I just saw a film that made made realize Tamil cinema should never do sequels. Singam 3 is directed by Hari and it stars Surya, Anushka, Soori, Shruti Hassan (for some reason) and Thakur Singh.
The Good

Surya. The man can act. He has saved some horrid scripts in the past (I’m looking at you Anjaan.) He delivers what is necessary as Durai Singam. This is his 3rd venture with the character, so there isn’t much to with it. This isn’t his fault - that’s completely on the script.

The other actors are fine in it. They work well with the script given to them. The plot itself is quite interesting in its social message. Sadly, there isn’t much else that's good.

The Bad

One thing I can guarantee is that Hari cannot write or shoot comedy. The comedy in this film is horrible, but for one joke about oranges. The rest of the humour falls flat and you can feel it. Even Soori couldn’t save the jokes - and that man cracks me up.

Although the plot itself was interesting, the execution was bad. The sped-up frames, the horrible action scenes, the bad subplots of a love triangle (really Hari?). Everything was going so fast that if you sneezed, you would miss the entire film - that's how fast the film is moving. You cannot take a breather in order for you to catch up on what’s going on - there is always something moving and none of it had to do with the plot.

The thing is Hari isn’t a bad director. He is known for his speed that’s how he told stories. Some of his good commercial films - Saamy, Singam 1, Seval and Arul (one of my favourite films) have the same feel. In this it felt too claustrophobic. This was clearly a producer thing or a horrible misstep by Hari - but I haven’t even covered the surface of how bad this film is.

The Ugly

Shruti Hassan. Once upon a time - a lifetime ago - I thought she was pretty and a good actress. A lifetime later, I’m regretting that thought. She is a horrible addition to this film. She serves nothing except for being a bumbling idiot to drive a horrible plot. She is such a 2-dimensional character and actress.

The villain was the worst. All the character does is scream, go shirtless, insult India, and repeat. I miss the days of Mark Anthony and Muthupandhi. Harris Jayaraj is a generally a good composer but I don’t know what happened - the music in this movie was atrocious.

Overall, this is yet another poor representation of Tamil cinema. It's odd because Hari is a competent director with some great films. But this was a complete misstep and clearly a money-grab film. Let’s hope Saamy 2 isn’t subject to the same flaws.

I give this film a 1.5/5.

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