scudie.net

I watched this movie about 10 days ago. Wrote it off as reactionary bullshit. Now I’ve changed my mind.

 The first thing that strikes you about the movie is the simple way Nishikant drags you into Sridhar Vasudevan’s life. In under a minute, you are as bored, as tied down to routine, as hopelessly middle class as the protagonist. Vatsala is so typical, so blatantly real, I can see my mom mouthing the same lines 10 years ago (of course, I didnt fail in three subjects).

Yes, like any other creator, Nishikant takes a lot of liberties with his characters, giving them extreme reactions to mundane things, that make people like me shudder to contemplate. But do these extreme steps serve their purpose? Does Nishikant drive home his message?

 Oh, is there a message, you ask. Good question! My best answer to that is, maybe there is. For me, Evano Oruvan just raised  a hell a lot of questions and provided no answers, except of course, the easiest one.

Is the answer to life’s scary questions that simple? Is it, as Sridhar tells the street artist, just greed?

The character of Inspector Vetrimaran is a personification of our conscience. He questions his own actions, then proceeds to tow the line and obey society’s rules. For me, the most powerful scene in the movie was the one where he asks his wife, ‘Do you think it is possible for us to live honestly and comfortably using the salary I get?’. She laughingly says ‘I dont think so..’

Ah yes, back to the topic. Does Nishikant drive home the message? I didnt get the message. Didnt understand. I can understand the protagonist of Katradhu Tamizh going berserk due to the perceived unfair treatment he receives. I cannot digest a bank employee doing the same thing. Maybe thats Nishikant’s message? Maybe he is trying to say, ‘listen society, if white collar people start becoming vigilantes, we will descend into anarchy’. No, that doesnt seem to be his message.

Ok so I wasnt able to glean a message from the movie. But I wasnt able to enjoy it either. We’ve seen too many vigilante movies for us to enjoy this kinda deglamorised flick.

Evano Oruvan = Anniyan minus Shankar

Ok, you say, no message, no fun, whats the point of the movie then? The point of the movie, gentle reader, is to raise questions. A lot of them. Answers are your problem!

Go find out what the questions of life are, watch Evano Oruvan.

No, the answer is not 42!

This is not a review. Tamizh M A deserves more than a review. It deserves a discussion. Please leave some thought provoking comments! 

Director Ram is clever. Very Clever. He is the kind of guy who gives you reality wrapped in a dream and then rips the dream away saying ‘Hey the dream was just a way to bring you out of Wonderland, Alice!’ And once the dream is ripped away, reality stands there. Stark naked, dirty, puss oozing from its sores. You want to run away, but you cant, because the this is not a dream. Its real and it cant be wished away.

 Halfway through the movie, I had already decided to go the normal review route. Everyone worth reading has commented that Tamizh M A (another clever ploy by the director, pointing out that the mastery of language needs to be qualified by a foreign standard in order to be accepted by society, tis unfortunate that it had to be changed for tax benefits) starts off as something different and interesting but degenerates into the usual psycho movie.

 Everyone worth reading is wrong.

Make no mistake, ladies and gentlemen. Tamizh M A is not about Prabhakar (the protagonist). It is not about Anandhi (his lover). It is about the millions of people who are being left behind by a fast moving multiplex India which doesnt have time for its culture. It is a warning on celluloid. Growth better become inclusive. Else robbery and murder for a pair of shoes and sunglasses will become common (As told by Prabhakar to the cameraman he lures into filming his confession).

 Ram uses the psycho movie to send a much stronger message to modern India. But will it be heard? All the bad reviews about this movie reveal that Indian society lives in denial of the inequality that is starting to strain this country. When well read, intellectual reviewers fail to recognize the concept behind the ‘motive-less’ killings by the protagonist, it behoves amateur reviewers such as me to point out naked nature of the ruler.

 A much bandied about comment by reviewers has been that the director fails to clearly explain the motive behind Prabhakar’s 22 murders. Herein lies Ram’s brilliance. Using one scene and a couple of dialogues, he makes the entire storyline about the murders redundant. Essentially he tells the viewer, ‘He might have murdered 22 people, or just hallucinated that he did it, but thats not the point of this movie. The point is that these kinds of things are happening due to rising inequality and unhappiness of people who happen to follow their hearts rather than heads.’

 I wont be writing about the performances (awesome), the cinematography (i had to compensate for not blinking during the movie) and the music (yuvan IS the next raja). For me, the screenplay and direction were enough. Tamil cinema is ready for the world now.

A standing ovation to Ram. I await his next movie with bated breath.

Whats Next? MOSS - Master of Social Service? Yaaaaawnn…