Irugapatru Movie Review

Films on relationships have died down in huge numbers from the early 2000s to what we have now, largely due to the attention span of audiences and the power of bloody and violent content to land butts on seats in theatres. At a time when such films would be labelled as a ‘bore’ right from the beginning, director Yuvaraj Dhayalan makes a proud comeback after 8 years with this entertaining and thought-provoking film that binds into our daily lives very well.

Irugapatru tells us the story of 3 couples – the first being Vikram Prabhu and Shraddha Shrinath who are an elite pair with the latter working as a psychologist who speaks people out of their choices to divorce. The second is the couple of Vidaarth and Abarnathi, who are troubled by their lifestyle, and the third is the pair of Shri and Saniya Iyappan who have a major misunderstanding after coming together through a love marriage. The film is excellent in depicting these three relationships first up, and showing us the problems they face with great clarity. Though the three stories hardly have any constant connection between them, Yuvraaj Dhayalan ensures that his screenplay structure is wonderfully woven with great writing strokes in the dialogues, situations and the solutions brought forward for the problems on screen. Yes, Irugapatru does feel like a psychology class at some points, but the film going onto steal our hearts later on makes this negligible.

Yuvaraj Dhayalan takes great care in putting forward many points that cause problems in relationships, and the simple solutions that can solve most of it. For example, there is a scene in the film where a problem between a couple simply arises cos of a small argument in the morning, but by night, it has broken into a big fight. Yuvaraj has taken his time to correctly analyze relationships, and has put forth a superb film that makes us think at every turn.

Just when the second half starts to wander a bit, there are a row of spectacular scenes for all the three pairs which bring the film back on track and make it a home run. The best thing about Irugapatru is the fact that it fully focuses on relationships and does not pander to preach anything, mention about sex and other deviations, or abide by any commercial compromises.

The cast are brought together for the film with such precision – Vikram Prabhu carries out a classy performance which is his best in recent times, the actor has a neat portrayal of the elite businessman. Shraddha Shrinath as his pair has an angel-like presence in the film, with  a stylish presence and powerful role. Vidaarth is expectedly excellent once again as the confused husband, his single take shot in the second half is so well done that it deserves a big applause. Very few actresses put in a good physical transformation, but Abarnathi has done her job to perfection in the film. After a long gap, it is nice to Shri back on screen and his emotional outburst in the pre climax will win you over for sure. Saniya Iyappan too has a very good role to play, with a lot of intensity to it.

The film has good music by Justin Prabhakaran with the song ‘Maya Maya’ being the highlight, along with a fine score. The other technicalities are good too.

On the whole, Irugapatru feels like a warm, tight hug. A film on relationships that is relatable and does resonate with you after walking out of the cinema hall.

Irugapatru Movie Review Rating: 3.75/5