Interreligious and intercaste love affairs have long been a popular theme for Tamil cinema. The movies usually followed a standard storyline of young lovers fighting against the opposition and closed with the lovers casting out religion in favor of love, usually accompanied a preachy speech against the ills of being religious fanatics. The theme has not been as popular recently with movies like Kadal Pookkal relegating religion to the background inspite of the lead pair being from different religions. Director Hari resurrects the theme in Kovil but unfortunately doesn't provide anything new.

Sakthivel(Simbu) and Angel(Sonia Agarwal), who study in the same college, fall in love. While Sakthivel's father Periyasamy(Rajkiran) is a man who values humanity over religion, Angel's father Michael Suse(Nasser) is a religious fanatic who refuses to step into a temple even to avoid getting wet in a rain. Naturally, he is dead against the love affair when he learns of it.

Kovil falls victim to the high expectations placed on its director. Both of Hari's previous films tackled familiar topics that were popular at the time they came out but were engrossing because of his fresh treatment. While Thamizh featured a believable, unwilling rowdy, Saamy's protagonist cop was ready to accept bribes from the villain and strike deals with him. But Kovil is disappointingly unoriginal. From its caricature of the heroine's rabid father to the predictable climax, the movie does nothing new. So though the movie is quite well-paced and rarely leaves us bored, it is eventually disappointing.

The romance between Simbu and Sonia is low-key but has its moments of sweetness. It does not feel rushed and though Simbu falls in love at first sight as usual, Sonia falling for him is more practical and based on his behavior (compared to Simbu's romances in movies like Dhum, it is more believable too). The scenes where the couple try to hide their romance from Nasser are well picturised. But more fun is the couple of clever games the couple play to get her cousin into trouble with Nasser.

The movie ends with the usual moralising but refrains from making it too long. It also has a couple of lame twists that fail to prep up the proceedings. If anything, they just make the movie turn even more cliched and cinematic.

Simbu plays a normal younth without any of his usual 'styles', finger swishes or punch dialogs. But that doesn't make it any easier for me to accept him as a hero. Sonia Agarwal is quiet as her character demans but also lacks energy and seems disinterested. Rajkiran is dignified and mouths his dialogs softly but convincingly while Nasser is a little over-the-top. Vadivelu has a lot of screen time and isn't terribly funny. But he avoids getting on our nerves mainly because none of his scenes extend for too long. Arali Vidhaiyil... is a catchy number inspite of its heavy theme while Kaadhal Panna... is quite an unusual long with some nice lyrics. Among the less impressive numbers, Kokku Meena... is the standard folksy number with fast beats while the start of Collegukku... sounds exactly like the Kamban Engu Ponaan... number from Jaathi Malli.