Excerpts from reviews of Drishyam:
The Hindi Drishyam, directed by Nishikant Kamat, works just fine so long as it reproduces its original twisty quality, but it nevertheless suffers from miscasting and unnecessary scripting tweaks. Wearing a scowl that occasionally lapses into a menacing smile, Devgn is far too sullen and cold to play a part that might have suited Govinda or Anil Kapoor better. He struggles, like the rest of the movie, to emerge from under the vast shadow cast by the original Drishyam and the redoubtable Mohanlal.
– Nandini Ramnath (scroll.in)
Ordinariness aside, Nishikant Kamat’s Drishyam is watchable and even builds tension effectively from time to time, but ends up an overlong, overbaked drudge, largely because of Ajay Devgn in the lead, trying to look cerebral and calm while assuming solid-coloured shirts will absolve him of the artlessness he has flaunted in recent movies. Don’t get me wrong, several parts of the film work and, for the most part, Drishyam motors along far more efficiently than most Hindi films — but isn’t that too low a bar? Is it too much to ask for an ingenious, tight thriller?
– Raja Sen (rediff.com)
The only thing worse than Devgn’s acting is Drishyam’s background score, which tries to reflect various moods, but ends up sounding like a tacky medley of supposedly comic and suspenseful sound effects. Between bad acting and a slow pace, the first half of Drishyam is one of those rare situations where you may actually find yourself wishing there was an item number. At least that would wake us up. Handicapped by its stars, Kamat ends up making a decent film that doesn’t live up to its potential, lacks wow moments and seems too long at 163 minutes. And that’s a shame, because there’s a good story and an intelligent adaptation hidden out of sight in Drishyam.
– Deepanjana Pal (firstpost.com)
The premise is engrossing enough, and there is enough of a pay-off when things gather steam, but the film tries our patience in the languid build-up. Both the formidable Mohanlal and Kamal Haasan, respectively, were terrific, the latter playing up a hyper-emotional core to the hilt, the former parlaying his knowing wryness as well as only he can. Ajay Devgn is a trifle stilted (the effect of those buffed-biceps pumped-up characters he has been playing in such awful tripe as Action Jackson wearing off slowly?), but it is good to see him try on a ‘character’ for size after a long gap.
– Shubhra Gupta (indianexpress.com)
What works against the film is the loud Ramsay-like horror film background music and mediocre performances by most other actors, except Rajat Kapoor and Prathamesh Parab. But do watch this film for Ajay and Tabu’s performances and of course, that one-in-a-million story. Content, after all, is the key.
– Shubha Shetty-Saha (mid-day.com)
…for a thriller, the plot unravels so lazily it’s criminal. Yet for those who haven’t watched the Malayalam Drishyam or its Tamil remake Papanasam or read The Devotion of Suspect X, the Hindi Drishyam will seem novel and entertaining.
– Aniruddha Guha (Dedh Minute Review)
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