With Devan, Arun Pandiyan showed us that he was unwilling to stick to 'safe' romantic or masala formulae followed by other directors. With Vikatan, his second effort as director, he sticks to the promise to deliver a better feature than his first. It is a fairly engaging thriller with an interesting premise at its core. I, for one, am definitely looking forward to his next directorial venture.

Rammohan(Harish Raghavendra), after five long years of saying 'no' to getting married, agrees to wed Gowri(Gayatri Raghuram) after seeing her picture. But he gets a shock on his wedding night when Gowri turns out to be the exact opposite of what he has imagined her to be. While he had thought she would be a traditional, homely girl, Gowri turns out to be an ultra-modern gal who even drinks. On the other hand, Kaveri(Uma), who Rammohan hires as his secretary at work, is the kind of woman he wished for as his wife. Meanwhile Rammohan rubs Selvakumar(Arun Pandiyan), the new policeman in town, the wrong way and Selvakumar itches for a chance to get back at him. The time comes when Rammohan gets into an accident.

As director, Arun Pandiyan does most things right in Vikatan. The movie revolves around an interesting premise but at the same time, doesn't let us lose interest while getting to it. Things move at a fast pace and there is a sense of unpredictability about what is going to happen next. There is no unnecessary comedy either (though Arun Pandiyan's sequences with his wife(Radhika Choudhary) at home could also have been easily excised with no effect on the story). Characters are shaped well and the key characters have shades of gray, which keeps things interesting and unpredictable.

While the movie does set things up well, where it does falter is in the second half. Once the key to the whole story is revealed, the movie has nowhere to go but down. The change in Harish Raghavendra's character is a little unbelievable but can be overlooked in the interest of the story. But his actions to hide what he has done are amateurish. They would have been really easy to uncover and this just makes Arun Pandiyan, the cop, look bad since he takes a real long time to figure things out. And even when he does, it is from luck rather than any deductive reasoning.

Harish Raghavendra cuts a sorry figure initially but surprisingly, becomes more believable in the second half. He seems more comfortable playing the confident man taunting Arun Pandiyan rather than the soft-spoken husband. Gayatri Raghuram gets probably her strongest role to date. Like Harish, she too gets to play two different characters but unlike him, performs well in both of them. Uma fits her role well and looks every bit the homely, traditional woman. Arun Pandiyan expresses his frustration well on being interrupted by Nasser everytime. Rama Rama... is a catchy number.