Kandha Koattai serves up the two most popular aspectsof a masala movie - romance and action - in almost equal proportions. While it atleast tries to offer something new in the romance via the characterization of its leads, it doesn't even make the attempt to do so in the action department. While that's only one of its numerous flaws, its fast pace helps overlook most of them.

Shiva(Nakul), who lives in Chennai, pooh-poohs the concept of love and his day isn't complete unless he breaks up atleast one couple that is in love. Pooja(Poorna), who lives in Nagercoil, is his exact opposite. She is a firm believer in love and is well-known for uniting young lovers. Pooja's cousin asks for her help in his own affair and she travels to Chennai to assist him. Her first few meetings with Shiva don't go too well and things aren't gonna get better since the girl Pooja's cousin is love with is none other than Shiva's sister Girija.

While we normally don't expect much importance to be given to characterization in masala movies, the lack of depth in the characters in Kandha Koattai is still an unpleasant surprise. We know only enough about the characters as necessary for the screenplay and little more. The clearest example of this is the fact that we don't even know what Nakul does for a living. Also everything in the movie, whether its the way in which Nakul exposes the true colors of a guy to her lover or the way in which he realizes the power of love, is presented real amateurishly. These things make for a very amateurish, insubstantial film.

The radically opposite views on love that Nakul and Poorna have make them an interesting pair. Still the difference hasn't been exploited enough barring some simple fights and their romance doesn't offer anything new. It simply follows the tried-and-tested route of the two of them fighting for a while and then discovering feelings for each other. Even the potentially explosive situation of Poorna helping Nakul's sister, which one hopes will turn out to be the biggest obstacle for their romance, is defused rather tamely by having Nakul undergo his transformation before finding out about the affair.

With Poorna's suitor dealing with his disappointment differently and essentially tying Sampathraj's hands, the proceedings temporarily show signs of being different. But the storyline soon reveals itself to be cut from the same cloth as films like Gilli as Nakul, employing a combination of brain and brawn, saves Poorna from Sampathraj. Nakul's plans are few and rather simplistic but they keep things moving and the way he makes Bala Singh a strong enemy of Sampathraj is pretty clever. Nevertheless things feel rushed and abrupt at the end.

Nakul plays his role like it is a continuation of his role in Maasilaamani but he does ham it up quite a bit, especially in his facial expressions. Poorna reminds us of different actresses in different angles with her resemblance to Asin seeming a bit more than her resemblance to others. Santhanam once employs Goundamani's tactic of coming up with a variety of insulting names for his friends but does make us laugh with quite a few of his quips and comments. Sampathraj shows up pretty late and doesn't add much variety to his role of the bad guy.