Mirage movie review: Late twists can't save the Jeethu Joseph thriller that's lost in weak writing, dull characters

Mirage story: After her fiance Kiran is suspected to have died in a train accident, Abhirami is approached by three men for a hard disk containing incriminating data. One of them is an investigative journalist, while the other is a goon of the owner of the data and the third, a cop. Abhirami along with her friend Rithika need to choose her allegiance carefully as they attempt to retrieve the hard disk. But during the process, each of them also uncover secrets.

Mirage review: Towards the end of Jeethu Joseph's latest mystery thriller Mirage, there is a shootout in a canteen. You have three sides shooting randomly at each other. In a way, it also surmises the film — which has more misses than hits. 

Unlike the usual Jeethu Joseph thrillers, Mirage doesn't spend the majority of its first half crafting its characters; instead, it dives straight into the mystery — of a missing hard disk and the attempt to piece together random clues to find its whereabouts. Its protagonists don't quite know whom to trust, especially when there is a mediaperson, cops and money launderers being the interested parties. While this could have kept the proceedings pacy, it never really gets going in the case of Mirage, due to its writing that keeps the incidents and the characters insipid. 

What makes the movie, which has a story by Aparna R Tarakad and is co-scripted by Srinivasan Abrol and Jeethu, even more tedious is that the makers are more interested in misguiding the audience to accentuate the impact of the twists they have in store. But these come too late and by then the audience get too tired to appreciate, whatever genius is at play. 

Most of the first half hinges on Hakkim Shajahan’s Kiran and his intention. Even though he is hardly shown, why he decided to smuggle the hard disk from his company and why he hid secrets from his fiancee Abhirami will have your attention. But as the film progresses, you wonder whose narrative to truly believe in. Now, this is a great device that Jeethu had previously used in 12th Man, had it been also backed by great writing. Sadly, that's not the case in Mirage. You tend to stop caring for any of these characters, and thereby also nullifying the shift in their narratives that are supposed to thriller the audience and drive the story. 

Both Asif Ali and Aparna Balamurali don't make too much of an impact till the late reveal, and Hakkim and Deepak Parambol’s characters felt weak to be able to pull off a crime of the magnitude as the plot made it seem. Hannah Reji Koshy and Sampath perform what's expected of their characters, but nothing more.

Mirage verdict: As far as Jeethu Joseph thrillers go, this Asif Ali, Aparna Balamurali-starrer is among the weakest in that list.