Petromax is a Tamil comedy horror film directed by Rohin Venkatesan and produced by Passion Studios. The film starring Tamannaah and Yogi Babu is a remake of the Telugu film Anando Brahma and it opened to positive reviews.
Petromax is the latest to join the tried-and-tested horror-comedy genre in Kollywood. Barring a couple of scenes, in the beginning, there’s hardly any horror angle in it, but the comedy scenes that appear in the latter half make up for it. The movie starts with the plight of a dejected son (Prem) who comes to Tamil Nadu from Malaysia after knowing that his parents are no more. He decides to sell the empty house in his native as he is about to return to Malaysia in a week’s time. However, many people who showed interest in purchasing the house backed off due to the widespread rumor that the building is possessed by evil spirits.
He comes across four different people who are badly in need of money and offers them a huge sum on the condition that they stay there for a few days to prove to the outside world that the old home is safe to live. A couple of twists and a flashback story follow which engages the audience in parts.
Though the film starts off as a promising one, it loses the steam quite early but manages to entertain after a point – but it takes a little time to do so. If at all the film works to a certain extent, the credit should go to the quartet, which includes Munishkanth, Sathyan, Kaali Venkat and TSK. There are quirky backstories for four of them, and we wonder why so much of screen time is given for the same when the film has Tamannaah as the protagonist. But a little later, we realize that Tamannaah’s role is one among the many characters in the story. It is the backstory of those four actors which helps to bring the roof down in some of the episodes in the second half, which comes as a welcome relief after a tiring first half. Yogi Babu’s cameo also works when you leave your brains and enjoy his histrionics and dialogues. The reason behind the evil spirits, though, has an emotional story, falters in execution. The conflict between two gangs who hatch a plan to purchase the house also falls flat. The wafer-thin plot of the movie, which has ineffective emotional scenes, is saved to an extent because of the comic sequences.
