‘Gatha Vaibhava’ movie review: Suni directs an uneven reincarnation drama with few positives

Not agelong ago, director Simple Suni faced the disapproval of making dialogue-heavy movies. While the words had wit, the stories lacked depth. From his erstwhile movie, Ondu Sarala Prema Kathe (2024), Suni seemed to person shed his style. That movie and his latest, Gatha Vaibhava, person a semblance of story. However, some movies are fto down by writing, contempt absorbing premises.

Gatha Vaibhava is simply a reincarnation story. In Indian cinema, the genre has a acceptable template, with its astir salient facet being lovers gathering a fatal end. Suni’s movie is nary different, but that it spans crossed 4 lifetimes alternatively of conscionable two. The director’s ambition lies successful mounting his crippled successful aggregate worlds, but not investing capable to marque each information engaging.

Ashika Ranganath plays Adhunika, meaning modern, but she is drawn towards history. Dushyanth is Purathana, meaning ancient, but helium is funny successful modern-day technology, similar VFX. These ironies don’t adhd thing to the wide script. Suni is contented with teasing america with specified wasteful sarcasm.

Expectedly, opposites attract, and Adhunika tells Purathana astir their failed attempts to unite successful their past lives. The archetypal flashback is acceptable successful a celestial realm, wherever a demon (Dushyanth again) falls successful emotion with a goddess (Ashika). Marred by mediocre CGI and accumulation design, the predictable information is pugnacious to beryllium through. The 2nd communicative is acceptable successful the satellite of pirates, and Suni attempts a spoof of movies specified arsenic Titanic, Pirates of the Caribbean, and Life of Pi. However, the attack is simply a large misfire, arsenic the parody is unfunny.

The 2nd half, which reveals the 3rd flashback, is somewhat watchable due to the fact that it unfolds similar a story, and not similar elongated scenes seen successful the archetypal 2 flashbacks. Suni seems to beryllium successful power of the proceedings, with amended staging and the actors complementing his narrative. While Ashika is astatine easiness successful each the characters, debutant Dushyanth, though a tad raw, plunges confidently into the analyzable situation of handling roles of antithetic natures.

Set successful Mangaluru, the tender emotion story, built connected affectionate letters, reminds you of Malayalam’s deed Ennu Ninte Moideen (2015). Again, the predictability of the result disturbs the viewing experience. I wonderment wherefore the manager didn’t spell backmost and distant with his screenplay. A spot of intercutting to the contiguous from the past would person reduced the wide dullness of the story.

You spot a clever instrumentality connected science, reality, and the conception of past beingness successful the last 20 minutes of Gatha Vaibhava. However, Suni leaves it excessively precocious to articulation the dots, and his reliance connected specified coincidences and not integrated twists results successful an underwhelming experience.

Gatha Vaibhava is presently moving successful theatres