Review Raja

Review Raja
Born Tweed, Ontario, Canada
Residence Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Alma mater Ryerson University

Davis Courneyea (better known by his alias Review Raja) is a Canadian film critic, who reviews Indian films from the Tamil film industry. He became popular through his YouTube channel "ReviewRaja", where his team regularly posts film reviews in the English language combined with satirical film sequences of the Tamil film in question. His production team consists of college friends and colleagues. Among them are two Tamils, Rajeev Kugan and Arjun Mano, who introduced him to Tamil cinema. As the popularity of Review Raja grew, he got offers from the Tamil film and television industry. However, Review Raja targets mainly non-Tamil audiences as his often repeated motive is "bringing Tamil cinema to the world."[1]

Biography

Personal life

Review Raja's real name is Davis Courneyea.[2] He was born in the small town of Tweed, Ontario in Canada and grew up in Belleville.[3][4] He graduated 2011 in retail management at Ryerson University.[5] He lives in Toronto working as an IT consultant.[1] In Who is Review Raja? he talks about his family. Both parents, Shawna and Richard, live in Ontario and he has a two years older sister Destiny.[3] His father is an entrepreneur, who has been frequently traveling to India since 1991.[3]

Film critiquing

Review Raja

Logo of Review Raja
Available in English, Tamil
Created by Review Raja (Davis Courneyea), Rajeev Kugan, Arjun Mano, Wes MacDonald, Udaya Bharathi
Website www.moviereviewraja.com
Launched July 19, 2012 (2012-07-19)
Current status Online

Review Raja became a good friend of Rajeev Kugan, who worked in the same downtown IT company. In the summer of 2012 he met with Kugan and Kugan's high school friend Arjun Mano, a film student at Centennial College,[6] and decided to watch Billa (2007), starring Ajith Kumar.[5] Being unfamiliar with Tamil, or Indian, films before, Review Raja was impressed by the action sequences of the film, stating "It was like nothing I had seen before. I found the action sequences really amazing. Ajith punches someone and they go flying across the room!"[5] Later, Kugan and Mano brought him to Woodside Cinemas in Toronto, where for the first time he experienced watching Tamil film among Tamil film goers, "I was shocked, People were hugging each other, running up and down the aisles, throwing popcorn and candy in the air. Just because Ajith had walked (into the shot)."[5] As there was a dearth of English language reviewers of Tamil films on YouTube, Kugan had the idea to promote Review Raja as an English reviewer of Tamil films.[5][6]

Review Raja made his film critic debut on July 19, 2012 by posting a video on the popular trailer of Billa II (2012), in which he mentions that he watched Mankatha (2011) as well. Five days later a fully fledged film critic on Saguni (2012) was uploaded, where he used his 5-point rating system for the first time, giving Saguni 3.5/5 stars. Here he also introduced his film certificate punch line "This is Review Raja certified." In Who is Review Raja? he revealed, that he is relying on subtitles when watching Tamil films, and that he planned to learn the language. Additionally he revealed the organization of his team consisting of director and editor Rajeev Kugan, cinematographer Arjun Mano, visual effects and 3D supervisor Wes MacDonald, a sound engineer and Chennai-based musician Udaya Bharathi.[1] The Review Raja logo was created by Kugan's brother Sanjeev.[3] They use Adobe After Effects, Final Cut Pro X, Cinema 4D, Adobe Photoshop and a Canon EOS 5D Mark II camera.[7]

In September 2012, Review Raja opened the Tamil Short Film Contest with a 30 minutes limit for each film with English subtitles, and received 60 submissions by November 4. Later, Team Review Raja decided to make a special video dedicated to the then worldwide Korean song phenomenon Gangnam Style. Kugan mixed it with the A. R. Rahman-composed song "Style" from the soundtrack of Sivaji (2007) under his musical pseudonym dJ.icykle using Sony ACID Pro along with Adobe Audition.[8] The video became a hit by crossing 400.000 views within a few months and is currently the most viewed video by Review Raja. From Pizza Movie Review HD on, Review Raja changed the rating system from the current 5 points to the more accurate 10 points rating system, due to public complains on past reviews.[9] In Thuppakki Music Video HD Review Rani was introduced, who made her film critic debut in Podaa Podi Movie Review HD as Review Raja thought the film was a "chick-flick and I wanted to see how a girl would gauge Silambarasan as an actor."[10]

Review Raja made his official debut in Tamil cinema with Venkat Prabhu's Biriyani (2013), in which he was cast to act in a dance number choreographed by Shobi.[10]

Media coverage

After a couple of weeks of their existence, Review Raja won the Ottawa Rickshaw's online voting contest to feature a free advertisement on their rickshaws to spread Tamil cinema awareness.[11] Taking notice of the rising popularity, Galatta, a South Indian film magazine, arranged a partnership with Review Raja. Review Raja came the first time in contact with Tamil film stars, when he welcomed the Aadhi Bhagavan film crew at Toronto Pearson International Airport. The team around Ameer Sultan, Jayam Ravi, Neetu Chandra, Yuvan Shankar Raja and Ganesh Venkatraman were posing and chatting with Review Raja in front of the media.[12] A growing number of Indian newspaper companies featured stories about Review Raja.[13] In February 2013, Review Raja left Toronto to visit Chennai, where he was interviewed by the leading English newspaper The Hindu and met numerous Tamil film personalities, including Vijay, Gautham Menon, Venkat Prabhu, Yuvan Shankar Raja and Prabhu Deva.[3] He also met Rekhs, an English subtitle specialist for Tamil films, on whom Review Raja relies on when he watches Tamil films.[3] The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) featured him in the news show The National [14] and in Ontario Morning of CBC Radio One, where Review Raja announced that he would be a jury member of the 7th Vijay Awards, presented by the News Corporation-owned Indian Tamil television channel STAR Vijay.[15]

List of reviewed films

10 points rating system (current)

Year Film YouTube video Cast Story Direction Music Camera SFX Overall rating
2013 Thalaivaa Review 8.5 8.0 7.0 9.0 N/A 8.13
Singam 2 Review 7.0 7.0 6.0 6.5 N/A 6.62
Ethir Neechal Review 7.0 7.5 9.0 6.0 N/A 7.37
Udhayam NH4 Review 5.0 6.0 6.0 6.0 N/A 5.75
Paradesi Review7.5 8.0 8.0 8.0 7.0 N/A 7.7
Ameerin Aadhi Bhagavan Review8.0 5.5 6.5 7.5 7.0 N/A 6.9
Vishwaroopam Review 8.0 7.0 8.0 6.0 7.5 N/A 7.3
Samar Review 7.0 6.5 7.0 6.5 7.0 N/A 6.8
2012Alex Pandian Review 6.0 5.0 4.0 5.0 6.0 N/A 5.1 [note 1]
Kumki Review 8.0 7.0 7.5 7.0 9.0 N/A 7.7
Neethaane En Ponvasantham Review 7.0 4.5 6.0 7.0 7.0 N/A 6.2
Naan Ee Review 6.5 7.0 7.5 6.5 8.0 9.0 7.2
Podaa Podi Review 6.0 6.0 6.0 9.0 6.5 N/A 6.7 [note 2]
Thuppakki Review 9.0 7.5 9.0 6.0 8.5 N/A 8.0
Pizza Review 7.0 7.5 8.0 7.0 6.5 N/A 7.0

5 points rating system

Year Film YouTube video Cast Story Direction Music Camera SFX Overall rating
2012Maattrraan Review 4.0 2.5 4.0 2.5 3.5 N/A 3.0
Thaandavam Review 4.0 3.5 3.5 2.5 4.5 N/A 3.5
Chaarulatha Review N/A N/A N/A N/A N/A N/A 1.5 [note 1]
Mugamoodi Review 3.5 N/A N/A 3.0 3.5 N/A 3.0
Sivaji 3D Review N/A N/A N/A N/A N/A N/A 4.5
Billa II Review N/A N/A N/A N/A N/A N/A 3.5
Saguni Review N/A N/A N/A N/A N/A N/A 3.5

Special features

Year YouTube video Description
2012 Thuppakki Music Video [HD] Dance video featuring Review Rani choreographed by Cre8ive Arts
Tamil Gangnam Style - Review Raja [HD] parody of Gangnam Style and Sivaji (2007), mixed by dJ.icykle (Rajeev Kugan)[8]
Tamil Short Film Contest - Review Raja
WHO IS REVIEW RAJA?

Filmography

Year Film Role
2013 Biriyani special appearance in a song

Notes

  1. 1 2 "not Review Raja certified"
  2. ↑ in collaboration with Review Rani

References

  1. 1 2 3 Subramanian, Karthik (12 February 2013). "Distance, language no barrier for 'Review Raja'". The Hindu. Retrieved 12 February 2013.
  2. ↑ "THROUGH THE EYES OF REVIEW RAJA". Behindwoods. Retrieved 13 September 2016.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Rekhs. "Review Raja's mission impossible". Behindwoods. Retrieved 25 February 2013.
  4. ↑ "Who". Review Raja. Retrieved 12 February 2013.
  5. 1 2 3 4 5 Bhandari, Aparita (4 January 2013). "Review Raja: Ryerson University student became Tamil movie expert". Toronto star. Toronto, Ontario. Retrieved 12 February 2013.
  6. 1 2 "Co-creator of ‘Review Raja’ hones his craft", Centennial College Success Stories
  7. ↑ Review Raja. WHO IS REVIEW RAJA?. YouTube. Retrieved 27 February 2013.
  8. 1 2 "DJ.icykle - redefining Tamil remixes". Thamarai. Retrieved 24 February 2013.
  9. ↑ Review Raja. Pizza Movie Review HD. YouTube. Retrieved 24 February 2013.
  10. 1 2 "Raja shakes a leg at DC". Deccan Chronicle. 16 February 2013. Retrieved 24 February 2013.
  11. ↑ "Rickshaw Media". ottawarickshaws.ca. Retrieved 22 February 2013.
  12. ↑ Review Raja. Yuvan & Aadhi Bhagavan Team at Toronto Airport HD. YouTube. Retrieved 24 February 2013.
  13. ↑ "Review Raja". moviereviewraja.com. Retrieved 12 February 2013.
  14. ↑ Review Raja. CBC The National. Retrieved 24 February 2013.
  15. ↑ Review Raja. CBC Radio One. Retrieved 24 February 2013.
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