Kalabhavan Mani, a mimicry artist-turned-film actor as well as strong villain, has proved his acting capabilities in many movies like Vasantiyum Lakshmiyum Pinne Njanum, for the performance of which he won a Special Jury Award in 1999. With his unique performance as an entertaining villain (Gemini and Teja), Kalabhavan Mani has managed to establish himself firmly in Tamil and Telugu. But what about his popularity as a hero?

In the beginning of his career, after the moderate success of his Ben Johnson and a few other films in that genre, Kalabhavan Mani wanted to make it big as an action hero in Malayalam. But sadly, Mani lacked the star charisma of a Mammootty or Mohanlal to make his character convincing on screen. His choice of films and style of delivering loud dialogues have not gone down well with viewers. Added to the people's feelings, his style of acting is that of a mimicry act.

And it is a fact that the actor is now struggling to establish himself as an action hero in Malayalam. Many of his recent movies, including Kerala Police directed by Chandrashekharan, and Swarnam by debutant director Venugopan, did not succeed in the box-office.

So it seems that Kerala audiences have almost rejected Kalabhavan Mani as an action hero as predicted by film critics and film pundits.