One hears the sound of a car being revved up in Turbo Jose’s fights set against the high-octane but monotonous background score. This is an indication of what he is about to do, and thus serves as an anticipation. What follows however turns out to be an anti-climax because all of it rests on very shaky grounds that one stops caring at some point whether the car does hit its top speed or not.
However, taking into consideration Vysakh’s previous movie which happened to be a disaster called ‘Monster’; Turbo must have come with something better than before. It seems like Turbo runs on the notion that a film only needs basic story so as to have reasons for showing various action set pieces and bridging gaps between them. All Midhun Manuel Thomas does here is meeting this expectation. Thus, his career as a screenwriter keeps moving downwards with no chance to change direction.
Turbo(Malayalam)
Director: Vysakh
Cast: Mammootty, Anjana Jayaprakash, Raj B.Shetty, Bindu Panicker, Shabareesh Varma
Run-time: 155 minutes
Storyline: A major banking scam revolves around ‘Turbo’ Jose who loves getting involved in fights while Vetrivel Shanmuga Sundaram becomes the centre of these scandals
‘Turbo’ Jose hails from middle Kerala and has a tendency to get into fights. After another one of such incident happens it comes out that actually goons wanted nothing but harming his friend Jerry (Shabareesh Varma) who is in love with Indulekha (Anjana Jayaprakash). Owing to Jose’s support of Jerry under unanticipated conditions they end up in Chennai. They quickly meet Vetrivel Shanmuga Sundaram (Raj B. Shetty), an enigmatic businessperson trying to win influence over Tamil Nadu through some good old horse-trading, which is much in vogue these days.
Vysakh and Midhun, during the first half of the movie clearly lay out this story without any ambiguities or grey shades, leaving all the chase and action sequences for the latter. This also becomes one of several reasons why there is no surprise factor in it when the whole thing unfolds after a banking scam has been exposed as being central to its plot. Amidst all clichés that constitute an otherwise flat screenplay though, Midhun does manage to insert a few interestingly written parts like Auto Billa (Sunil)’s Marlon Brando act at a decrepit shopping mall where Jose comes out to his boss or Jose’s recollection of an incident from his childhood that explains his attachment to his mother (Bindu Panicker).
However, ultimately ‘Turbo’ will be memorable because it follows all those clichés adhered by other movies in this genre since time immemorial and never attempts anything new. Like every other second film now-a-days even this one ends with a hint at its sequel. One must give them credit for that level of confidence they say about ‘Turbo’ Jose in this film.
