Comedy is serious business, and it took superstars like Rajnikanth, Chiranjeevi and Mohanlal years and many films before they could master the art of being a one-man entertainment troupe. In south, the ultimate superstar is the guy who is an all-rounder- providing romance, dancing, sentiments, action and above doing comedy in his films.

Vishal seems to be in a hurry to become the next superstar. So he has packaged the first half with comedy and romance, which sticks out like a sore thumb while in the second half he plays more to his strength of action, which he delivers with ease. At the same time director Bhoopathy loses track 30 minutes into the film and for rest of time wanders aimlessly in alien territory (5 fights!) and makes a come back as the humorous and whacky end title card rolls!

Anbu (Vishal) is a happy go-lucky guy, who lives with his family in Pudukottai and is having a good time singing energetic fast numbers like Kantha Kadamba.., along with his friends. One day he gets into a fracas with a local politician (‘Kathal’ Dhandapani) and his comic henchmen while trying to save a friend and is arrested and case registered against him. The local court gives him conditional bail, provided he signs the register in a Tiruchi police station!

On the way to Tiruchi police station, he sees a girl on a terrace (Motta madi) drying clothes and falls for her. It is love at first sight for Anbu as he becomes crazy about Malar (Priya Mani) a college girl, which leads to some hilarious situations. And in the police station where he has to sign daily is manned by his Chittappa Kanthaswamy (Ashish Vidyarti), a comic sub-inspector whose ex-lover Kamala (Urvasi) is the lady constable at the station. Anbu kindles the love life of his uncle and makes merry at Malar’s college leading to funny situations.

Meanwhile Tiruchi town is run by a powerful politician Palani (Devaraj) and his brother Guna (Ajay), who have killed the local RDO in cold blood watched by a huge crowd of onlookers! The brothers continue with their ‘dada giri’, till they clash with a brave heart! He is none other than our Anbu, who while trying to save Malar from a difficult situation ends up getting the wrath of the brothers. Anbu, the one-man army does a good demolition job and cleans up Tiruchi of all its baddies!

The story itself is a Kitchadi of Vishal’s earlier films like Sanda Kozhi and Thimiru, along with Pandian’s comedy track in which he tries to make the hero do all kinds of slapstick humour. Vishal is made to do a comic drunken act scene with Ashish, which is quite embarrassing as his body language and timing goes totally haywire. However in action scenes he is menacing and convincing. The climax ‘Matrix’ style fight in rain looks similar to Ghajani, no wonder as both the films action was choreographed by Kanal Kannan! Mani Sharma’s music is ok, and the DI work in the climax fight scene is impressive.

Priya Mani wearing mini skirts in dream songs is eye candy, while the baddies Devaraj and Ajay does all that is required to be filmi villains. To give it a more mean look, the director has disposed off with the normal white Tata Sumo’s used by our villains on screen and instead gone for black new model Ford Endeavour SUV’s bearing the dreaded registration number 8!

The film is predictable and slow moving, with nothing new in the story or treatment. End Result? Malaikottai is a big let-down.

Verdict: Disappointing