‘Inga Naan Thaan Kingu’ movie review: This Santhanam comedy of errors is more error than comedy

There’s a terrorist attack in Mumbai and the next target happens to be in Chennai. The police are on their toes. Will they be able to avert an impending disaster?

But that can wait, alas, as Inga Naan Thaan Kingu is not one of those thrillers that Kollywood routinely dishes out or an edge-of-the-seat tale. It is a comedy starring comedian-turned-hero Santhanam as Vetri, a man who desperately wants to marry but just cannot find a girl. So what does he do? He joins as an employee at a matrimonial company!

“Sweet kadai-la vela panna rendu sweet saapta thappa?” (If a person working in a sweet shop eats a couple of sweets, is it a sin?),” Vetri tells his manager when asked why he is more interested in getting married himself, rather than achieving targets, which is getting other people married.

This is one of those routine Santhanam comedies that require you to leave your brain at home. At least that is exactly what the first half is, as we travel alongside Vetri as he scouts for a girl and finally ends up marrying a rich zamindar girl. Or so he thinks.

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Inga Naan Thaan Kingu primarily revolves around two things, both of which Tamil cinema has dealt with in excess: a marriage that isn’t what it seems to be, and a death that doesn’t seem what it seems to be. With a complicated problem at hand, Vetri — and a motley group that end up irritating not just him but us, the audiences too — has to find answers.

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For Santhanam, whose avatar as hero has seen more downs than ups, Inga Naan Thaan Kingu presents a good deal, because he doesn’t have to do much of the heavy lifting. It is written like a comedy of errors, with Santhanam and friends finding themselves in awkward situations, most of which are not as funny as they ought to be. The humour works in just a few places; the loud caricaturish characters, played by Thambi Ramaiah and Bala Saravanan, get on your nerves a lot in this 131-minute Anand Narayan directorial.

D Imman contributes little to making things better. The music composer hasn’t been at his best for a while, and that continues with this film, where he seems to have purely gone with thevibe and not attempted anything more. Inga Naan Thaan Kingu is one of those summer films that is more error than comedy.

Inga Naan Thaan Kingu is currently running in theatres