Director Nelson Dilipkumar's latest outing has many of the similar elements that made his directorial debut Kolamavu Kokila (2018) a hit. A middle-class family, thrown into a world of deceit and crime, dollops of dark humour and a motley crew of quirky, eccentric characters.
Sivakarthikeyan plays the titular 'Doctor, a seemingly emotionless army surgeon, who makes it his personal mission to find the kidnapped niece of his fiancé. He assembles a rag-tag bunch of misfits to perform the task, which is where an excellent Yogi Babu and an over-the-top Redin Kingsley make their grand entrance.
The duo manages to infuse a lot of humor which combined with outlandish twists and turns makes the first hour quite entertaining. However, the movie loses steam towards the end with the logical inconsistencies and the ease with which the many issues in the film are resolved by the climax, leaving the viewer dissatisfied.
Sivakarthikeyan has clearly given his all for the role, playing the scheming, Machiavellian doctor with ease, nailing the body language and mannerisms of the extremely practical-minded character. Another notable performance was Deepa Shankar as the bungling house maid who delivers some of the funniest dialogues in the film, accentuated by her funny expressions.
Milind Soman delivers a characteristically appalling performance in a cartoonish guest role while the heroine, Priyanka Arul Mohan is given precious room to shine. Vinay Rai, who excelled as a suave, debonair villain in Thupparivalan (2017), tries to recreate the same magic here but is let down by shambolic writing. This truly has to go down as one of the stupidest writing for an antagonist in a thriller film, such is the ease with which the hero dismantles his entire operation.
Overall, Doctor has more lows than highs. I just wish the director had managed to sustain the same frequency of unexpected twists and moments of dark humor that we saw in the first hour, for the entire length of the film. The setting of the stage was quite grand, the follow through, sub-par.
Just an average watch. Not recommended!
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