JAN 14, 2011 – Here, finally, is the other piece on Rajinikanth, the one alluded to in the comments section of this note about Rajinikanth. See, also, this first story about the man, the star, the superstar who keeps writers like me grinning from paycheque to paycheque.
“Gazing at a Southern Star” is what I originally titled this story, along with this intro: “What makes Rajinikanth Rajinikanth? Baradwaj Rangan attempts to explain the inexplicable.”
PS: Happy Pongal. Though I don’t see what we environment-conscious, non-bull-owning apartment dwellers have anything to do with the spirit of the festival. Well, at least there’s the food.
Posted in: Cinema: Hindi, Cinema: Tamil
Baradwaj Rangan 
rameshram
January 14, 2011
Dear Brannigan,
Thanks for attempting to profile me. Unfortunately you covered the wrong guy.
thx..
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Sandhya
January 15, 2011
BR – For some time now, in my eyes, Bollywood (the main course of my cinema diet) has become curiously unappetizing and cold-bloodedly formulaic; every hair just so, every joke pre-meditated, every act over-rehearsed. I have watched movie after movie of late, without experience that “hit”, that satiety factor that only a true ADDICT can comprehend. In this detached landscape comes a Rajni movie and more than once in those few hours, forces a genuine gut response…maybe I’m over-articulating, but I find even the most “playing shamelessly to the gallery” effort by Rajni Saar to be charmingly guileless and impervious to (as opposed to majorly desparate for or downright dismissive of) audience approval. Simply put, unlike his colleagues, he has fun on-screen and we have fun watching him.
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milo minderbinder
January 15, 2011
Wonderful read, especially the 2nd part about the “actor” vs “performer”. What is even more remarkable is the quick transformation from an anti-hero to superstar (easier to say in retrospect that the signs were always there, but he could very well have continued to be an entertaining “villain”). I never saw his earlier movies in a chronological order, but do you think there was a particular inflection point (1 or 2 movies) for the transformation?
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bran1gan
January 15, 2011
Sandhya: Do you watch only the big-star films? Those are fairly plastic and pre-meditated, yes. But there was, last year, Ishqiya, Striker, Well Done Abba, Love Sex Aur Dhokha, Udaan, Peepli [Live], Band Baaja Baaraat — that’s a fairly decent handful of non-star films. And there was Dabangg that “played shamelessly to the gallery.”
milo minderbinder: I would say Billa and the films around that time (like Polladhavan) were the bridge, allowing him to showcase both “anti-hero” as well as “star” personas. And that segued very quickly to Murattukaalai, where he was still a rough/tough guy, though on the good side. Even a little later, in films like Viduthalai (where he played Feroz Khan’s role) he was a good guy with shades of grey. But in the 90s, he moved over completely to good guy, and in mythological dimensions.
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kasi
January 15, 2011
Rangan – For some reason, I’d wished you would have avoided the MGR-Sivaji parallel to explain Rajini’s success. That explanation, has always struck me, as too simplistic and somewhat trite. It might have given him, a more clearer path to tread on as compared to Kamal, but his mystique, I feel, extends far beyond that. Why did you fall for that as well??
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Sandhya
January 15, 2011
BR – Agree that Dabangg was super-fun, had some of the best cinematic moments in recent times and yes that’s a fair comparison…(haven’t watched BBB yet) but disagree that I have to find solace in Udaan, Peepli Live etc, etc, each of which I have watched and loved. These movies made it inspite of Bollywood and measuring their worth alongside a Rajni discussion is a little bit apples-oranges no? When one has to go back to a well-worn collection of Amitabh Bachhan DVDs for true good-quality masala entertainment in Hindi, one begins to wonder if in general, mainstream Bollywood isn’t a little bit delusional. I think that’s why you have these previously unheard of co-minglings with big stars rushing to do Vishal Bharadwaj and RajKumar Gupta movies…but that’s for another forum topic.
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kumaran
January 15, 2011
Hi Rangan – Venturing to check out Aadukalam? Read some pretty good reviews thus far about it..
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bran1gan
January 15, 2011
kasi: I didn’t want to bring Kamal into this discussion. As I said in the beginning of the piece, there can be no single explanation (i.e. hard truths, provable truths) for such phenomena — only a number of theories. I tried to extend my theory, that’s all, and I’m ten other writers will be able to extend ten other theories that will sound plausible.
Here’s a thought: Why don’t you, if only in this comment space, tell us what YOU think is behind the Rajini phenomenon. It would make for interesting reading.
Sandhya: Ah, you were talking specifically about masala entertainment. Got it.
kumaran: I had very mixed feelings about Polladhavan — gripping narrative core, but very crudely handled. The shifts in mood/tone were so jarring and random, and don’t even get me started about the songs. But despite it all, I was fairly gripped and I hope Aadukalam is better. Won’t be able to see it for a while, though…
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Mambazha Manidhan
January 16, 2011
BR – What is this I am hearing? You will be interviewing Kamal for an event? How do we get passes for this?
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bran1gan
January 16, 2011
Mambazha Manidhan: Not an interview. More of an “in conversation with.” There’s a big difference. BTW, where did you hear of this? 🙂
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Anand
January 16, 2011
BR: Give us the details – like NOW.
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Anand
January 16, 2011
BTW, did anyone watch KamalHaasyam Jaya TV? Loved it.
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rameshram
January 16, 2011
Ask Kamal that I wanted to know why he prefers manmadan over ilaya thalapathi for just ponns of the India.
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Gradwolf
January 16, 2011
WAT? Pls let us know about this and if it’s all closed door discussion or it’s open for us mere mortals! And in agreement with Anand. The Kamal Haasyam program was kickass. Hope you caught it.
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Anush
January 16, 2011
As you say “The only foe capable of quelling Rajinikanth is time” … but if you saw the recent Hollywood movie : Tron Legacy , they have used to technology to successfully make an actor look younger. Jeff Bridges did look 25 years younger , but looked a lit plasticky too !
I mean this is just the beginning … a few years down the line the technology could be perfected to allow Rajini to play a young man and look really young . So the movies could keep on going , also there is talk that George Lucas is planning a casting coup by using computer wizardry to re-unite James Dean and Marlyn Monroe on screen in his next movie …
So you never know what future brings!
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Just Another Film Buff
January 17, 2011
“Now may be the time to ask why heroes who came after Rajinikanth, heroes who religiously modelled themselves in a similarly stylish masala mass-hero mould, have failed to achieve a commensurate level of success. Who knows? The essence of a superstar isn’t a formula that can be bottled and bartered. The only foe capable of quelling Rajinikanth is time” – That, sir, is the reason why Endhiran is profound. 😀
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Mambazha Manidhan
January 17, 2011
“More of an “in conversation with.” There’s a big difference.”
This is not a review, but a between reviews. Sure 🙂
I got this off the Tamil cinema community on Orkut.
I guess the reason Kamal refused your interview right after Dasavatharam was because he was well aware of the crap nugget the film had turned out to be and was sick of pretending otherwise to the journos. All those questions from your imaginary interview, I’m sure Kamal must had seen the same after coming emerging from the makeup trailer after 6 hours and seeing what KS Ravikumar had been upto while he was away.
But, now that you’re having a conversation with him, do you have plans to veer the convo to one of your oft-discussed topics in the comments section viz. the poor execution of Dasavatharam script and the botch-job it has become ?
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vijay
January 17, 2011
BR, I am glad that you have noticed this recent trend too. Which is that of indhi reviewers like Raja Sen/Rajeev Masand who had a jolly nice time ripping Rajni films and his fans to shreds every time they had a chance, suddenly jumping on the bandwagon and finding it “cool” all off a sudden to kick back and join the mania and fun. This paradigm shift in reviewing deserves a separate piece all by itself 🙂 what is the psychology behind such a shift in attitude? did they feel afraid that they would be left behind or looked at as some sort of spoilsports/partypoopers if they pissed all over Endhiran? I am not sure. But I find this intriguing. I believe CNN-IBN even gave Shankar some award for best entertainer of 2010 or something like that, if I am not wrong.
Reg. Rajni phenomenon, I feel the last 10-12 years has been different with the carefully machined hype, the spacing between films and keeping the curiosity factor high and reaching out to “family audiences” which is important for our distributors. The phenomenon has been manufactured to quite a large extent. It has almost become like a Star wars installment – to think of an equivalent phenomenon. You release them once every 3 years or so with the hype machines working overtime and you have fans dressed up in weird costumes waiting in long lines to get tickets. Rajni is quite the Darth Vader here. An amusement park ride experience. THat’s what it is. Not that it is derail-proof-we have Baba and Kuselan as recent examples.
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rameshram
January 18, 2011
http://idlebrain.com/movie/photogallery/golcondahighschool/pages/image039.html
Can it be?! finally a cricket movie where they actually play cricket!
(Golcunda High school)
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MumbaiRamki
January 18, 2011
Some points from my side ..
1) I think its the uniqueness in everything – if he can’t emote in ‘ chinna thayaval’ , its still unique , and keeping such parts lesser in count . He not only played to the gallery, but also played to the gallery of their sub-conscious that kept their balls in face sticked to him .
2) Even people who try to hate him , find their voice very bleak that infear of feeling secluded , they watch him more so as to hate him more , but *cannot* ignore him . We have trouble ignoring success, if thats not within our OXFORD’s definition of it !
3) Who is a star, in the traditional sense ? Huge fan base, producers queueing up , huge salary and most importantly make the common man make keep the collars up when he is seen firt in the queue – its not the expectations- barring endhiran, its always the obvious – that extension of our part growing wide, expanding to fill the screen – its ‘our’ part that has expanded – so he invested in being ‘our’ part – not just being an angry man like vijaykanth , but being a part of you !
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raj
January 18, 2011
I rather think Sayank Mhekar, Saja Ren, Majeev Rasand were all paid by Malanidhi Karan to give favourable reviews for Endhiran.
Sayank Mhekar used to make such fun of typical Rajini antics, the kind found in Chitti V2.0. I rather feel if he had written an honest review, it would have sung a different tune. Especially Sayank Mhekar’s review seemed to have some red herrings which indicated that this wasnt an honest review but one written for commission.
Raradwaj Bangan, Did you miss out on some riches by refusing to give a positive review for Endhiran? Or, wait, the staunch refusal to do the “Between Reviews” – was it because you refused to do a positive review and Malanidhi being Malanidhi, and you being in TN, you had no choice but to muffle your negative review between comments?
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vijay
January 19, 2011
Talking about Maran and all, I wonder if BR would do a piece on the politicization of the TN film industry,the hijacking of the industry by the K family and the way certain producers have suffered because of that. BR, would your editor allow such a piece even if you are willing to pen one? I think this is one of the recent disturbing trends in the last couple years on which not a lot of ink has been spent. Maybe as Raj says everyone is afraid that their offices will be set on fire if they write something about it
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Rahini David
August 5, 2016
So did the “In conversation with Kamalhassan” thing happen at all? (Discussed in the comment section)
Nice post btw.
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Yossarian
August 5, 2016
@Rahini: https://baradwajrangan.wordpress.com/2011/01/18/in-conversation-with-kamal/
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