjawala, the movie has a gripping background score and engaging sound effects. The dialogues by Niraj Vikram try to induce a Bollywood tadka and humour to the screenplay.
Suhas D Kadav has directed the film while Ketan Mehta (The Rising: Ballad of Mangal Pandey), Deepa Sahi and Anish JS Mehta serve as producers for the film.
The story could have been more engaging but the characters salvage the film; after all Motu Patlu is a brand which has considerable resonance. It’s an animated movie which adults in India rarely prefer watching on the big screen so let’s not give away the plot. If you don’t get entertained probably you might just remember good old comics.
