Sandakkari Movie Review:
If a film delayed by years doesn’t leave enough impact, it can often be dismissed as a casualty of changing times. But director R Madhesh’s Sandakkari offers little evidence that its problems stem from its release date. A remake of the 2012 Malayalam hit My Boss, starring Dileep and Mamta Mohandas, the film arrives with a dated screenplay, limp humour and a convoluted plot that struggles to justify its own choices. Even its attempts to modernise the source material only expose how little the writing has to offer.
Sandakkari kicks off in London, where Vetri (Vemal) joins Magic IT Company as executive secretary to the company CMO, Maya Azhagan (Shriya Saran). Vetri’s new colleagues warn him about Maya’s temper, but the two grow closer. Their unintentional and transactional bond soon becomes something more.
The makers of Sandakkari might have thought the delayed release could find similar success to Sundar C-Vishal’s Madha Gaja Raja (2025), which was released after more than a decade. What worked for the Sundar C film, despite the brickbats for some distasteful choices, was that it delivered regular laughs and presented Santhanam as the beloved comedian we were yearning for. Sandakkari has none of that. The film, it seems, would not have cut the ice with the audience even if it was released in 2019 as planned. The main reason is that no joke, healthy or unsavoury, lands properly.
The film is clear about its ends all along, but not the means. Sandakkari tries to innovate the screenplay, and give us a different film than the original, it leaves gaping holes. The film crumbles under the weight of its own complex plot points. Ideas like UK citizenship, marriage of convenience, and an app launch remain merely ideas, and the writers don’t bother to flesh any of them out. The elements of the Malayalam film that director Madhesh chose to add or avoid have no rhyme or reason. There simply seems no application of thought in introducing a rich Tamilian, with a degree in B Tech and proficiency in AI and Machine Learning and an eight-year career gap, ‘helplessly’ fleeing to England to work as a menial to launch his app.