Spoilers ahead…
Recently, I saw a Malaysian film titled Jagat, directed by Shanjhey Kumar Perumal. The films from the country are usually in Bahasa Malaysia, but this one is in Tamil. It’s about the plight of Malaysian Tamils who used to work on estates, but were forced to migrate to the cities when these estates were sold off. Without governmental support, many of them ended up in minimum-wage jobs. It’s a story of urban poverty and crime, and this film kept coming to mind while I watched Pa. Ranjith’s Kabali. One reason is that the latter tells a similar story, about a man from the oppressed class rising to the top of the Malaysian food chain. I mean this literally – a visual near the end shows Kabali (Rajinikanth) on the rooftop of a building, flanked by the Petronas Twin Towers. The other reason is that a character in Jagat says the only thing that could break his “adimai sangili” is money. And here’s Kabali, the millionaire gangster. He has money and power. There’s a lighter link between the two films. In Jagat, the movies playing on TV are Moondru Mugam, Maapillai, Dharmathin Thalaivan… It’s as though Rajinikanth rules the Malaysian airwaves too.
But remove the Malaysian setting, and Kabali plays like… a Rajinikanth movie. A revenge drama. It would be silly to expect the grime and grit of an indie production like Jagat in a mega-budget Superstar movie whose seemingly endless pre-release publicity has spanned the earth to the sky (courtesy, Air Asia), but given that Pa. Ranjith is behind the camera, there is a sense of a letdown. It’s as though, given the biggest stage of his still-young career, the director went up before the audience and got a severe case of the jitters. The meat of Kabali is a gangster story that attempts to tease out some history about Malaysian Tamils. The suits Kabali wears aren’t just a fashion statement. The coat, the tie – they’re symbols of a rung of capitalism people like Kabali weren’t allowed to set foot on. (They’re also a nod to Ambedkar’s sartorial tastes.) But as with Ranjith’s Madras, these are scribbles on the margins of an all-too-familiar story.
Ranjith is an intriguing filmmaker. On the one hand, he seems to load his films with Dalit subtext. But on the other hand, he makes sure it’s all just… subtext. It doesn’t rise to the surface and grab us by the throat, the way it does in the films of Nagraj Manjule. A Fandry or Sairat is inconceivable outside of a Dalit framework: the films can be viewed no other way. But because Ranjith transforms all his Dalit references into Easter eggs, they become some sort of elaborate did-you-spot-this? game rather than an integral, inextricable part of the narrative. Madras and Kabali can be viewed as Dalit films. But to many, they are simply generic star vehicles – “generic” because most hero-centric films are built around people oppressed due to their class rather than caste. When we first set eyes on Kabali, he is in prison, reading My Father Baliah, by YB Satyanarayana, a book rooted in the Telengana Dalit experience. We want it to mean something. We want it to inform the protagonist’s actions in a meaningful way. But the way the film ends up, this is really no different from the copy of Joseph Campbell’s The Hero with a Thousand Faces Rajinikanth was seen reading in Lingaa. A seed is sown in the audience’s mind, but very little sprouts from it.
One of the most distinctive bits in the much-viewed Kabali teaser had Rajinikanth imitating MN Nambiar, whose sidekicks on screen were usually named Kabali. But think back, also, to the Dalit gardener Nambiar played in the MGR vehicle Naadodi. He transforms into the head of a group of bandits (in other words, a gangster of those times), and utters lines that Rajinikanth could have uttered in Kabali: “Yenna endha samoogam midhichu thuvachadho, adhaiye naan etti odhakkaren. Andha samoogam ippo en kaaladiyil kedakku.” There is little doubt that this man is an “untouchable,” because in an early scene where this gardener steps into his employer’s house, the latter throws him out and orders a servant to clean up the place where he stood. But in Kabali, when we hear the words “untouchable, a.k.a. Kabali” – sung in a seductive hip-hop style in the song Veera Thurandhara – they could simply mean that no one can touch… the man’s gangsta coolth. Maybe a mega-budget star vehicle cannot really accommodate a filmmaker’s personal politics. Maybe we have to wait for Ranjith to make a small movie without a Karthi or a Rajinikanth to see him tackle these issues in an overt manner. (Only the smaller films like Gouravam seem to talk about caste openly.)
But where Ranjith scores over Manjule is in his refusal to show stereotypical portrayals of Dalits (that is, if we want to read his characters that way.) These characters aren’t in villages, performing lowly jobs that no one else will do (or touch). In Attakathi, they harbour naïve ideas of romance (just like everyone else) and go chasing women, without a care that caste might come in the way. In Madras, they work in software companies. And now, we have a gangster-don. Some dialogues are undeniably powerful. I especially liked one that comes early on, when Kabali and his friend (John Vijay) pass a large cage filled with exotically plumed birds. Kabali says that birds should be free. The friend says they have been caged for their protection; if set free, they will be devoured by bigger birds, birds of prey. Kabali replies, “Unnoda karunai adhoda saavai vida kodooramanadhu.” The line stings like a whiplash, and it echoes the lyrics in the song Ulagam oruvanukkaa: Every man gotta right / To decide his destiny / I’d rather die standing up than / Living life on my knees. But there just aren’t enough of these lines, these scenes, these whiplashes.
The primary narrative thread in Kabali deals with the (gang) war between Kabali and Tony Lee (Winston Chao), a purring Malay (I’m assuming) who wears his silken suits with the entitlement of generations of privilege. This conflict is, of course, a metaphor, for the antagonism between Malaysian-Tamils and natural-born Malays – but the way all this plays out is hardly new or interesting. One of the strengths of Ranjith as a writer is the way he shapes the supporting characters – but no one registers here. Kabali is filled with familiar faces. Kishore. Attakathi Dinesh. Kalaiyarasan. Riythvika. But Ranjith could have cast unknowns and nothing would have changed – they all get so little to do. A lot of the film looks as though epic-length subplots were compressed into one or two shots. It seems a great idea (a great Rajini-film idea) to have a Merc mow down a bad guy – but we don’t know this man yet, and we don’t get the primal satisfaction we should get from on-screen revenge. Or take the scene where the Riythvika character rails at Kabali for abandoning his pregnant wife. It harks back to her own pregnancy, which is referred to so casually that a scene that should have slammed down on us like a ton of bricks floats by like Forrest Gump’s feather.
At least some of the lightness, the lack of amped-up drama – I think – is intentional. Even within the cage of a Superstar movie, Ranjith is trying to be subtle. Another filmmaker would have given Yogi (a very ill-at-ease Dhansika) a rousing introduction, given the weight this character carries in the story. But she comes in like an afterthought, and it isn’t until interval point that we realise who she is, what she’s doing here. But again, this sounds better than how it plays out. Kabali unfolds like those noble-minded Hollywood biopics that try to do a lot, say a lot, and yet end up being not very distinctive, because the specifics that could make the story special are sacrificed to the bland broader beats. We aren’t emotionally invested in anything, anyone.
Except, maybe, Kumudhavalli, Kabali’s wife. Radhika Apte, who plays the part, looks ridiculously young beside Rajinkanth. (She looks like a little girl in old-age makeup. He looks like a sexagenarian in a wig.) She is a part of what is ostensibly the second (and far more interesting) narrative thread of Kabali, about the man’s personal life. But Ranjith doesn’t seem very invested in it (he keeps cutting away to shootouts and rather graphic violence for a U-certified movie) and Apte is wasted. But she gets one scene which makes you see why Ranjith wanted an actress of her calibre. It’s a scene where she breaks down after seeing Kabali after a very long time, and she makes us see a long-dormant volcano erupting suddenly with everything that was buried deep inside. Unlike many actors, she’s not afraid to look ridiculous – and that’s why she’s so convincing. This is the only time the film touches us. It’s a mystery why so many juicy emotional possibilities are left unexplored. If the fear was that taking these detours would make Kabali more of Ranjith movie than a Rajinikanth movie, then what about films like Dharmadurai or Nallavanukku Nallavan, where action and emotion were equally important?
Even the songs – an excellent album by Santhosh Narayanan – aren’t used as vehicles of emotion. They are relegated to the background. The film you imagined after listening to the soundtrack or even watching the crackling teaser isn’t the film on screen. Ranjith’s filmmaking is different too, and not in a good way. Kabali does have some of his trademarks – the way he introduces characters and their circumstances in a prologue-y rush at the beginning, or the way he uses little flashbacks to fill us in on what really happened. But the life that infused his earlier films is missing. The directorial confidence is no longer visible. You sense uncertainty, cautiousness. Kabali doesn’t have the lovely rhythms of Attakathi or Madras, where Ranjith gave us a sense of life being lived with micro-shots of people just… being. Here everything is a full-fledged scene. There are no moments. This isn’t to say Ranjith is coasting. He’s still trying to stage scenes. A scene where someone tries to assassinate Kabali could have just been about the assassination but the way Ranjith stages it carries an element of surrealism. But yet again, it works better on paper than on screen. The film doesn’t look very good either, which is something you find with many Indian filmmakers. They are brilliant when they shoot in India, but when they step outside the frames end up looking bland. (Another pet peeve: with rare exceptions like the nun in Anbe Sivam, foreign actors perform horribly in our films.)
And what about the big star at the centre? He does well, though his age is beginning to show – both in his physicality and dialogue delivery. There’s a scene where someone asks Kabali why he is a gangster when he is so educated. He removes his glasses. The camera moves closer. He gives this look, at once hard and wistful. He makes you wish for more such shots that studied his face. What a great still camera subject this face makes. Still. Another favourite shot of mine came when Kabali is in a hotel in Chennai, and the camera captures him not as a gangster but a father. The earlier edge is gone. There is so much warmth here, you feel this is what he must look like with his grandkids. And though we have the slo-mo walk and the staccato laugh, it is nice to see this star act his age – he kicks ass and yet, he’s vulnerable. He could use someone looking after him. Kabali doesn’t pander to his fans. No comedy. No punch lines. (The punch lines are all Ranjith’s). One of the songs in the soundtrack has this line: “25 varushathuku munnale eppidi ponaano Kabali appidiye thirumbi vanthutanu sollu.” I hoped that was an indication that we were going to see the Rajinikanth we saw in Thalapathi, which was released 25 years ago. There too, he played a low-caste gangster. There too we wondered if it was going to be the star’s film or the director’s film. But consider this. Mani Ratnam, at that point, had made nine films. He’d made Nayakan. That the two-film-old Ranjith is inviting these comparisons is proof enough that Kabali is just a small misstep. But a misstep it is. For now, it must be said that Rajinikanth does more for the movie than the movie does for him.
KEY:
- Jagat = see here
- “adimai sangili” = chains of slavery
- Sairat = see here
- Madras = see here
- My Father Baliah = see here
- Lingaa = see here
- Naadodi = see here
- Yenna endha samoogam midhichu… = The society that crushed me now lies at my feet.
- Gouravam = see here
- “Unnoda karunai adhoda saavai vida kodooramanadhu.” = Your compassion is crueller than the prospect of its death.
- Anbe Sivam = see here
- “25 varushathuku munnale eppidi ponaano Kabali appidiye thirumbi vanthutanu sollu.” = The Kabali from 25 years ago is back.
An edited version of this piece can be found here. Copyright ©2016 The Hindu. This article may not be reproduced in its entirety without permission. A link to this URL, instead, would be appreciated.
raghavan0418
July 22, 2016
Gotta disagree with you on this one. I liked the film, because I saw beyond the story to the character of Kabali.
Here’s my review…
http://mohansmovies.blogspot.com/2016/07/kabali-grin-and-beard-it.html
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the brangan fan
July 22, 2016
finally……a review worthy of a film like this
but i expected you to make references to rajini’s recent films….because its obvious that how much ever dissapointing kabali is,it is leagues above what rajini’s been doing for over a decade
and one more thing….if kabali had not got such pre-release expectations,would it have been more satisfying? When thalapathy released,did rajini have the same demigod status and world wide popularity?If he did,would it have turned out to be something else?
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Meghnath
July 22, 2016
What a bummer it was. It has actually gotten to the stage where it is almost impossible for anyone direct Rajini. He is way too larger than life to be accomodated in a normal movie. I wouldn’t be surprised even Mani Ratnam with all the experience he has can ace a movie with Rajini in the lead.
Plus his age has really started to show up. Maybe they could have used the vfx(similar to Fan) to show him as someone in his 30s. Not sure if it’s a fitting way to sign off but i really dont want Thalaivar to embarass himself more with Shankar’s 2.0.
I certainly don’t want him to be remembered as the one who ended his career with a string of flops. 😦
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MG
July 22, 2016
It’s not a bad movie. Over promotions killed this slow burning crime drama. It resonates much better with Malaysian Tamils. There are some additional points that you forgot to mention. Tiger coming to kill Kabali in the end was a nice callback to the Crab story. The fact that Tony calls Keling Raja is important as Keling is a word used to degrade tamils in Malaysia. The last scene was also very unconventional for a big-budget star vehicle.
When I think about Kabali, I’m most reminded of Batman v Superman. Both were ambitious misfires. Both tried to deliver a different movie with their heroes and weren’t entirely successful. But both movies did something that made them stand out. They TRIED to be different. Both that reason alone, this movie stands above Sivaji, Endhiran, and Lingaa for me.
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sridharraman
July 22, 2016
Speaking of book references, I found the Terry Pratchett (Sourcery) one highly intriguing. Rajini in the Discworld! Mind explodes! 🙂
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Srivatsan
July 22, 2016
Pa Ranjith said that he had tried to bring back the Mullum Malarum Rajinikanth in Kabali. But the film has enough traits to remind one of Mani Ratnam’s Nayagan, that starred Kamal Haasan in the lead role. What if Nayagan’s Velu Naicker had a daughter who is not against her father? What if Velu Naicker’s wife Neela (Saranya) lived? What if actor Jhonny is the new Tinuu Anand? Is the dialogue, “Neenga yen sir gangster aaninga,” a testimony to the iconic dialogue,”neenga nalla vara ketta vara”? Are these some of the questions from Nayagan that seem to be answered in Kabali?
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nanda
July 22, 2016
”For now, it must be said that Rajinikanth does more for the movie than the movie does for him”
Ranjith had achieved what he set out to do, to make it more about the star than about the movie.
Do you have to bring up Mani Ratnam again?
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Madan
July 22, 2016
“I certainly don’t want him to be remembered as the one who ended his career with a string of flops” – Well, that is exactly how AB would have been remembered but for KBC. I have heard from news reports that Suryavansham was a hit but when I went to a cineplex (this was pre-multiplex era) to watch Badshah, nobody had turned up to watch Suryavansham and people regarded the aging Bachchan’s efforts to look younger than he really was with a mixture of amusement and irritation. That is sort of how I feel about Rajni at this stage, so I was happy that he is playing his age in this film. But the reviews are pretty discouraging.
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Abheri
July 22, 2016
I am not able to watch the movie and may not be able to watch it for a long time, but I couldn’t help but follow reviews online and try to get a sense of Thalaivar’s movie. In a broader sense, your review seems to indicate that the film looks much like Godfather 3 (Which is a movie, unlike popular opinion, not something I hate – especially because of the richness in the last scene with Don Vito on his chair, alone.) Is it really a Godfather 3, then?
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Prabhu
July 22, 2016
I was impressed with the film. Ranjith had to keep it subtle. As easter eggs. The film has Rajini and a lot riding on it. Making his statements overtly in such a setting would have been a bigger misstep. A cursory check on twitter timeline shows people blaming Ranjith making social commentary and spoiling the film. He has to work with lesser known actors, hone his craft a bit more. I hope he does.
I particularly liked the sartorial social commentary quite persistent in the film. Gandhi and Ambedkar made a statement with what they chose to wear. There is reason and politics behind it. Gandhi goes from wearing coat suit to almost being naked. While Ambedkar’ s case was the reverse.
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Dilip R
July 22, 2016
“The film doesn’t look very good either, which is something you find with many Indian filmmakers. They are brilliant when they shoot in India, but when they step outside the frames end up looking bland.”
I think Vishnu had done quite a good job in both Billa & Arrambam
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Prasan Kumar
July 22, 2016
Great Great Review. In depth. I knew the film wouldn’t do that well when radhika apte crying scene evoked laughter from the crowd.it was such a good bitt of acting from her.
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Arvind Sridhar
July 22, 2016
Nice one there, Brandy. Kabali at the end of the day was very underwhelming
You hit the nail on the head when you talked about Pa Ranjith. The confidence that he exhibited in his previous two films was absent and that was visible by the way the scenes were staged or how the character arcs were handled. None of the secondary characters made an impact. Be it Attakathi Dinesh, Kalaiarasan and Kishore, they are mere archetypes that have nothing much to do but walk on the line of predictability.
But again predictability is never an issue with movies as much as tangibility or should I say the lack of it. It never really made an impact on me as a viewer. It barely tried. And by trying to be a few things too many, the movie just manages to brush a few generic strokes and ends up being nothing special. It tries to be the emotion driven family drama of an aging don, his hunt for his long lost family and his vulnerability, it fails; it tries to be the story of a messiah for the downtrodden, it fails. And what was the ending all about (a sort of a a nod to Nayagan I.. am not sure ). But it was so awfully constructed. And the lesser said about the climatic showdown the better.
But I did like some parts of the movie. Rajini was wonderful. Watching him close up, gives an inkling as to how good an actor he is. Wonder if they could have had more close up shots of him. Like for example,the way he wails when he gets to know that Kumadhavalli is alive could have warranted a close up. And the first 20 minutes easily embodies the phenomenon. And those were the only portions that worked as a whole for me and the movie went downhill for me after that. Coming back, I thought Radhika Apte did a great job, considering the limitations of her character. The foreign villains though were intolerable as with any tamil movie. And was Kaba-Li and Kumudhaval-Li named as such to be used of an indicator that they were no lesser than the native Malaysians. You never know.
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niresh
July 22, 2016
I like the movie though I am not a Rajini fan. While watching the movie, it reminded me more of BR’s article on ho difficult it is to make a Rajini movie these days. Hope Ranjith comes back out of this soon.
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Shreekrishna Prasad
July 22, 2016
Too much pre-release hype killed an otherwise nice and much better movie than the likes of Sivaji, Enthiran and Lingaa. And Radhika Apte! _/_ What. A. Performer.
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Vishnu
July 22, 2016
Agree with most points. I do think Ranjith’s way of tackling caste issues is better than Nagraj’s. Also, don’t know why there were 2 versions of the same Nayagan reference.
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Priya
July 22, 2016
Long time lurker, first time commenter here. I’m Malaysian Indian. Kabali is the only film I’ve seen so far that portrays Malaysian Indians this realistically. Malaysian-made Tamil do release time to time but they have a reputation for being terrible. Even they only try to copy Kollywood and never put out anything relatable or remotely watchable. That’s why I didn’t think of watching Jagat.
Of all the reviews, yours is the only one who seems to understand the backdrop of the film. By the way, Tony Lee is Chinese. And that’s how the structure of actual gangs are in Malaysia as well. It’s always the Chinese at the top but the lower level gangsters will all be Indian. The people who does the dirty job and gets shot by the police are always the Indians.
And real gangs do have numbers for names. 43 doesn’t exist for exist for real though but 21,36,04,24 all do.
Caste is less of a problem than race here. You can be a high-caste Indian and still be looked at as a criminal here because Chinese and Malays don’t know caste. They only see skin colour. Malaysians are openly racists anyway.
As a film, Kabali is somewhat average. But Ranjith has done his homework on the issues that concern Malaysian Indians and chose to tell our story. That’s something nobody has tried to do in mainstream cinema.
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Neena
July 22, 2016
I usually comment here when I don’t agree with something in the analysis or comments; but, this time, it’s because this review articulates so much of how I felt about the film… I was happy, though, that the film was interesting enough to spark discussions and analyses in my mind, among friends etc.
About why Ranjith prefers to make his Dalit politics a subtext, I suspect there are two reasons: one is he doesn’t want to be shoe-horned as a Dalit filmmaker, but as a director with Dalit politics and sensibilities. Similar to why Mani Ratnam wouldn’t overtly call his characters brahmins (not all of them) or upper caste. We just pick that up from the mileu, language etc. The second reason is explained by the now much shared documentary about caste in Tamil cinema. He might not want to alienate large sections of his audience, or he might actually face some resistance among film producer/distributors if the film was openly about Dalit politics. This ‘ulkuthu’ is in a way more subversive.
Despite the ‘personal’ thread of the plot being more effective on the whole, giving that up might have allowed the film to do better justice to its host of far more interesting characters than Kumudhavalli and the Don’s attempt to take stock of what has happened to the community he once fought for.
Dhansika wasn’t exactly great, but I loved it how she was there just because. The plot doesn’t need her, there was another woman pandering to the appa sentiment. Even the reason she takes up the gun is not over-dramatised. She is subject to the same kind of anger, revenge-seeking and irrational moralities that a male action character is shown to have usually. For eg, she had no problem doing the dirty work for drug-peddling gangs until the assignment was to kill her own father…
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Neena
July 22, 2016
MG: I read the ‘free life foundation’ thread as something of an answer to the often reported ‘why are Malaysian gangsters always Indian’ or ‘why are Indians gangsters in Malaysia’ type stories. That’s why characters like Tiger or Meena were interesting, despite being underdeveloped in the movie arc. Also, the Soprano style ending left the question of ‘Kabali nallavara kettavara’ hanging in the air.
I dunno if this was intended, but the way Kabali came to face the students of the FLF that he’s been funding from jail, I thought he was meant to have doubts about the relevance of his own work/politics so far. Ranjith’s protagonists so far have been unlikely ambivalent heroes filled with self doubt – maybe that’s how he wanted to portray Kabali too and that didn’t work so well in a movie that had huge expectations for Rajini to regain his ‘gethu’.
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ganesh
July 22, 2016
It was a great letdown and you sir, have captured it perfectly. The director was lost between taking a gangsta, action flick and an emotional one. Like you mentioned the emotional attachment was not there for any character. The comparisons will obviously go to Nayagan and Thalapathy where you will feel for a velu naicker and surya.
In fact you will feel for Deva in Thalapathy, When he asks surya to go kill Arjun. The way how Kabali becomes a gangsta was taken so cliched and so loosely based that I think is where the movie failed. There was no solid reason like how velu become velu naicker.
And Rajini looked so tierd. His retro getup was hideous. One would think they would have paid some attention to that.
P.S: Long time reader, first time comment. Kudos to your reviews sir.. Ana Mani sara romba support panna venam ella padathukum. 🙂
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shaviswa
July 22, 2016
Hmm – I will wait for the euphoria to die down and check everyone’s reactions again. It is quite possible that the long hype surrounding the film and the frenzy amidst fans raised the expectations to limits that are probably unattainable.
Maybe we can look at it with a different set of lenses after the initial hysteria. I will wait…
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Adithya
July 22, 2016
Top review Rangan….. the only disapointment about this film is that the film that should have concentrated more on Tamils in Malaysia rather than focusing rajini’s revenge on tony Lee… this made the film more of revenge drama…. nevertheless kabali is one of better rajini film In recent times…
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venkatesh
July 22, 2016
It is not a Rajini film for sure and all the subtexts, subtleties are completely lost in the noise of a Rajini film.
I suspect 3 to 4 weeks later the film will be perceived as being better than the reception it gets now.
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Vijay Nandakumar
July 22, 2016
BR…. the movie overall worked for me as there was an intent/ attempt to tell a story. Like you rightly point out, the gangster arc is what probably let the film down- After a rousing start, the movie flirted swiftly into a generic zone from which it never came out. I however did like the underlying tone of the movie. If that tone had been developed unflinchingly throughout, this movie would have worked for majority of the audiences even without usual Rajini mannerisms. This may be one of those movies which is like a ARR song- Slow poison!
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shivkumarg
July 22, 2016
I loved the fact that Tiger is the chosen one at the end to do the honors because he establishes himself as a trigger happy guy in an earlier scene when he explains his obsession about using guns during that townhall with Kabali. Ranjith has definitely left his touches in the movie…though I would rate this as his third best till date. But i think it is a good first step to the new-age Rajini movie, with a balance of what his fans want to see combined with a subdued content. No duets, no humor….yet it was pretty engrossing for most parts. I liked the final scene as well which leaves you guessing.
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brangan
July 22, 2016
Neena: But don’t you think this ‘ulkuthu’ will result in these things being understood only by those already in the know? I’m not saying Ranjith is OBLIGED to do what Nagraj Manjule does, just wondering out loud…
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brangan
July 22, 2016
Posting a comment by Pavithran, who said he was unable to post directly:
Sir I read your Blog review for Kabali..
I completely agree with your review. I just need to add a few points.
In the scene where Rajini goes out of the house and cries when he hears that his wife is alive, I thought the camera would pan from his backside and take a close-up to his face – but I was completely disappointed. From the beginning of the movie, I wanted a close-up crying shot for Kabali, as it would legitimately express his feelings and would also add weight to the movie.
I think Rajini wore very minimum make-up (or no make-up, am not sure!) in the second half and I don’t know why he did that (although it added to his expression in the close-up shots when Kabali goes to Pondicherry to meet his wife).
Finally, I was not happy about Nasser’s role – he could have been given a role with more weight or he could’ve been placed in some other role; given his calibre, I think he deserves more than this.
Nevertheless, it’d have been an amazing learning experience for Pa. Ranjith at this stage – wishing him the best…
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Meena
July 22, 2016
How is this— ‘taken’script-AR murugadoss direction– Anirudh music-no female lead or a dead lover sad past, has a child from that that he doesnt know yet– she gets abducted and he finds the deadliest bad ass child trafficing gang.. Story that goes upto say south america..Rajini’s past includes being expelled from indian army for a deadly crime he did not commit ( or he did for good reasons, he was their deadly weapon like our Bourne) grand plot..deadliest villain ever better than ‘Joker’ crowdsourced screen play would be a great idea..
Just some crude thoughts from a hungry Rajini fan
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Neena
July 22, 2016
BR: Maybe, he’s saying, ‘you, the viewer, do the work. I’m not going to explain everything to you. after all, you’re perfectly capable of getting it when it’s a brahmin mileu being depicted. or a thevar or gounder mileu’.
For eg, we only need to know that it was mostly Dalits who were taken to work in plantations as indentured labourers, in order to see Kabali’s politics, sartorial choices in context. We only need to know that bit of history. But, as Priya says, the problems shown in the film might really be applicable to any working class Tamil or Indian in Malaysia. So, it’s a labour and caste struggle…
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meghanasudhindra
July 22, 2016
Wow !
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SRS
July 22, 2016
“It has actually gotten to the stage where it is almost impossible for anyone direct Rajini.”
This comment nails it.
Somebody mentioned Rajini should act in a Karthik Subbaraj movie next. That would be a disaster. Ok, maybe not. But it will still fall short of expectations.
Arunachalam was the last most satisfying Rajini film. Padayappa was crass, though it was a hit. So nearly 18-20 years of struggle is what this superstar has been facing. Chandramukhi, Endhiran might be hits, but Rajini was not in full form.
After all those struggles, the teaser of Kabali promised us a “satisfying” show of Rajini that we all loved. The teaser made an important point – we’ll attempt to “satisfy” the Rajini fan keeping in mind his age. This was a killer promise. Everybody agrees he has aged. But you could still write stories that accepts this premise and brings out the fire in him. And that’s what Ranjith showed he was trying to do. Looks like he achieved some of it but still fell short.
So who should Rajini go to next?
The 80’s-90’s gang:
Most of them have lost stream and are out of touch with current realities – P. Vasu, K.S Ravikumar, Suresh Krissna. Potentials (then) like Vasanth, Selvamani are nearly out of the game now. Maniratnam is going on a different tangent these days. There is no locus between Rajini and Mani. Bharathiraja is a spent force to the power of three.
Shankar is moving into a phase where he seems to be losing the grip. His USP was grandeur + tight screenplay. Now just replace that + with a minus. For
Millenials:
3-4 people come to mind. But we are in 2016 and it feels a bit too late.
– Dharani (Dhill and Dhool had elements of Rajini factor)
– Sundar C (Arunachalam was good, knows commercial formula well)
– Bala (too dark, though knows how to make a powerful film, might not fit Rajini sensibilities)
– Hari (Saamy, again had that punch).
More potentials: Mysskin, Karthik Subbaraj, Nalan K, Thigarajan Kumararaja. All of them are quirky and might not handle Rajini well.
So, who?
Let’s scan the landscape more. We have
Gautam (sensibility mismatch. Can do big star vehicles, but still feel he is not mature enough to handle rajini)
SS Rajamouli (potential, but does he understand Rajini’s age constraints? Question)
Vetrimaran (complicated choice. Might not deliver)
Raam (losing stream)
And then you have Ameer (was he a one hit wonder?), Sasikumar (sensibility mismatch) and a slew of one/two film wonders.
So, who?
Let’s go North. Ram Gopal Verma? Who are you kidding? The Shetty guy who works with SRK. He is a kiddo. But wait. Language is a big constraint, so let’s stop here (though we have some potentials from Anurag Kashyap gang). Same reason not to get some one from Hollywood.
So, who?
Did we do a thorough scan? Did we miss out someone? What about that Drishyam guy? He seems solid with big stars. Hmm. Maybe.
So, finally?
None in sight who can direct Rajini?
This brings us to one man who can do it. His name is Kamal Haasan. He has unique characteristics. He has seen huge stardom, he knows and understands what age can do to stars, he knows the Tamil milieu. And lastly, he knows cinema.
If at all there is going to be a Tamil film that’s going to be a fitting tribute to both these legends – it is going to be Rajini before the camera and Kamal behind it.
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gm
July 22, 2016
Thanks for the review. I’ll wait a while so ticket price drops from current $25 per ticket. With so many movies in so many languages (thanks for the subtitles), I depend on your reviews and Mr. Joe Morgenstern of WSJ to decide which movie to watch. Keep up your good work. Appreciated very much.
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Hermoine Granger
July 22, 2016
What a refreshing mouthwash Kabali turns out to be after the Linga climax! I felt that Kabali is to Rajini what Papanasam was to Kamal in recent times. It was refreshing to see him play his age on screen without losing an iota of his “gethu.” With no comedy, no punch lines (unless you count “Magizhchi”) and a dignified romantic track, it shows that Rajini is capable of stretching his acting chops if he wants to. (Pointer here to Vijay and other future Rajini wannabes). If at all Rajini is back to dancing with bikini-clad models, it shows how much other directors want him to do “mass” scenes for the so-called “audience-satisfaction.”
Was the movie perfect? No. Would I have been this happy with the same story enacted by someone else, say Sharathkumar? No. But is it a step forward in a new direction? Yes.
I’m so looking forward to what people might give him now to forward his legacy as an actor. For example, a juicy thriller like Vettaiyaadu Vilayaadu as an aging cop. I felt he was telling the audience: “You want me to play the same caricature that I was forced to play all these years? Rajini da!”
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Neena
July 22, 2016
oh, and I said it’s more subversive because: I dunno how many of the vanniyar or other men who claim ‘intha Dalit pasanga jeans, cooling glass pottuttu namma ponnungala davadikiranga’ wolf whistled for Rajini’s suited style 🙂
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Dracarys
July 22, 2016
Hmm. I think the primary thread was his love story and their eventual union with gangsters (2ndary thread) thrown in to fill the gap…
Looks like Ranjith wanted to bring out the actor (for primary story) and star (gangstergangster thread) Rajinikanth which is not usually seen in any of his earlier movies..not even Dalapathy…u see the actor not the star.. may be Baasha to an extent but no other movie.
The end result however is not that satisfying…as either of the threads is not so impactful or memorable…
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Ashwath Ram Gopish
July 22, 2016
The expectation is not the problem. The issue is what’s the expectation you go with. I went with the expectation set by Pa. RANJITH and not Rajni or the teaser.
CONTAINS SPOILERS:
You have pretty much penned in detail and explained what didn’t work in the film, which is the lack of depth:
Lack of a devious villain. Ranjith’s obsession with authenticy ruined the end product wrt Kabali’s enemies (be it the police or Tony Lee). Chinese drug Lords are like this. Flashy. Gawdy suits. Use other people to turn against each other. Always drinking soup. Ranjith should have made it more approachable.. relatable.
Now to what worked for me:
Kabali is a very interesting movie and that’s how I see it. Ranjith is usually a guy who spins a screenplay based on story that can be tweeted, and uses props, incidents to build them convincingly and his tool is usually politics of the oppressed. From Anbu (secondhero) in Madras mouthing something on the lines of ‘won’t be oppressed anymore.. We’ll show who we are’, to Kabali (main hero) preaching ‘Aalu porandha parambara..’ His use of frames is stellar.
One way to look at this film is for what’s presented than complain more on what it lacks. What worked for me is the character arcs of all the characters (agreed, there were too many. But each one represents one strain of the society and each one was completed) Right from:
Meena (starts as someone who needs cries always and ended up with her telling ‘ippo naa azhardhilla’,
Kabali-Meena adoption arc.
Anbu’s brother, he was mistaken to be a disturbance and untrustworthy. Started of with a ‘nambinor kaividappadar’ dialogue and fittingly helps Kabali and Yogi thanking him.
Tiger: introduced as someone who has this weakness for guns and ends succumbing taking it again.
Durai: the Tamil police who introduced himself with a sense of false self-pity (Naa Tamizhngardhu naala yaarum namba maatanga..) which was just a hint for the audience, justified in the end.
The system/law enforcement (pointed out by my brother, Harish) : Started with the lady officer briefing about Kabali and all the gangs when she drifted to Tony Lee and drug war, the senior officers asks her to focus on Kabali (“Tony Lee is history”) and ended by showing that if someone tried to be more than the system, the system will not allow you to do so. Apt ending that law enforcement plotted his downfall.
The arcs may be small, but detailed and completed.
When characters are complete, he probably lost it in their in-depth association with the narration.
(Open ended?) Climax:
Velu Nayakar, Corelone.. Template gangster end.
Justifying the theme of the film: fight for power amidst Tamils and they won’t let other Tamils to succeed with reference to the crab story.
By fading out when the gun was shot.. It’s up to you. Viewer. You dunno if Tiger shot him or Rajni pulled a pistol from his sleeve and killed him. (There’s an arc to justify this – remember that poosari says ‘Un pondaati irukkura varaikkum unakku saavillai’ and that justified everytime there was an attempt to kill his life, he survived, including the 13 times there was an attempt to his life in prison (props to my friend, Poorvaja for pointing it out!)
The turn of events: I liked that the interesting turn of events were more emotional and personal to Kabali, the family man than Kabali the Don. That’s such a non-gangster template for a gangster flick. He was focused on eliminating Tony Lee and 43, simultaneously sets out to find out what happened to his family. Once he realized that his family was alive, his priorities changes. Kabali seemed to be more happy as a family man than as the do(n) gooder. I loved that.
The numerous stereotypes broken : Yogi rescuing Kabali, the climax, supporting artists given a lot of screen time (was the sequence necessary to elaborate Jeeva’s death in a film about Kabali? But his over enthusiastic bravado arc had to be completed)
The editing was shoddy. What’s that scene where Yogi floating in the pool? What was that?
That said, it’s going to generate polarizing opinions. But there’s a lot to like and welcome. As a huggge Rajni fan, whatever qualms I have with the film is not because of the fact that Rajni’s image diluted the script but more of Ranjith disappointing in his own story.
Kumudha happy. Kabali magizhchi.
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brangan
July 22, 2016
One thing I was totally unprepared for was how shockingly bad some of the filmmaking was. There wasn’t one memorably staged scene. And many scenes (like that early dinner table one) were staged so badly. And this is the guy who gave us the funeral sequence in Madras, the karate scene in Attakathi… i can understand fumbling with content, but how does one lose form like this? Whether or not you liked Iraivi’s story, characters etc., as a film it was supremely well-made. Again, just wondering aloud…
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Arvind Sridhar
July 22, 2016
@ brangan:
This was exactly what I felt….The film making was very ordinary. Still cant reel my head as to what happened out there. There was nothing in it to salvage a scene unfortunately…..Beats me seriously….
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Iswarya
July 22, 2016
SRS: Wow, even as a fantasy, that’s a delicious one! But I think it will take at least another 6 years for both of them to get over their current obsessions and even contemplate that possibility.
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kadhalyaanai
July 23, 2016
I saw ur video chat after watching the first show and agreed to what you said at that time. Just now came out after watching a second time and felt it was much better.
I feel nowadays, we all fall victim to the unrealistic expectations we have on Rajinikanth films.
I don’t know, if it’s BR’s style to rewatch a movie and change his opinion.
But as you said in ur video chat, I hope you keep a longer discussion/dissection of the movie and I hope before that you watch it one more time. 😊
Kudos. (You are much more kinder in your written review compared to your video chat, softening of stance as an afterthought perhaps??)
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bart
July 23, 2016
BR, I hope you would write something about this pre-release craze, ticket prices, no. of shows (including a failed attempt to screen in 5 star hotels in Bangalore). A bad precedent in many ways.
It was great to see thalaivar display strong acting chops but felt sad for Ranjith. He got a great opportunity – a stronger script with depth on the milieu, carrying through the crispness that the movie displayed in the first 15 to 20 mins, using thalaivar’s platform as a base to spread his ideologies.. All squandered. Thalaivar’s age showed up on the screen. Even “Madras” had some lightness through the interactions between Karthi and the heroine or the Johnny character. This movie didn’t have any such relief. It was a serious movie that could not take itself so seriously! No twists / intelligence in the narration of the gangster wipe-out mission. So flat… The Venkat Prabhu stint has not helped him enough. At least the social-cause could’ve been registered hard but it feels like Ranjith was rushing into filming the movie without detailing the script enough. The lack of confidence in direction stems from the confidence in script itself.
I agree that it was not a Ranjith movie nor a typical Rajini movie. But inspite of the limitations, Thalaivar just carried the movie through. You could just watch him dole away those looks, smiles and expressions and get through with the movie. I think you’ve got Tony Lee’s origin wrong there. He is not a “natural-born Malay” but a Chinese who are next to the Malays in the class-order.
Rajini needs a K.S. Ravikumar or a Murugadoss in their peak. “2.0” will be a Shankar extravaganza in which you do not know if there are any actors behind the make-ups and graphics. Magizhchi!
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praneshp
July 23, 2016
@brangan: Did you think many of the fight scenes were heavily Tarantino-inspired? Maybe I was drawn in by the pistol-from-sleeve that thalaivar did, but I thought the fight in the climax was out of a Tarantino movie (even if not made that well.)
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Vikram Sarathy
July 23, 2016
Superb Review ! Every line makes sense
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venkatesh
July 23, 2016
One thing I was totally unprepared for was how shockingly bad some of the filmmaking was.
Bingo. There were sequences that were almost like a KS Ravikumar drama circa Muthu. The camera stays static , characters come in from the left say their piece and retreat back. Plot point established, the scene moves on. Terrible this.
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Arivalagan
July 23, 2016
Dear Brangan, since you referenced Jagat, what are your thoughts on Tamil films such as Kabali tackling issues of gravity – inequality and rights? And if the film utilizes such issues to focus or taper towards sheer entertainment; our anticipation of Thalaivar’s presence and his delivery of dialogues, is it not fair for the community at large? Understandably, it is not realistic to always expect a film (à la Life is Beautiful) to cautiously tread around sensitivities and yet be both critically and commercially successful. But as a fan who grew up watching Thalaivar films, I am hoping that he moves towards films that a small minority of his fans would readily appreciate; the ones who remember and relish his stellar performance in Avargal. While a great deal has been made about Rajinikanth’s age, the man still has acting chops; if a film like Anthimanthaarai receded into relative obscurity despite in spite of excellent performances by Vijayakumar, only a superstar like Rajinikanth can do otherwise: enshrine both personal and film legacy. It is due time.
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sridharvisu76
July 23, 2016
Agree with you 100% on every single word and tone.
I normally love your review of smaller films (the “Kirumi”s, the “Rajathandiram”s) and somehow find your review of bigger films spending too much time on various elements (much like Ranjith sprinkling instead of staying on various threads)
This is your best review in my opinion. (not because I agree 100% 🙂 )
//Kabali unfolds like those noble-minded Hollywood biopics that try to do a lot, say a lot, and yet end up being not very distinctive, because the specifics that could make the story special are sacrificed to the bland broader beats. We aren’t emotionally invested in anything, anyone.//
This is the crux of the problem. Any film that doesnt pull me in and hold me there is a failure.
This movie held me in the freeing birds from cage scene. It promised a huge feast but fizzled.
“Free life” came out as a cliche. (it is far better than Aishwarya rai character from Endhiran where she runs a cliched “Muthiyor” illam) It didnt spend much time on this.
//Unlike many actors, she’s not afraid to look ridiculous – and that’s why she’s so convincing.//
this is what makes Vadivelu a great actor too. (In my head, the only “pure” comedy actor of this generation)
//If the fear was that taking these detours would make Kabali more of Ranjith movie than a Rajinikanth movie, then what about films like Dharmadurai or Nallavanukku Nallavan, where action and emotion were equally important//
Wonderful. I wonder if ego of director “am going to make a different Rajini movie” kind of makes them not see that Rajini has already done movies like this. He is not a one movie “Mullum Malarum” actor wonder
Loved this review. A “Maniratnam Thalapathy ” level review for a “Kabali” movie.
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Honest Raj (formerly 'V'enkatesh)
July 23, 2016
Had to wait so long for your review. Thankfully, chanced upon this on Facebook.
Agree with you on the fate of films like Mullum Malarum and Johnny in today’s age. I’m amazed at the artistic taste of our audience of those days!
I hoped that was an indication that we were going to see the Rajinikanth we saw in Thalapathi, which was released 25 years ago.
Having not seen the film, is it safe to presume that Ranjith tops the ‘directors who brought the best out of Rajini in the post-Thalapathy era’ list?
Radhika Apte, who plays the part, looks ridiculously young beside Rajinkanth.
But she looks very convincing as a Tamil woman, doesn’t she? The best thing about her is that she can effectively do a Kanchan, Ahalya, or a Kumudhavalli.
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P
July 23, 2016
Loved Ashwath’s comment. Epic. Totalled almost everything I wanted to say but for a couple of things.
Yes, its time dalit references were silent and lashed only those who deserve to be lashed (aka only those who still think like that).
Loved the use of Untouchable as a cool word. I never thought that That word could be subversive. I have mentioned this before, but I grew up with a brahmin neighbour who refused to see my face as he performed his morning ablutions to the sun and the tulsi pot because to him it was impure or mleech but if I was still a Hindu then with this movie that circle would be complete. Untouchable is cool now. As cool a word as “slay” or “sexy” or “killer” or “awesome” 🙂
Loved the Ambedkar references, this is probably the biggest film to reference Ambedkar(who has been, understandably, woefully ignored by mainstream film-makers) so far. That part about Gandhi vs. Ambedkar especially hit a raw nerve because I have always contended that Gandhi played up to the Oriental imagination of the Europeans by donning his langot while Ambedkar proved he was less than no one and his clothes made him an everyman not a fancy-dress competitor begging for attention. That is what Kabali says- that these clothes can be worn by anyone, they have no caste or creed and don’t you dare assign one to them.
I really liked that the story had a universality despite being about the Malay Tamils. It could be the story of anyone who has ever been oppressed. And isn’t that a sign of great art? That we can all identify with Scarlett from Gone with the Wind or with Jane Eyre or with Heathcliff- that is what makes them eternal non?
If only the script hadn’t meandered as much as it did. If only the production values matched up to the legend who overpowered every frame. Yes, that shot of his daughter in the pool made me scratch my head too- I was like – what does it even mean? Though I loved that she was not the typical touch-me-not out-of-touch good little girl daughter of a big man (don or not!) , she was a badass, she dressed however she wanted, she openly flirted with the guy she liked, she wasn’t demure and she wore a swimsuit in front of her father without it being an affront to his honour. Hopefully this teaches men to let their women just be.
Saving the last for the best, I loved the Radhika Apte track. Loved how in love this man was with his dead wife. How he saw her in everything. How he thought of her all the time. How he spoke of her all the time. Beyond adorable. And that reunion scene. And that entire song that happened with the flashbacks in that moment. It just broke me. I wept.
(If you’ve ever lost someone to death, you’ll know that the greatest mirage that you hate/love to believe in is that it was all just a dream, a lie and its all going to come back and everything is going to be fine again)
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kripal
July 23, 2016
Another thing is how did Rajini know about vadivelu comedy (that he uses in feast scene) when he was in jail for 25 years ! 😛
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Bharath
July 23, 2016
I liked the movie. It was definitely not satisfying. My issues are with the narration. The placement of some scenes, especially in the second half, slow the movie down. I think there is a better movie in there, begging for a few cuts and rearrangements.
Ranjith was appreciably loyal to the thesis of the movie, which was packaged as the nandu kadhai (crab story). The last scene tied things up fairly well.
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Kaaviyathalagani
July 23, 2016
Regarding form, I respectfully disagree.
There was one distinct scene with Dinesh getting beaten up with bottles in an apartment which was very well done. The drifting in and out of men and tremendous use of depth – a deadly composition as he walks on the ground floor and they dump bottles from the floors above. But it was lost in the blandness of the proceedings before and after that sequence. Even this wonderful bit of choreography by the twins was bookended with much less effect. Why was the Chinese Villain relegated to such awful Tamizh dialogue/dubbing?
For giving us terrific/possible subversion with a female Tamizh cinema gun-wielding badass (atleast on paper – The daughter twist we could see a mile away but the fact that she fought as well with him was a triumph), he went ten steps back with an awfully composited rooftop sequence. I think we all cringed a little when he ripped off Django too. Oh well.
Iraivi’s terrific sound design far outweighed/nullified half the problems with the form in that story – with its relentlessly overt props, skewed compositions and shallow shock-value-violence.
P.S: This doesn’t count as “staging” but the real masterstroke there was keeping Vadivukarasi’s character bedridden through the story. The last 15mins would have sent her into a coma anyway.
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nanda
July 23, 2016
SRS
is rajini mature enough for gautam, stop making claims.. he is not good enough.. he has killed another good director like ranjith with this movie
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KadaKumar
July 23, 2016
I had been keenly waiting for your review, refreshing your page every once in a while.
I am depressed now. I was really looking forward to this day ever since rumors began trickling out about Rajini playing a don again. I assumed that a Rajini-gangster movie, like pizza or chicken biriyani, has got to be good even when its bad. You have Rajini as a swashbuckling gangster, what more do you need to work with? A drone simply going through the motions could have dished out a delectable product with just these two ingredients. Squandering such raw material is unforgivable.
As Brangan had mentioned in his reviews of (or comment sections of reviews of) Ranjith’s previous movies, its clear that cinema is more than an art to him. That he’d be willing to compromise on the aesthetics just to shoehorn references to his political ideologies and stuff. I was hoping against hope that he wouldn’t try such stunts in a superstar movie.
More than all that, I am worried about Rajini’s future and how this film will change his course. Will he regard his blind trust on a young director a foolhardy misstep he shouldn’t have risked? Will he return to his Shankar-KSR-ARRahman comfort zone? Or will age take a toll on his resilience and make him fatalistically accepting of this (hopefully temporary) downward trend as the inevitable decline?
I know it sounds stupid to worry about a sixty-year-old billionaire superstar who has a lifetime of achievement and glory to be proud of and thankful for, but this isn’t about the person Shivaji Rao Gaekwad. This is more of a selfish lament of a fan over the uncertain future of a dear cultural icon called Rajinikanth.
Has Rajini become too big for any director? Can any present-day director do full justice to his aura? And if not, are we fans to blame for that? Maybe our fondness, or rather obsession, has made us unhinged and brutally demanding. We just don’t seem to find any movie worthy of his presence. He simply outshines his setting and most movies only hamper the flow of his charisma.
What do you guys think?
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Neena
July 23, 2016
Yeah, the staging was rather off – and I don’t even get why that dinner scene was there…
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shreyasi07
July 23, 2016
Just got back from the movie. I quite liked it, though the 19 Tamilians I went with vehemently disagreed and told me “you won’t get it”. 😛 The climax, along with the Kumaram trying to assassinate Kabali really reminded me of the climax in Nayakan. Wish they had invested in a back story for Tiger.
The story was very intriguing with so many historical touchpoints and subplots. I think it did not do justice to either or Thalaiva’s star power. Some of the scenes were so lazily shot: for example the father-daughter reunion, the takedown of Tony Lee’s drug empire in the climax, the scene where the 00 gang has dinner after Kabali’s release. They had so much potential for tension and crackling drama!
My friend told me had they used Vijay instead of Rajni, this would have been a faaar more convincing gangster movie. Most went expecting “good action and entertainment”, kept mentioning Endhiran, Thalapathy and Baasha’. I was actually quite hooked on to the story. The soundtrack was beautiful, especially Maya Nadhi.
I also quite enjoyed Dhanshika as the ass-kicking mercenary. Gangster father- mercenary daughter duo- this plotline alone deserves a movie of its own.
Nevertheless, everytime Thalaiva came on screen with Neruppa Da blasting in the background, everyone stopped grumbling and hooted and whistled like mad. Quite a magizhchi moment that was.
As a non-Tamilian, I don’t get a lot of cultural references, nostalgia trips, comparisons my friends kept discussing, hence judging it solely by how I felt!
WordPress.com / Gravatar.com credentials can be used.
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ss
July 23, 2016
The staging of the intro song was really uncomfortable with the singers and random dancers. There really should not have been an intro song for such a movie.
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Srivatsan
July 23, 2016
//One thing I was totally unprepared for was how shockingly bad some of the filmmaking was. There wasn’t one memorably staged scene. And many scenes (like that early dinner table one) were staged so badly. And this is the guy who gave us the funeral sequence in Madras, the karate scene in Attakathi… i can understand fumbling with content, but how does one lose form like this? Whether or not you liked Iraivi’s story, characters etc., as a film it was supremely well-made. Again, just wondering aloud…
Completely agree from first – last word
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Santosh Kumar T K
July 23, 2016
Telangana (not Telengana)
I’m so glad you called the film for what it is (of course in your eyes) based on how it spoke to you “cinematically” rather than get awed by the fact he attempted to champion the cause of the societal “fringe.” Otherwise every dissenter out there was almost running the risk of being bundled into the “north indian who doesn’t get the mania, or nuances” wagon. (these are unlike the other lucky north indians who have “appropriated” the fandom “in both ironic and non-ironic ways ever since the Sivaji ’07 days,” it seems.)
But then again weren’t you mauled in the comments section for not spotting the caste-based easter eggs in Madras?! 🙂 🙂
The film doesn’t look very good either, which is something you find with many Indian filmmakers. They are brilliant when they shoot in India, but when they step outside the frames end up looking bland.
I think filmmakers think that clean light, and air along with posh cars, and sterile glass-based skyscrapers in almost all first-world foreign locales that they rush to will visually make up for the lack of framing, composition, mood, and texture. Also, since these foreign shoots are done for the zing factor (not necessarily germane to the story) and on really tight schedules, they are left with no choice but to do with whatever they shoot, and the puke-worthy jump cuts, and swooshes in the edits! *exceptions: RGV/Hemant Chaturvedi Company ’02, Farhan Akhtar/U Mohanan Don’06; incidentally both of them were shot in Malaysia! 🙂
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Madhu
July 23, 2016
I don’t know the differences between direction / screenplay / editing issues, but throughout the movie I had this feeling that I am not feeling what the director has set out to make me feel. Compare the scene in Baasha, where Devan is called out as a traitor and do the same here (the first dinner scene). I mean, it has Rajini calling out the man in such a sarcastic way and ending with ‘magizhchi’ to boot; and I didn’t feel any desperation from the traitor, or even a controlled fury from Rajini. It just had a feeling of a don doing don stuff: let me throw out the traitor, let me just ram and kill the man who dared to call my wife a name. And his scene with Dhansika after his gunshot wound. Nope, nothing. The only scene where the tension / emotion was even a little palpable was when he meets Radhika Apte, but that whole stretch before it somehow spoilt it for me. I couldn’t feel the desperation when the father and daughter try to find the mother, it was just prolonging the inevitable. And through it all, I couldn’t fault the acting, everyone seemed to be doing just what they were supposed to be doing. It didn’t touch me, though.
One thing that totally amused me was this pandering (though, I agree with BR, the pandering to Rajini – the star, is quite less) towards ‘Rajni is dark and dark is beautiful, and only dark is beautiful’. Apte’s line on ‘un karuppai eduthu en mela poosikkanum’ or something equivalent sounded wierd and definitely not romantic. and it doesn’t help that the leads do not have that mysterious chemistry.
One thing I totally loved, that the daughter gets to do the traditional son’s role and no one even bats an eyelid over it. Not even a villain utters something pithy to the effect of ‘oh, she is just a girl’. She has no romantic track to justify her presence like his daughters of earlier films. She tells him “irungappa, naan paakaren” and checks and opens the door, which normally any man in Tamil Cinema wouldn’t let a woman, let alone a daughter, do. Here she does, and the father doesn’t ask her to stop taking unnecessary risk on his behalf. It is both the father and the daughter trying to protect the mother in the shoot-out scene, and only because, at the point of time, she is the most vulnerable. It has got nothing to do with the mother being a woman. No one even tells her that she needs to get married and make babies. This is probably the equivalent of Venkat Prabhu’s gay couple in Goa: no questions asked, no explanations given, normal pa… just normal. Wow! This is probably the only Rajini movie post his “star”ness where the females are normal, atleast, in a movie-don-world sense. Thank you, Ranjith!
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Aseema
July 23, 2016
Great review! The emotional arc I traced reading your write up is more substantial than the movie is likely to offer. One strangely gets the feeling that you’ve done more for the movie than the movie did for you!
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Ramanan Varadarajan
July 23, 2016
I am not sure why BRangan looks at the film through the prism of “What it should have been?” .. Its obvious in his yearnings when he says “it did’nt have enough whiplashes”, “It did’nt stage enough scenes”, “It just used Malaysian issues as a subtext”.. These are obviously conscious decisions of film making that the Ranjith made. If you did’nt like the genre, you perhaps went to the wrong movie. Regardless, as a reviewer, I would like to know more about the flaws in the content and style it purports to be.. not you/I wished it stood for.
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vettiscene
July 23, 2016
Long time reader. First time commenter. Your review as always was spot. However, I am wondering why no one picked up on the fact that his offspring was a daughter. He doesn’t bat an eyelid on her becoming someone so comfortable with violence. It’s a huge step forward for a rajni movie that the women are not weak or wimpy. No sexist dialogue. As a female rajni fan, it was a huge huge plus for me.
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vigneswaran
July 23, 2016
Sir, you seem not to know much about Malaysian culture, and much less of Chinese names. Tony Lee is clearly a Chinese name, and you “assume” he is Malay, and further expound on that, by saying Tony is privileged and go on to talk about Tamil Malay conflicts. The Malays are privileged and there is of of course a sense of discrimination towards the other races. But to use Tony Lee ( who is a Chinese ) is totally wrong
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harish ram
July 23, 2016
@ BR few points and questions for you to ponder over:
I disagree with the bird cage scene. It seemed to end up as a look, I have been in a cage and I know the pain; and when the bird is set free, as a reference to his recent internal freedom once he beats up people. It gets even worse when for the sake of consistent symbolic style, Ranjith shows the birds fly, when Rajini walks out of the prison in an earlier scene. Seriously? are we in the 80s to do that? especially after the Ethiree bird flying scene?
with respect to the weird characters, I felt Ranjith got carried away with the claps the ‘Johnny’ character in Madras got. Back then while watching the movie, I thought the character was kept to pander to the audience. But I liked how a pressure release character (Ranjith won’t agree these are comedic excuses) has a sensible link to the overall film. Here too the characters seem to have a background and is linked to some kind of gang war issue. But Rajini’s character seems to be taking part in gang war part of the film as a token presence.
This previous point leads to another consistent issue I had throughout the film. I can’t fathom where the heart of Kabali the character and the film lies. If he is inherently a social uplifter, why should he utter the lies in the epilogue that he is just a don? If he feels he has ended up as a twin-towering tall gangster, I don’t see him wield real power both in past and present. If his heart is in finding his family, the film consistently misfires in the emotional parts. After hearing words that hint his wife could have been alive, there is no reaction, not even an internal turmoil. Instead the film resorts to the overdone style of bringing Radhika Apte in to the screen, after several miles of car travel, in a deserted bay area.
In short, this film to me is just a cacophony of so many ideas and nothing works.
How do you as a creator feel when your work gets chopped off so badly? The review that appears in The Hindu and here is completely different because of word constraints. Maybe if you want to ensure the content and style remains consistent you should think over word limits more even before your start writing?
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sanjay2706
July 23, 2016
Did we just see the most dumb gangsters and hitmen ever? They keep exposing their bosses like crazy in the movie. I know logic isn’t something that we talk in a Rajini movie but it was the film makers and producers who promised a movie that would be different. Brangan hit the nail on the head about poor film making. The scenes seemed so flat! I expected a scene to end in a certain vicious way but every time I was disappointed. Ranjith apparently defends his product saying that it’s realistic. I think he has confused realism with dullness. Movies can be realistic, but there needs to be certain drama in it to keep it interesting.
Brangan again nailed it when he said Rajini looks like a soft grand dad. I could feel the warmth. I almost wanted to have a meal and chat with him and wonder how he would be. But I could never feel the “neruppu da”! Oh I would have loved to see a movie where he plays an aging patriarch and spouts philosophical dialogues. But then, that’s just me!
Brangan had mentioned that there was no pandering in this movie. I disagree on this
Talk about his black skin – Check
Tamizhan pride – Check
So the pandering elements are there! Just that it’s not too obvious. My Favorite scene in the movie features Dinesh. The frantic scene where bottles are hurled at him and culminates in a horrific way was brilliant! But the rajini scenes were so flat! Agh
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Nilosh Sathiyamoorthi
July 23, 2016
Not sure if any of you guys know this but there is a different ending card shown for the Malaysian Audience
SPOILERS
“Finally Kabali surrendered to the police”
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lakshmi
July 23, 2016
BR on NDTV … in Hindi!
http://www.ndtv.com/video/shows/prime-time/prime-time-nobody-like-rajinikanth-424707
Watch from 11:10, 23:20 and 29:02.
Ravish Kumar (the anchor) wraps up the show saying he’d read BR’s brilliant write-up on Rajinikanth (https://baradwajrangan.wordpress.com/2012/12/27/the-last-superstar/)
and quotes this line from it – “Rajinikanth himself may never know how and why he became a superstar.”
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Kartkum
July 23, 2016
@brangan – Now with Kabali not living up to expectations, more pressure will be on Shankar as a director and I’m not sure if he can handle superstar image without compromising much on his style of filmmaking. I rate his Sivaji/enthiran the least and ‘Ai’ which was terrible. Now, with Shankar coming back after disappointing ‘Ai’, the failure of Kabali and add to it the comparisons that will be drawn with ‘Bahubali’ I could sense the difficulties of making film with a star power like Rajnikant. I felt bad and sympathetic for Ranjith and sincerely hope he can overcome the mental trauma and come back in his next project with Surya. Now, with Surya known for altering scripts to suit his image (of late), I wonder how much freedom will be given for Ranjith to dictate directorial terms.
Also, Production houses have to realize film’s potential and make sensible marketing. Too much hype certainly had an effect on the overall disappointment for this film. I felt that there was a lack of communication between the director and the star. Having said this, I also felt Ranjith was too hesitant to ask for a retake/reshoot, and even Rajnikant would have lend an ear to a director like Shankar/Ravikumar’s status and the Ranjith has admitted this in an interview prior to the release of the film. This is a bad precedent to the film industry and many follow these and select directors who could propel the star image rather than indulge as a team in filmmaking. This could be witnesses with all the top actors from Rajni, Kamal, Vijay, Ajith, Suirya to even STR. To me Dhanush makes a balance in this aspect with films like Maryan, Adukalam, Mayakkam Enna, etc. Having noted this it is better to appoint a proxy director like what kamal did with some of his latest films Thonngavanam etc
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Ramchander Krishna (@ramctheatheist)
July 23, 2016
@SRS: That was the most unexpected suggestion for a director! But holy crap!! If that can ever happen, I’m willing to sign a change.org petition for it and scream like Madhavan in Anbe Sivam “Take my blood!! Make it happen!” And I’d be satisfied just watching making videos of the film! Enakku main picture kooda vendaam!
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sanjana
July 23, 2016
Well, media has turned its attention from Sultan to Kabali in a big way. Sultan now looks like an abandoned spouse!
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Madan
July 23, 2016
“But I think it will take at least another 6 years for both of them to get over their current obsessions and even contemplate that possibility.” – Besides which, just how good Kamal will be as a director is another question. Methinks he’s better off ghost directing/controlling the likes of Sangeetham Srinivasa Rao/KSR than making films himself, where his record is more patchy.
We are talking about directors who would be capable of directing Rajni. But Rajni also needs to reinvent himself now. And, I am afraid, reinvent himself as more of an actor and less of a superstar. Sort of like Sean Connery after he quit the Bond franchise or Clint Eastwood in later years.
I don’t watch a lot of mass Tamil films but having had to endure Katthi and Vethalam and also parts of Singham, they don’t seem to be rooted in a rural context anymore. This wasn’t exactly true even as late as Vikram’s mass run and it was certainly important from Rajni’s POV (Padayappa/Muthu/Ejamaan). Whether a rural-based Rajni mass film will still have the pan-Tamil appeal he is looking for is a question mark. Baasha itself was sort of a total mass take on Nayakan (I mean there is an attempt to use the same context even if Rajni’s father is now shown as an employee of the don) and has since been reprised to the point where it may feel stale if done again. Plus, going by Katthi/Vethalam the current trend is of actually casting the mass hero as an out and out baddie with either a flashback or a double action to provide a positive context (i.e. a darker shade of grey). Is Rajni comfortable doing that since he has always played the avenging angel (emphasis on angel). Maybe it’s time to move on, accept lower payments and seek out mature roles where he doesn’t just play his age but plays an everyman again. Which is how he started. Of course, if this here film is accepted, then that changes everything.
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blurb
July 23, 2016
brangan: You were so zen in all the video chats leading upto and soon after the movie! I found that quite bewildering 🙂 I don’t mean to put you on the spot – but are you just not the kind of person who is easily excitable? I thought the energy and hype surrounding the movie was very infectious, but you just seemed somehow impervious to it all! Even if it was a conscious effort, it’s some feat to remain this detached given the scenario 🙂
To me, sadly, it seemed somewhat of a hastily done project 😦 Kabali is shown to be this emotional and rooted family man. I would think that the first thing he would when he gets out do is find out about his wife and kid. The fact that this scene comes after all the celebrations and stuff really made it weak and in effective. Must have been the clash between the need to pander to Rajini’s stardom and quenching one’s directorial impulses.
A scene that would have sounded good on paper is the one where Kabali finds out who his daughter is. What lovely dichotomy! It reminded me of “Santosha kaneere” from Uyire. It was also rendered in effectively due to.. wrong placing?
And I found it unbelievable that a couple to just pick up where they left off 25 YEARS ago. That just doesn’t happen. They could have shown… discomfort, and even a little unfamiliarity to make it realistic. 25 years is a loong time. That might have had more impact.
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rk
July 23, 2016
Why is Kabali’s rival Gang called ’43’? Here’s my answer! 🙂
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Aadithya
July 23, 2016
@brangan:
Aadithya here. I wouldn’t say that not a single scene that was memorably staged. Let’s not throw the baby with the bathwater. The scene where Jeeva goes to his housing complex to find his mother dead and is attacked from all sides by masked assailants was shot and edited brilliantly. It’s just a bit disappointing that the one scene that had rhythm and pulse was the scene without Rajni in it. More on the movie later!
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Rad Mahalikudi
July 23, 2016
I left with mixed feelings and lots of “why” questions:
Happy to see Rajini acting his age (thanks Ranjith) and no duets, running around trees, silly dance moves, etc. Highly refreshing to see Rajini in this getup / character.
With all the money and great star vehicle at your disposal, why Ranjith missed the opportunity? I can see that he has tried but like you all pointing out didn’t push it harder. Commercial compulsions?
There is no strong villain / antagonist in the story. Hero shines with strong antagonist.
Not able to connect with the movie. BR as you pointed out no emotional investment.
Story and screenplay is a let down. I am sure we have great writers. With this money and star vehicle, can’t they be creative in the story department? Is this cold feet and getting risk averse?
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udhaysankar
July 23, 2016
To hell with the ranjith film. Especially after the teaser that promised us so much, and the pre-release expectation that it would be a gangster film. How much more fun the film could have been had it simply been a thalaivar-cum-gangster film with more action and some emotional weight?
Imagine this storyline. Rajni is in jail. Flashback as he enters his house.
Thalaivar becomes a Don to help the tamilians overcome the racial oppression and marries Radhika along the way ( like Vito of Godfather 2). An assassination attempt goes wrong and Radhika gets killed before or after having delivered the baby (know that it’s highly clichéd, but you could have staged it well). Rajni goes to jail. Comes back after 25 years. Finds the situation very different. Yet, adapts and fucks those who had fucked him before with a lot of gangster-scheming and planning, with or without his daughter. ( with the second half being an all out action film).
Thalaivar would have killed this type of a character and the audience would have huge payoffs. But, ranjith wanders somewhere else with his own idea of a thalaivar film, that’s impossible to achieve.
You can’t have complex threads for a Rajni film and more ranjith had realized this better the film could have been. A good thalaivar film post baasha is one that accepts his onscreen image of a superhuman persona and complents it with the character. And Rajni is primarily an action star, someone who could ace well shot action sequences and gun battles and there is very little of the same.
All the action sequences had poor imagination, writing, staging, build up, editing, cinematography, music with the exception of the benz car scene. The climatic showdown was so bland. Thalaivar goes to a feast inhabited with his foes, without showing us any planning on both sides. He introduces his wife and daughter. Plain-shooting resumes.
The villains were so straight and ineffectual. Why need thalaivar to topple these men, when an overaged balayya could have sufficed?.
The soundtrack and teasers promised us a different film and I’m not forgiving ranjith for not giving me that film. We didn’t need his personal obsessions and thoughts on politics and caste, just some solid action-cinema writing and craft and has failed to deliver on those.
SRS :thank you for that idea.
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lakshmi
July 23, 2016
Watch from 11:10, 23:20 and 29:02.
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Mustafa
July 23, 2016
It’s a superb movie , I m a die hard rajni fan
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Vinod
July 23, 2016
I think this is an unfair review. With a little care this could have been a great movie but it is a good movie. The beginning and end were a bit annoying but the middle portion is excellent. Rajni is absolutely brilliant. Since it is an epic movie it probably should have been 30 minutes longer and a bit slower.
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Chris
July 23, 2016
Kabali Mind blowing.
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sanjana
July 23, 2016
It is a satisfying experience reading such an elaborate and interesting review.
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Josh
July 23, 2016
Funny that you mentioned about THALAPATHY here because the first thing I thought after walking out was what if this could be the template for a sequel for that one. The man returns from prison after 25 years to take back the reigns of the gang. We all know who Surya from Thalapathy is, so when he returns from prison the audience already knows what or whom to expect.
But this is not a sequel , is it?
Now here the character KABALI is introduced with a brief intro police meeting and he is instantly released. Who is he ? What is he ? what is his back story? Why do he has such a support ? The director expects the Rajini factor to work here and so we go along with the protagonist.
Ranjith set his story in Malaysia and wants to address the issues of the Malay tamils. But what a feeble half hearted attempt was that eventually?
IT could have been tweaked with a different narrative. If Ranjith could have avoided the current intro and introduced the Rajini character as a prisoner, had his character and flashback established, which again could have been narrated out by his close friends like Aamir or so, hype up his past, explain the political scenario right up to the tragedy that struck his family, and THEN have him released from prison….that we would have had the audience really rooting for his return and his revenge spree. (lets take the recent Sultan narrative as a perfect example. Zafar had mentioned in his interview with Anupama, if you have the audience emotionally connected with the main protagonist, you can then get away with anything in a commercial format however big the loopholes are).
At least it would have set the emotional connect that is required to go boom boom in the second half.
The reunions with the family could have also have been set up and staged more effectively. Though the reunion between Rajini-Apte was a stand out scene, the sequences leading up to it looked like scenes from a totally different film altogether.
And if you have action sequences, at least show some creativity with it. The ones in KABALI are outright amateurish.
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P
July 23, 2016
Also wanted to say this about that first sound that wailing siren in the beginning of Neruppu Da. It is not “the love child of a megaphone and an ambulance siren” as you so poetically put it in your music review! It is a sound those of us who grew up in factory towns know all too well. It is the first siren that goes off at the factory warning the workers at 7 am and also the one that ends up rousing the entire town. Most of us woke up to that. It must have lots of subtext and significance.
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siddarthsen
July 23, 2016
Considering that some of the filmmaking is shoddy and that the movie is a letdown, the film is still leagues ahead of any Rajni film in a long long time. I’m not defending the film at all but its good to see Rajni take this detour from his post-Annamalai oeuvre. However, with the reception the film is getting, would Rajni possibly feel vindicated for not taking this detour much earlier? With 2.0 coming up next, I don’t believe that there is a change in direction for the superstar. He might as well hang up his boots after that. But what does this say about us as an audience? Some of the conversations in this blog are fantastic where films are discussed beyond the binary of good and bad. Outside of this space, however, movies are mostly boxed into two categories. A disappointing film is a terrible film. Reactions are always extreme. A misstep, such as this, is considered a disaster. With such an atmosphere, why would a giant star like Rajni even take the chance of stepping outside his comfort zone. Again, not defending the film, but if this is how we react to a film, we are not giving Rajni any incentive to pick a Kabal over a Linga.
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brangan
July 23, 2016
All: I agree I may have overreacted yesterday about the complete absence of well-staged scenes. The low-angle shot of a besieged Dinesh is truly memorable. I guess I was just annoyed that so much of the film was so flat and rhythmless.
Harish Ram: How do you as a creator feel when your work gets chopped off so badly?
Are you saying the Hindu review doesn’t make sense? Or are you saying it feels different? If the latter, then it’s bound to, right? It’s a much shorter review, with far less detail, than the one on the blog.
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vikrammervyn
July 23, 2016
Amazing review really.. I think you were a little harsh on the movie… Here’s more of a reaction to Kabali just after I was done watching… I felt it was the new Rajinikanth movie… Please do check it out. And by the way sir, you taught me a new word today ‘coolth’… That really made my morning… SO here you are please do tell me what you think
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Arivalagan
July 23, 2016
Brangan sir, following up on my earlier comment. Do you think there is scope for Thalaivar to ever do a movie like Anthimanthaarai in the future? Or is he destined define the later part of his legacy in these kind of Kabali movies. Your views on this as a critic will be much appreciated.
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P
July 23, 2016
I really wish they had gone the Kill Bill route with the movie. The revenge being central to Kabali with family and love coming in as well, but so tightly filmed, so rioutously well done in the scenery, the settings. I mean with all the interesting places to film in Thailand, they found the most generic place to set the reunion with the daughter?!
In wanting to downplay the super-star element the director ended up downplaying his script. Your last line holds completely true. Rajni did more for Ranjith than vice versa.
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brangan
July 23, 2016
Arivalagan: Kind of writing a piece on it. But if you ask me now, I’ll say the chances are very slim – UNLESS the budgeting is sensible.
I think both Rajini and Kamal can do very different kinds of films if they slash their salaries. (Of course, I am not saying they should. If they are demanding huge amounts and are getting these amounts, then who can tell them to not accept these amounts?)
But once your leading man’s fees get so high, then other things come into play.
Scenario 1: The producer tries to cut down the budget allotted for other aspects of the film, which means you get a tacky product.
Scenario 2: The producer doesn’t cut corners, but this means the actor fees + production fees makes the film a very costly affair, and the more expensive a film gets, the “safer” it has to be.
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Arivalagan
July 23, 2016
@sanjay2706 Yes brother.. Agree with your review. You’re right on the pandering part. Didn’t really cross my mind initially. Maybe Wunderbar Films can come up with an all-rounder entertainment package for Thalaivar.
@siddarthsen As I had mentioned earlier in my comment, I really want Thalaivar to step out of this Kabali kind of zone and do something different. I just wonder whether the hardcore fans will accept it. Maybe I am a bit over anxious n immature in expecting something ‘arthouse’ fingers crossed but this supposed gangster genre has been successfully done by Amitabh sir in Sarkar, so maybe it is simply skewed to a point of the movie taking secondary importance to Thalaivar’s screen presence. This must be very challenging to producers and director especially when so much profit is at stake. When the movie becomes a mere vehicle to showcase Thalaivar, I have come to realise the wise thing to do is to walk in with no expectations.
P.S. I love Brangan sir’s blog and all you folks you give such nice dignified comments on film reviews. Shows that we are thinking audience after all 🙂
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venkatesh
July 23, 2016
One of my mate said “This is the Aalavandhan of Rajini” , lot of potential, some great ideas but falls short. Interestingly, both are Thanu films.
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Arivalagan
July 23, 2016
@Brangan Sir thank you I jumped the gun perhaps with my last comment to fellow readers which I had just sent.. Yes you made a very important point on budget that I had completely overlooked. The scenarios u mentioned are insightful and sadly relevant; really looking forward to ur piece on this. Thanks again sir!
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Arivalagan
July 23, 2016
@venkatesh Interesting you bring Thanu up. That is a good fact sir. This reminds me digressing here a bit of an article that Brangan sir wrote sometime back on importance of producers… http://bit.ly/29ViLhn @Brangan The way you ended that article with commentary on opening credits (some interplay between start and end maybe?) is simply brilliant.
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Aadhi
July 23, 2016
“It seems a great idea (a great Rajini-film idea) to have a Merc mow down a bad guy – but we don’t know this man yet, and we don’t get the primal satisfaction we should get from on-screen revenge.”
Actually the filmmaking does try to do something in the previous scene that leads Kabali here. Jeeva(Dinesh) tells kabali about drug trade being the powerbase of gang 43. Amir disagrees and says something about gambling and prostitution being the primary source of revenue. Both of them address their points to Kabali while Kabali is transfixed on something outside the window. He doesn’t react. And then we cut to Kabali’s POV shot , where he sees Meena pleading to a pusher. Kabali looks on , while we cut away to a prologue about Loga with Jeeva talking about drugonomy, Loga controlling the operations etc. And we cutback to Kabali’s POV exactly when Jeeva says Loga’s drugs run in Kabali’s school as well. We see the pusher trying to sexually assault her as Kabali sees it. Only after this shot Kabali says ” Yes , we’ll go for Logu” or something, as Kabali has already been developing some fatherly, protective emotions towards meena.
Now we are supposed to resonate with Kabali’s intent going into the next scene, which I actually did. But I can see that the length of the previous scene and the duration of each shot in that scene did not give enough emotional thrust to root for Kabali in the next scene. This is a classic case of a director really trying to do something and the editor messing it up, fearing for comments like “Padathla pace ila, padam slow va pogudu, editing seri illa” and stuff like that (which ironically is what the film is being panned for among the public). I’m thinking a lot of disagreement must have happened at the edit table for this film. The way the teaser was cut with full of energy and action, was a big mistake for a film like this. The film looked like it was re-assembled after the teaser was cut, in order to match the teaser’s energy. Therefore, no emotional connect could be established with the story, further hampered by the cliched nature of the central conflict.
BR : Btw, I was the one who asked you the question about pacing of the movie in your facebook live chat (thanks for the answer!). What I intended to ask was, should the movie have been given more time to evolve , in the sense the way a scene unfolds and establish its intent with the filmmaking devices Ranjith tries to use. My doubts about the ‘restless’ nature of scene transitions were cleared by your answer.
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Sreekrishnan
July 23, 2016
http://visithra.blogspot.my/2016/07/detailed-explanation-of-kabali-movie.html
Read this post Fromm @visithra about the movie ..
May be you’ll have a different opinion
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balaji
July 23, 2016
Some well staged scenes: The interval block with wide angle shot and the lighting was delightful to watch, bottle attack on jeeva, the vintage rajini shooting sequence in the hotel/bar could have been better and lengthier, the hallucinations where he sees kumudhavalli initially ending up in dining table…finally, Kabali doing a drift on his own when reversing his car after hitting veerasekaran and sequences before it where Kabali says, SOOPERU, when veerasekaran points out gun at him but Kabali takes out a photograph
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Pato
July 23, 2016
I believe rajni should give a chance to karthick subbaraj.Karthick subbaraj is a die-hard rajni fan on one hand and is a good filmmaker on the other hand.A movie with this blend will work perfectly.If rajni is ready to shed his image and with subbaraj’s love for gangster movies,a gangster movie with rajni playing the real bad guy and not this nayagan type gangster where you become a gangster for a reason would work perfectly.
Another option is to do a out and out comedy film like thillu mullu.
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udhaysankar
July 23, 2016
The scene where kabali is listening to the poosari, just as his head is shot down was superb.
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Arivalagan
July 23, 2016
@Sreekrishnan read the link.. very detailed and interesting. many thanks for sharing this sir.. but it seems to be a double-edged sword (i brought this up during my earlier posts) when say Thalaivar’s presence dominates these issues.. maybe for visithra she is at a distinct advantage for she knows the situation first hand.. but what about the wider audience? if they are more distracted with Thalaivar and style scenes and forget about the issues at hand then maybe producer/director intentions has been sadly overlooked.. or maybe they tried to do too much. not expecting for a documentary but on hindsight i am actually kinda glad that malaysian indian viewers feel that this movie perhaps is a stepping stone in the right direction – and perhaps one of those instances in which wider audience need to do their homework before watching.. a tall order for Thalaivar movie and fans if u ask me…
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Arivalagan
July 23, 2016
@Pato A comedy film like Thillu Mullu? Why not Sir… very much possible.. Thalaivar’s got great comedic skills too. And perhaps it just might work with Karthick Subbaraj.. As Brangan sir mentioned.. the importance of cost… perhaps if the price is right, it might all come together nicely..
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balaji.v.sankar
July 23, 2016
Surprisingly i’m the one who found out from where one of the bgm’s from Kabali is https://youtu.be/80sCcPGF7KU
Pls listen to the Oscar nominated OST 🙂
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|()/\()| (@manathakkali)
July 23, 2016
Please read this : Kabali from a Malyasian Indian perspective
http://visithra.blogspot.in/2016/07/detailed-explanation-of-kabali-movie.html
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Pravin
July 23, 2016
Spot on – May be Rajni scored while we see Ranjith failed as a director. He is lost in the narrative of portraying a Dalit Leader or about a gangster searching for his family and getting his life back. He is confused. Another miss of what could have been a wonderful story inline of a classic Nayagan. Not sure why so many good premise is mixed by screenplay – looks like there is no fine tuning a premise that happens in the back end. A long way to go for Tamil Cinema to take a Bold theme.
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Random Junkie
July 23, 2016
Am a long time reader and first time commentor. yes these big reviews bring out all the lurkers teeming from the woodwork. Will chime in again after watching the film but was shocked to see such vitriol directed at you online. Wanted to reply to this but seeing as I didn’t know the dude, in true lurker fashion just seethed a bit on your behalf
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henselot
July 23, 2016
As much as I like your review, sometimes it just bothers me when critics get basic facts wrong about a movie. Tony Lee is an Ethnic Chinese character, NOT Malay. Lee is a typical Chinese surname. And ALL Malays in Malaysia are Muslims… So its quite a wrong assumption you made. Malaysia has three main ethnic groups. To generalise, the native Malays are the ones with political power, the Chinese are the ones with economic power and the Indians are historically the labourer class, of South Indian origin mostly and generally the most downtrodden of the main races…
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Rad Mahalikudi
July 23, 2016
Kabali from Malaysian Indian perspective: Thanks for the link. It gave a good perspective. I can understand the constraints Ranjith has to work with. Without getting a perspective, it would be hard to appreciate what the movie has tried. To be honest, I couldn ‘t comprehend with bits and pieces shown in the movie.
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MANK
July 23, 2016
An unsatisfying clash between the impulses of star and director
Brangan, The moment i finished watching this film, i imagined that the title of your review was going to be something like this. this turned out to be neither a good Rajni film or Renjith film. A film that was started with some noble intentions – by both Rajni & Renjith- but went haywire in the making. or rather by the industry economics of a Rajni film. the economics that you were discussing about a Rajni\kamal film is more relevant than ever in the case of this film. if i remember correctly, at first when this film was announced, this was supposed to be a quickie to be shot in less than 50 days and on a moderate budget. that would have stayed close to the sensibilities of a Pa Ranjith film. but i watched with sheer horror as the film grew to a 110 cr – thats what the producers are claiming- budgeted 1 1\2 year long project an then to be sold to the distributors fo about 200 crores. . then to watch that super trailer that promised a fast paced massey Rajni film. i must say i was very confused even before i went in to watch the film. but while watching the film , i can imagine what must have gone wrong. the film is nothing like the trailer- or for that matter the over done publicity – promised.. the film does have the basic sensibility of a Renjith film. there was no way this was going to be a record breaking mass blockbuster, never , no Pa Renjith film is ever going to be, not even with Rajni in lead. This is a slow burning character driven (sometimes) mood piece of a film. And if made originally as intended – without tweaking in the Rajni massey elements-this could have been a superb film, inspite of the fact that the basic story line is pedestrian revenge plot.. but i am sure hell of a lot of compromises were made while making this due to pressure from producer\distributor.
So we come to the real problem that Rajni is facing – which would be greedy producers and distributors who continue to use him as a golden goose, a Rajni film comes along only every 2\3 years and they want to make the most of it no matter what the quality. scale or scope of the film . this had happened before with Kuselan also – which was a remake of a very low budget malayalam film kadha parayumbol- that was sold for an astronomical price and bankrupted Pyramid saimira. i assume that Renjith buckled under pressure. this has led to the overall bad filmmaking – as you have mentioned in a comment-. it shows that he was very very nervous while making the film about presenting Rajni and concentrated his energies\attention on to that. at the cost of the rest of the film (barring a few exceptions). No filmmaker – and the fact is that he is a 2 film old filmmaker whose past 2 films together wouldnt have cost half of this film’s budget – who sees such a big investment, both of money and expectations could remain sane while making it. otherwise he is a super craftsman, there is no way he could have put out such a shoddily made film
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MANK
July 23, 2016
And reg: Rajni doing more for the film than vice versa, or Renjith’s poor craftsmanship, i would say there are about 3 instances where the actor & director scores together in tandem
The scene where he visits his house for the first time after his return and imagine his wife in every room. it is a superbly shot and superbly acted scene. i had pointed out Rajni’s skill at quicksilver change of emotions\expressions in an earlier post. this scene was an eg of that. his emotional display in that scene is reminiscent of his Jhonny\Nterikann performances.
The scene were he kills the guy by ramming him with his car. i loved the way that scene was build up. first instance where he says 2 mins, to the instance where he pulls out of the old photograph – in which the guy is young and pretty much shows him his place in his larger scheme of things- and then he walks away as the guy continues to taunt him from behind and just coolly gets in to the car and runs him down – while the fantastic neruppuda plays in the BG- .his men arriving at the moment to finish of the rest. that was a superbly executed scene.
The assassination attempt in his house- where you really get a sense of foreboding when he turns around and looks in to the mirror and admires his (aged) face for a moment and then the shootout that follows, it shows him to be at once vulnerable and macho and i dont remember the last time this happened to Rajni, l felt that was very well shot and edited.
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Arivalagan
July 23, 2016
@balaji.v.sankar haha i guess there’s some semblance. thanks for sharing. that was some movie also.
@Pravin Nice summary.. more concise than my comments.
@Random Junkie hmm ive been following brangan sir’s reviews for quite a while now.. u mean vitriol elsewhere like on twitter? seems like rather dignified here..
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Arvind Sridhar
July 23, 2016
On the possibility of Kamal directing Rajini on a scale of 1-10, its about a 0.5. It’s close to impossible. Rajini’s presence would definitely help Kamal not worry about the budget or the lack of it and would give him freedom to really give his best. But I am pretty sure he would refuse it even if offered the opportunity. Kamal has been in a zone of his own, a zone sculpted out of self indulgence. It’s been good for the most part, but the lustre is wearing off. I’ve been yearning for the actor for years. I hope he takes the success of Papanasam (however small it is) as an example and starts acting in films that warrant his acting alone. While it’s true that Kamal charges a bomb for the movies that he’s in, most of them are his own productions. And I think he acted in Papanasam for free.
As for Rajini, the movie is definitely a step in the right direction. This was a rather big misstep ( a costly one actually ), but Rajini is not the one to blame here. The movie had potential to be good if not great. Rajini for the most part looked wonderful and this should definitely give him the confidence to push further. He could probably reduce his salary but that would be asking too much. So let’s see what the man will be up to after 2.0
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Mag
July 23, 2016
FYI.. The character of Tony Lee in the movie is actually Chinese and not Malay. Like Indians, Chinese were also brought in to work in Malaysia in those days..
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brangan
July 23, 2016
MANK: Actually, this film reminded me of Bombay Velvet. Anurag Kashyap was another indie-type director used to small budgets, suddenly handed a huge film. He, too, did a hell of a lot of research about Bombay and tried to incorporate a lot of that history into the characters and the film. And that film, too, forgot to engage us emotionally with trajectories and character arcs, and instead tried to tell a “big” story in flashes — and none of it stuck because there was too much information, and all of it was conveyed too quickly.
Also, like AK, I suspect Ranjith shot too much and then had to cut down a heck of a lot, resulting in this choppy, rhythmless film.
I’m pretty sure Ranjith will return with a Raman Raghav of his own 🙂
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Arvind Sridhar
July 23, 2016
@ MANK:
True the scene where Rajini reminisces about his wife in his house worked. And the credit for goes to both the director and Rajini. But even there towards the end you could see the director’s effort slackening. The only scene that truly worked from the beginning to the end was the car jamming scene. It was done well.
Sort of feel Brangan’s right about Ranjith shooting a lot and having problems shortening out.
A very interesting comparison to that of Bombay Velvet. But the problem with Bombay velvet for me was more of how the movie was written than how it was shot. (it looked great for me) Kabali’s got problems with both
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MANK
July 23, 2016
Brangan, your comparison with AK and BV is spot on. all those things – like the plight of the tamils in malaya, their fight for equal rights, their turning to crime for a livelihood, the caste and class differences, racism, these must have been the real themes that must have interested Renjith about the subject matter. he was going to use the main revenge storyline as a trope to tackle these subjects. but what most probably happened was that once the commercial considerations kicked in, all this texture, all those layers of subplots must have been the first casualty at the editing table. so what we end up with is a routine revenge tale with flashes of these layers. yeah i am sure Renjith will return with a small personal film next time, he definitely knows his craft. the only question is whether the powers that be allow him a next time, i already hear chants of ‘off with his head for making a boring Rajni film’ all around . 🙂
Also i am rather perplexed with Renjith (and this film ‘s) comparison with Mani Rathnam and Dalapathi everywhere. Except for an artistic personal film making streak that is common to both these filmmakers, i would say, they are as different as filmmakers you can get. not just the fact that Dalapthi was MR’s 10th film (and any day a better filmmaker than Renjith), he had already developed a mainstream commercial sensibility by then. he had made agninakshathram and nayagan before that. also he was majorly into stunts, songs and spectacle. thalapathi was very much a grand, glossy opera inspired from our greatest epic. so even with Rajni’s character rooted in real life milieu , the character’s larger than life quality was never in doubt. on the other hand Pa Renjith a more down and dirty filmmaker, if i have to make a comparison, then Mani Rathnam is Francis Coppola to Renjith’s Sidney Lumet. so the marriage between MR and Rajani was much more comfortable one, there was scope for meshing of their sensibilities. the only way a Renjith- Rajani film would have worked is if Renjith made his film. there was no way his sensibilities was going to fuse with Rajani’s.
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brangan
July 23, 2016
MANK: Agree about the non-Mani Ratnam-ness of Ranjith. In fact, I was making the case today that MR’s gangster films work because they were ‘simpler’ films — i.e. they did not try to cram a history book into the screenplay — but rock-solid in terms of emotional connect.
Take the horrible end here. I mean, yes, it makes sense conceptually, as it goes with the crab story, etc. But when writing a screenplay, you have to layer this angle throughout, so the event makes not just conceptual sense but EMOTIONAL sense.
Take Tinnu Anand’s assassination of Kamal in Nayakan. The character was introduced as a boy. Then we see Kamal’s guilt and his decision to help the family. Then we see Tinnu again as a grown-up. We see Kamal becoming a sort of foster father. We keep seeing Tinnu even in scenes he is not really needed (eg. when Nizhalgal Ravi dies) — he is around. He says he is his “beta.” Then Tinnu learns the truth. He feels betrayed not just because this man killed his father but also because this foster-father killed his father. He takes revenge.
It is rock-solidly built up. It doesn’t come out of nowhere. We know the emotional history and trajectory of both parties. And the end makes logical and emotional sense.
But here, it comes out of nowhere. The cops come out of nowhere. Tiger comes out of nowhere. You have build these things up. You can’t say “oh, I referred to that crab story in Reel 3, so that’s why I’m ending the film this way.”
Yes, I know the Kalaiyarasan character was the real “equivalent” of Tinnu Anand here, but I’m just talking about how the end came about.
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MANK
July 23, 2016
Venkatesh, na, i wouldnt call this Rajani’s aalavandhan. Rajni’s Aalavandhan was Baba – with the same director suresh krishna. dealing with similair out of the box themes like dual persona, rebirth, mysticism and stuff like that. this is more like a down to earth Kamal crime drama like Satya, unnai pol oruvan or thoongavanam. i wonder, wouldnt Kamal have suited this subject more than Rajini?. If Kamal had played the lead role, perhaps Renjith would have had more freedom to make the film he wanted to make and subjects he wanted to tackle
btw i believe that Kamal almost directed Rajni. i read somewhere that he was considering Rajni for a role in Marudanayagam and Rajni was said to be interested. but Kamal changed his mind(for obvious reasons) and gave that role to Kannada superstar Vishnuvardhan.
During the promotions for Dasavatharam, kamal had talked about producing a film with Rajni in lead. he had rejected the possibility of them working together as actors. his logic was that a Rajni film has to be a Rajni film and there was no way he and Rajni would be able to work together as actors as they were doing different things now.
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MANK
July 23, 2016
Brangan, you are absolutely right about the emotional connect and solid build up in MR’s films.Here, even though the film is drowning in emotional melodrama, deceits and betrayals, we hardly feel anything at all. you feel totally disconnected from the proceedings and that too with Rajni in the lead. its unbelievable
i wonder where this leaves Rajnikanth , the superstar\Actor. he is now 66 and his health radically failing, is he going going to hang up his boots up after endhiran2.0- which is a film i am so not looking forward to seeing at all. it is all going to be Rajni\s face photoshopped on flying stunt doubles and performance capture characters created in computer. so would this be the last time we will be seeing our beloved superstar inhabit a flesh and blood character?. you can already see that he is feeling his age in this film. he doesnt have that spring in his step anymore. someone like NTR played the hero well in to his 70’s, even as he was actively in politics. But in case of Rajini, his health is biggest concern. but i fervently hope and pray that he has it in him to comeback with another of his knockout performances.
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Varun
July 24, 2016
I watched the movie and I would say this is the first movie that respects both Rajni and his Fans..Yes..Its a painfully slow movie..The over all movie is not coherent..Their is always a feeling of Something missing…But all these feelings are because how trained our minds when it comes to What to Expect from a Rajni Film. Rajni is not Arnold or Kamal..He is above them..He is both a Class and Mass Actor. But Except Baadshah and Endhiran, None of the Rajni Flims Respected him as an actor in this past 25 years. Ranjith is trying to break the mold and as a Cinema lover we should all appreciate that. Its a love and Family Reunion Story..Wait a minute..A Family reunion Story in a Rajni Film…? Its set in Malaysia…Wait..Is it Set in Malaysia? Its an Aging Ganster Movie.is our Rajni old? So many questions ponder you as you watch the movie..But once you come out of this pre established Conceptions about Rajni and how his movie should be..You start appreciating the effort the director has made in bringing out the acting Talents of Rajni and how much Respect he has for Rajni the Actor. I am sure AR Murugadoss, Siruthai Shiva etc etc and bunch of movie makers can give us a Rajni we want..But only Few film makers can give a film that respects Rajnikanth the Actor and Ranjith is one among them. The maniratnam comparison has said it all..Having said that, Yes the movie does not come together But its definitely not a failed attempt at all and a Real movie that respects Rajnikanth as an Actor than a Joker or a God.
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Papa Lemuritus
July 24, 2016
There was something amiss.It was interesting to watch but did not felt satiating.Kind of like you were given a taste of a piece of chocolate but when we want more there isn’a any left.Maybe the problem with the director was the upgrade in scale.But had he relied upon building up tension to the scenes rather than relying on horrendous twists and played out the subplots ,maybe it could have worked or maybe not.But as a whole I did enjoy watching the few brilliant scenes scattered all through the movie.As I said I was left wanting for more when there wasn’t any left.
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Krishna
July 24, 2016
Most stimulating conversation about the movie is happening here, and boy am i not glad for it. I even learnt of a couple of things i may have missed in the movie. Ellam OK, but did nobody, including rangan, get a sense of too much ‘nadaga nedi’? Or even something like an early cheran padam? Ellame solli solli kattikitte irukkanga, aana unmaila ethayume kataala… That’s probably my biggest let down, all the things kept aside.
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blurb
July 24, 2016
The scene where he talks to school kids about his wife totally didn’t work for me 😦 It felt like Ranjith had taken inspiration from 9th standard physics lab reports.
“My wife really inspires me.” Cut to flashback. Aapte says something supposedly inspiring (but actually forgettable).
“My wife is so beautiful.”: Cut to flashback. Show her being “beautiful”.
This is just lazy 😦 Act it out, man! I don’t need to see flashbacks as proof.
Just really disappointed 😦
Good Will Hunting. Remember the scenes when Robin Williams reminisces about his wife? We don’t even see that character.
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Madan
July 24, 2016
“Rajni is not Arnold or Kamal..He is above them..He is both a Class and Mass Actor.” – Pardon? Exactly how is Kamal not a Class Actor? Did Rajni ever take such a big risk as Pushpak? One Raghavendra does not equalise him to Kamal’s many experiments (many of which in turn were commercially unsuccessful).
I do agree that Endhiran did to some extent respect the actor in Rajni, though more by way of bringing out some of the pre-superstar (pre-Annamalai to be specific) shades of Rajni. The scientist Rajni was reminiscent of the Dharmathin Thalaivan absent minded professor while evil chitti evoked his villainous turns. I got the feeling that Endhiran might have been a better film had Sujatha himself directed it. 😉 There were some thoughtful aspects about the film that are quite relevant to the burning debate about AI these days. I thought it was quite nicely discussed through the filter of a typical mass action film; it wasn’t JUST turning Rajni into a robot so he could do the superhuman things his fans want to see him doing. Having said that, I don’t have high hopes of Endhiran 2 and don’t really see the scope for one from a narrative point of view because Endhiran did not have an open ended climax.
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Raj Balakrishnan
July 24, 2016
This is a great thread. Enjoyed Baradwaj’s review and some excellentl comments BTL. Just two points – couple of contributors have been critical of Sivaji. IMHO, that is probably the ultimate ‘Rajini movie’ and he (Rajini) could have actually retired, as a hero, after that film. It had the greatest thalivar introduction scene, amazing songs, a strong antagonist, Rajini doing some great action and playing the messiah. I don’t think even Shankar can better that.
Also, agree that Rajinikanth movies require great antagonists who can be put down only by thalivar – someone like Ramsay Bolton from the Game of Thrones. Irrfan Khan playing the bad guy in a Rajini movie would be interesting. Akshay Kumar in 2.0 should be good too.
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brangan
July 24, 2016
Madan: Yes, I’m not the biggest Endhiran fan, but you have to give credit where due. It’s a cinema of ideas, and may also be read as Rajini’s meta-movie the way Uttama Villain was Kamal’s — a career-crossroads dilemma between Chitti or Vaseegaran, superhero or ordinary actor. That the superhuman Chitti nearly wins is — to me at least — a summing up of the fact that the superstar keeps trumping the actor.
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Honest Raj (formerly 'V'enkatesh)
July 24, 2016
MANK: I’ll do a Santosh Kumar T K on you – he’s Ranjith not Renjith. 🙂
And yes, Baba=Rajini’s Aalavandhan.
About Tinnu Anand’s assassination of Kamal in Nayakan:
Let me delve a little deeper. 🙂 Sure, the sequences that lead to Kamal’s assassination in the film had flow and made ’emotional’ sense, but was it thoroughly ‘logical’? How is a mentally-challenged man fatally attacking somebody with a pistol from quite a distance justified? Also, the dept. should’ve asked Kelkar’s family to surrender his pistol (or at least the bullets) upon his death, no?
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brangan
July 24, 2016
Honest Raj: If a film’s emotional logic grabs you, the “logical” logic becomes entirely secondary. The former is far more important.
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Ravi K
July 24, 2016
There was a lot of potential for emotional resonance and mood that was discarded in favor of mere plot. What is it like to be an aging don? What’s it like to life a life in which death is always around the corner? What’s it like to not only find out that one’s daughter is alive, but that she has also entered the world of violence? Does Kabali feel bad knowing that? Even the big reveal that his wife is alive was not particularly emotional, except for the reunion scene. After that there’s no wistfulness or sadness about lost time. No re-adjusting to this new situation. We just hurtle into the gang war business. Rajini hasn’t had true romantic chemistry with anyone on-screen in a very long time, and this film continues that tradition.
The setup of Kabali speaking to the school was so lazy. It’s just an excuse for Kabali to impart information, and segue into flashbacks. Frankly, I’m tired of all the flashbacks in Tamil films. It’s become a stale formula. Set up a hero with some mystery and/or darker shades, then show in great detail how he got there. We don’t need to see all of that. As far as I’m concerned, it’s just information. Filmmakers can convey that a character had a rich and eventful past without always using extensive flashbacks explicitly showing us this past.
I did like the detailing of the world of the Malaysian Tamils in the world of the film. Even though the film itself is ultimately a letdown, there is a good deal more “world-building” and detail in this film than in most Tamil films. Rajini is underrated as an actor. To me his acting abilities and his poor choice of projects causes a cognitive dissonance.
Whatever my thoughts are on the film, I think a lot of people are expecting a typical Rajini movie. I heard someone in the theater at intermission say, “Rajini padam-ey illa.”
I am pessimistic about Enthiran 2.0. Without Sujatha, I think it will be a letdown.
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Varun
July 24, 2016
@Madan..I guess u misunderstood me..Anyone who says that Kamal is not a class actor would not reading or writing in this thread..What i meant was Kamal can never be a mass actor..But Rajni with the Right script can both be a class and mass actor..I am not saying Kabali is the best film in Rajnis Career..But Definitely be Quoted for Rajnis Acting in the coming years…I am sure Rajni had good time acting in this movie..If he can enjoy..why not we as a fan..Lets Face it..Rajni will be definitely hanging the boots in few years and considering his frequency of movies..we are going to watch just few movies of the screen..So lets not be super critical..The movie is definitely not crap or unwatchable..It has its flaws..But its definetely a one time watch..So lets be easy and enjoy the mans presence on Screen..
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Madan
July 24, 2016
“and may also be read as Rajini’s meta-movie the way Uttama Villain was Kamal’s — a career-crossroads dilemma between Chitti or Vaseegaran, superhero or ordinary actor. ” – Interesting interpretation.
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An Jo
July 24, 2016
To BR and others comparing this to BOMBAY VELVET in intent/execution:
Bombay Velvet is a dis-honest film. Ranjith/Renjith’s is an honest one gone awry.
BV is more of a tribute to American gansterism of the ’20s. For God’s sake, it has a scene literally yanked out of Cagney’s THE ROARING ’20s with that iconic shot of ‘He used to be a BIG SHOT.’
All leit-motifs, all tropes, point not to Bombay of the ’60s [can you please count the number of shots of the life-line of Bombay, the local? And not just the superficial shots of trams puffing around] but to America of the ’20s. Sure, AK points to jazz, he points to the horse-races, he points to MID-DAY, points to the influences of Parsis, and he barely, BARELY points to the mills.These are dis-honest chapter/page-reminders in a film that owes more to American gangster-settings than to ANYTHING of the post-60’s Bombay.
Take out BOMBAY out of BV. Will the film survive? Yes it will! And THAT’ s the sign of a massive failure. BOMBAY or not, it makes no difference to the film. That IS the failure of this film. Not budget. Micro-soft excel spread-sheet wise, yes; a lower-cost flop is better than a higher-cost ‘indie.’ It is off-the record but even Gyan Prakash, the author on whose MUMBAI FABLES, the movie is supposedly based on [ in actuality, as later revealed, it is influenced more by JAMES ELLROY’s ‘ LA QUARTET’ – there goes your ‘love’ for Bombay for a toss..] was tongue-tied after the premiere, and in a bad-way.
And then that’s when this ‘champion’ of chest-beating ‘liberals’ who hyper-ventilated and compared India to North Korea, realized his mistake and went back to time-traveling Raman Raghav from ’60s to Raman Raghav 2.0 in the millennium, keeping the spirit intact AND most importantly, the budget shoe-string and still managed to achieve what he initially set out to..
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brangan
July 24, 2016
An Jo: Be that as it may, I am only talking about the PROCESS of two ‘small’ filmmakers who set out to make a dense historical epic in a mainstream format and then ended up sacrificing the emotional beats that would help the film connect to an audience.
So I’m just talking about the overall process. Whether Kashyap researched Bombay or New York or Timbuktoo, I’m not talking about the places but the research, the process.
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Madan
July 24, 2016
“What i meant was Kamal can never be a mass actor” – Which is not true either. Maybe lately his box office influence has waned but this was not true for a long time about Kamal. Kamal was able to straddle both worlds like Amitabh Bachchan did a little before him. Rajni had the potential to be a class and mass actor but has given up so much of the former for the latter that it may be too late to turn the clock back. He may have to considerably downsize and choose to act in films which don’t depend on his name for box office success.
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Aditya (Gradwolf)
July 24, 2016
If there’s anything that made the film for me it is the complete Chennai sequence. That was really Ranjith there and Rajini the performer too shines. That’s one part where all the emotional depth was there to see. I loved how he stretched it out and used their fear of being in a foreign land (they are Malaysians, TN is alien to them and it probably feels like how they felt when they (only Kabali, not even Yogi) first landed in KL escaping a land of oppression). But after a point, Ranjith didn’t balance that and his star’s aura and lost the movie somewhere.
@Ravi: What’s it like to not only find out that one’s daughter is alive, but that she has also entered the world of violence? Does Kabali feel bad knowing that?
I thought this was a good thing. We didn’t get any of those useless if only I had been there for you, you wouldn’t have turned out like this nonsense. No one feels sorry for the other. A badass’s daughter is a badass. And you can see the pride in him when he sees how she is the one saving him there and he doesn’t care what happens from hereon. I only wished that part had better fight choreography (sorry for the twisted example – something like Vishwaroopam transformation scene) but Ranjith just does slo-mo and reaction shots.
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An Jo
July 24, 2016
@ BR Saab I get that. And that’s why this sentence: ‘Micro-soft excel spread-sheet wise, yes; a lower-cost flop is better than a higher-cost ‘indie.’
I feel,this is not an apple-to-red-apple comparison. When a film-maker doesn’t remain true to the milieu, to the intention on paper, there can hardly be a comparison! Ranjith’s intention, I feel was to marry his instincts to Rajnikanth’s super-stardom and get the BEST out..he may have not been successful at that..but his INTENTION was honest.
AK’s on the other hand, was a dis-honest movie venture. It never ventured to captured Bombay in all it’s glory in mid ’60s. It is pathetic to see Johnny Balraj more influenced by James Cagney of the ’20s than jubilee-hit star of the ’60s Rajendra Kumar dancing around nuclear reactors..
Any youth, in any country, is bound to be, if not impressed, at least ‘influenced’ by the happenings during his time-period. For instance, I was not even born when Amitabh stunned the nation with 4 mega-hits in a row, MKS, TRISHUL, DON, KASME VAADE in just 1 year – 1978. To NOT include this marker in a movie that talks of a period between ’75 and ’80 is a dishonest move. Pop-culture references, per my thinking, have to be true-markers. They just weren’t in BV.
Ranjith on the other hand, I believe after seeing KABALI has only struggled in commensurating the marriage between super-stardom and the facts on hand. And that’s a far nobler failure I feel.
All that he failed in, I believe, was in fitting Rajnikanth to the historical markers of Tamil lives and moments in MALAYSIA..
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sankarshan
July 24, 2016
Baradwaj is mild in his comments and has just tried his best to pick up some good things in the movie
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satishkvasan
July 24, 2016
Finally a Rajni movie, where you needn’t squirm in your seats while watching him eat chillies, trying to get fairer, dancing with the Sonakshis and Deepikas ! After all the backlash, I expected a slow boring movie and it turned out to be an engaging movie. Could it have been better? Yes… but you can say that for anything..
Much better than recent Rajni movies.
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Honest Raj (formerly 'V'enkatesh)
July 24, 2016
BR: Your explanation might hold good for a Vikraman film, but for Mani Ratnam?
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kurinji
July 24, 2016
Hands down this one was better than anything Rajini has acted in the last few years. Maybe we over expected from Ranjith and Ranjith was not in his best form . Ranjith and the movie aside I am curious why Rajini chose this film . He did Batsha when anti muslim sentiments were high in the early nineties. He did Kabali when anti dalit violence has increased in the state. These are not coincidences I feel .Agreed Basha did not carry a serious religious integration message . And Kabali was in the most part a rajini movie . May be he is trying to send out a message within the limitations of being a superstar and without ruffling too many feathers. Rajini is an honest artiste , so is Ranjth. Ranjith should soon make a movie with all the freedom he deserves with preferably no big star. He is still one of our promising talents. Someone like manirathnam came back after disasters like ayudha ezhuthu or kadal. But will it be easy for Ranjith who is an outspoken dalit .Something he keeps reminding us in his movies is a dalit succeeding is obstructed both overtly and covertly incessantly . Caste dynamics in tamil cinema industry is the elephant in the room . So is Misogyny . Will someone talk or write about all these . Oops Im ranting 🙂
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Bharath Vijayakumar
July 24, 2016
Did like a lot of things in Kabali until the last 30 minutes.
The promotions made it look like a high voltage T20 match.
Ranjith did manage to do a lot of damage control and reinstate some calmness through his interviews in the last week. From what he spoke it looked a solid Test match was on offer.
Taking the above two into consideration my mind had subconsciously calibrated itself into expecting a ODI. The format which does balance artistic finesse in a player with sufficient adrenaline rush.
What finally unfolded in front of me on screen was a Test match played in coloured clothing!!!
The film did leave me with some disappointment. But it was not like Ranjith had slogged wildly and gifted his wicket. He seems to have been beaten by a genuinely good bowler whose name on the scoreboard might probably read as ‘pressure’ or ‘expectations’.
I can see why people are disappointed with Ranjith. But those who are mocking him are only clueless.
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sravishanker1401gmailcom
July 24, 2016
BR : “Seeds are sown in the audience’s mind but nothing sprouts from it”
VOW !
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Jaga_Jaga
July 24, 2016
Watched it once this morning. Will see it again in the night. After knowing that this film would be about the Malays/Tamils/Chineese in the context of Malaysian gangsters, and the story of minority Tamil immigrants over there,I did my homework to comprehend the movie better, before watching it.
I see two ways of seeing the movie.
(i) Assume that I have no idea who Rajinikanth/Ranjith are. Have no clue about the fare awaiting me (though I assumed to be fairly educated about the Malaysian Tamils).
In this case, I felt that it was a very good movie which was both slow and too fast at the same time. Within any given scene, the events seemed to unfold so slowly that you were almost lulled into a nice sleep. But just when you begin to yawn, boom here comes the next scene with seething action which opens up your eyes. WOW so awesome excitement ahead, you think. But immediately excitement evanesces into boredom yet again. This loop recurs throughout the movie, and suddenly you see “a film my Pa Ranjith…” flash on the screen. You see everyone leaving the hall, and just think, did I see a good movie with a lot of flaws or a bad movie with lots of good things??
(ii) Assume you are familiar with Pa Ranjith’s film-making style; and Rajini’s panache/emoting skills as well as limitations.
it immediately strikes you that this is Ranjith’s way of making a gangster type movie. Push all the details into the background. Expect his audience to be knowledgeable about his subject. Make them read between, over, and under the lines, but the lines themselves must be subtle and open to multiple interpretations. Unfurl so many events that it is difficult to keep track of them, but take the pains to dot the “i”s in every shot. All of which should eventually explode towards a finale so hastily executed that you scratch your head, and are unwilling to accept
In that sense, this is just Madras II. His style of film-making has neither improved nor gone down. He is perhaps more versatile with Attakathi style rom-coms than Madras/Kabali-like gangster movies?
W.r.t Rajinikanth, there is absolutely nothing new – in a good way. Exhibited a nice mix of emotions which most folks for the last twenty years never got to see (such as crying, feeling lost, emoting despondence etc.), and of course his regular course of hand-waving, face-turning, quirky smirks, leg-heaving, etc.
So the bottom-line is verbatim the same one BR wrote as the last paragraph in this blogpst!
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MANK
July 24, 2016
Honest Raj, more so for a Mani Rathnam film. he always look for the emotional connection than the logical ones. just take thalapathi. a lot of the narrative connections are done for their emotional links rather than logical, also MR puts a high emphasis on the audience understanding of Mahabharata and the epic Karna story. just take the 2 scenes where both Jaishanker and srividya comes to know of real identity of Rajni. in the first from his angry reaction to a question in police station about his origin, second where srividya identifies the cloth which she had covered an infant surya, logically those could be straight from some manmohan desai film. also check out the circumstances how deva and surya becomes lifelong friend\brothers, if you are to take it apart logically, it comes across so contrived and ridiculous.but basically MR is banking on our identification of these characters with the epic ones of Duryodhana,Karna and Kunthi and we accept that is what is going to happen and should happen. that’s the half of it and mix it up with his brilliant film making , you as an audience arent bothered about the logical contrivances at all. you can spot several such instances in other films too, whether its Anjali,Roja ,Bombay, dil se etc..May be Iruvar was the film where he went all out to close the logical gaps in narrative and characterization. but even there may be you can spot him manipulating the audience based up on their real life counterparts.
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Varun
July 24, 2016
@Madan..Being Successful Does not make somebody a Mass hero..Yes Kamal was Successful in Box office with films like Sakalakala Vallavan( Its been 33 years since then) and Appoorva Sagotharagal(26 years since then) which is quite a time..As Kamal mentioned its a Conscious decision took by him very early in his career. Rajnis On screen presence, Charisma and Magnetism attracts generations after generations and is still continues.. You can interchange Rajni in any of Kamals films and he could fit 50% of his fims and people would have accepted him. You cannot say the same for Kamal. Its all about the Potentials we are talking here..This is all with reference to Acting and on screen presence only.
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Vijay
July 24, 2016
One thing I’m failing to understand over the last 10 years is why is Rajni trying to remold his filmography by subduing to directors’ subtleties? Wasn’t it him from the early days who revolutionized this mass movie formula (at least for Tamil audience)? Weren’t his fans the one who grew up by putting down character driven movies as a fashion statement? Why this gradual detract? Is it because that mass movies take more effort (and in my perspective, it does take a lot of effort to come up with trend setting style gestures)? Or is it to prove a point to, say a Kamal/Kamal fan, which in my belief is unworthy, because Rajni’s mass movie fans anyways are majority. To me, Rajni had grown the most in terms of hyped up acting the way he was treated by Shankar in Sivaji’s second half. Where is it from there that Rajni was/is planning to evolve?
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nanda
July 24, 2016
Varun, concious decision to do good films.. varehwah. rajini stopped doing serious films after bad run in content oriented films… he came to the tamil cinema to make a career…which he did.. not improve cinema….while kamal was winning national awards as well as delivering blockbusters.. that to me is real mass and class as per any terminology
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Ravi K
July 24, 2016
Aditya wrote: “I thought this was a good thing. We didn’t get any of those useless if only I had been there for you, you wouldn’t have turned out like this nonsense. No one feels sorry for the other. A badass’s daughter is a badass. And you can see the pride in him when he sees how she is the one saving him there and he doesn’t care what happens from hereon. I only wished that part had better fight choreography (sorry for the twisted example – something like Vishwaroopam transformation scene) but Ranjith just does slo-mo and reaction shots.”
I’m not asking for any rona-dhona about it, but it could have been interesting as subtext, if not as something that Kabali himself was feeling, then as a general sense that the film is conveying that the cycle of gangsterism continues.
Another point. I hate this “gangster with a heart of gold” stuff. Them avoiding drugs and prostitution is one thing, but the school is a ham-fisted device to show that Kabali is actually a good guy. “The Godfather” films made us relate to the characters simply by depicting them as a family and setting the film from their POV. We didn’t need to see Vito Corleone setting up a school for poor kids or something.
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Madan
July 24, 2016
@ Varun: I don’t want to get into an argument here about Kamal. But I think you are looking at only very few of his films. What about the comedies he has done with/without Crazy Mohan? They did great business at the BO too. Most recently, Viswaroopam was an unqualified success too.
I get what you’re driving at in marking out Kamal as class rather than mass but your definition of mass is something that is very specific to the Tamil superstar phenomenon (and would not apply to Arnold either, for instance). In general terms, an actor with mass appeal need not be one for which fans go into an at times unhealthy state of delirium and are prepared to genuflect before him. An actor with mass appeal is simply one for whose films the masses too turn up and which do not depend on a sophisticated audience parking bums on the seats for success. By this standpoint, Kamal has both class and mass films. Would you call Badshah (Shah Rukh Khan) a class film? I certainly wouldn’t. Urban, yes, but not class, not even close. There are lots of Kamal films, esp the comedies, which fit in roughly the same category as Badshah, maybe even ‘lower’ because often times Kamal comedies are only situational slapsticks while Badshah also had some brilliant parody going on amidst the tacky production values of the day.
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varun1
July 24, 2016
@Nanda…To put things into perspective…”Ejaman Kaaladi Man Eduthu”…”Naan Auto kaaran Kaaran”…”Naan oru thadava Sonna nooru thadava sonne maari”…”Mothathule Pombala pombalaiya irukanum”…”Andavan sollran Arunachalum mudikaran”…”chumma parandhu Parandhu Adipen”…”Rajni hitting 100 goons as he does in Sivaji single handedly” ..etc etc..If you agree that Kamal can do all these things and people will accept..Then yes Kamal is a mass hero..
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Amit Joki
July 24, 2016
Well this is what happens when a star’s presence burdens the scripting process.
Apparently Soundarya Rajnikanth asked Ranjith to ready a story which Rajini had to accept. So in essence Rajini is choosing both the director and the story.
Ideally directors should approach actors and not vice versa. I can only imagine Ranjith thinking of how he would regret if he missed on the chance to direct the superstar.
Also Rajini seems to consciously avoid roles that his fans wouldn’t like to see him in. This should change.
I have never understood Rajini the star and hype around him, largely because I am not from his era, but I see a great potential in him as an actor that many have failed to tap into.
I have a great script idea with Rajini playing a 65 year old seducer-detective who lives for his own self and is far from being an epitome of goodness. He is naughty, clever, has ego. Seducing was easier for him 40 years ago but after him being in coma a time lapse that big, his ego his hurt that what was childs play to him 40 years ago isn’t now. He needs to up the game to stay relevant and be redeemed and prove that he still has it in him.
Can someone pitch this idea to Soundarya Rajnikanth?
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Honest Raj (formerly 'V'enkatesh)
July 25, 2016
MANK: My issue is not about a filmmaker’s lack of focus on the ‘logical logic’ part per se, but about one factor being totally compromised for the other. Take Agni Natchathiram for instance: For most part of the film, Vijayakumar (drunk or not) keeps mixing up the names of Gautham and Ashok. Towards the climax, when he’s admitted in coma, Gautham and Ashok are called respectively by the latter’s sister and the former’s mother. We get an emotional connection right? The best part about the scene is it isn’t directly conveyed to the audience (i.e., we don’t get to see Vijayakumar specifically calling them and telling that he wants to meet Gautham and Ashok).
also check out the circumstances how deva and surya becomes lifelong friend\brothers, if you are to take it apart logically, it comes across so contrived and ridiculous
Gotta slightly disagree. From Surya’s POV, it definitely makes sense (on both accounts) because Deva makes a scapegoat out of his own men in order to ensure Surya’s release.
To me, Thalapathy is a well-made film than Nayagan. But then, I understand that he was relatively a newcomer when he made Nayagan.
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Honest Raj (formerly 'V'enkatesh)
July 25, 2016
Varun: When you talk about the ‘class and mass’ combination, Kamal is arguably the greatest actor in India. Mind you, Thevar Magan and Indian were huge hits as well. According to our trade pundits, he’s the only South Indian actor to have two films – Dasavathaaram and Vishwaroopam – in the 200c club!
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Athmi
July 25, 2016
Why is no one talking about the feminism in this movie? The characters of Dhansika and Radhika Apte are so empowering!
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kvass
July 25, 2016
@brangan If a film’s emotional logic grabs you, the “logical” logic becomes entirely secondary. The former is far more important.
On reading this, I remembered a scene from Anbe Sivam where Maddy drinks with Yugi and donating his blood the very next morning inadvertently killing the boy!!!!!
Able to realise the “logical” logic after viewing the movie quite a few times.
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Karthik
July 25, 2016
I loved the movie..
I think Rajini was fortunate to stumble upon Ranjith just when he wanted to do something different
And I feel Ranjith has given a better movie than we asked for..which can be understood better only with repeated viewings like memento or clockwork orange..
Many scenes had these characters on the background who will be connecting that scene to the next. Too many scenes that were really subtle to my relief. There were a few dull moments, bad acting and rare bad scenes just like every single great movie we have watched.
But the layered plot, movie that did not wander off from the central plot of gangster rivalry, excellent songs on the background, Ranjith’s strive to have a logical explanation for different happenings in the movie- like explaining the superhumanness of the hero, his wife and child coming alive, why characters do what they do and even why Rajini is wearing a suit and coolers which we would have never asked questions about etc etc. Finally someone has trusted the intelligence of the viewers and have given a real Gangster!
BR Sir, I saw your live chat regarding the hype that surrounded this movie’s release and I am sure you went to this movie in that state of mind. But I request you to view it one more time, forgetting the NEED for it to be a mass entertainer, you would be surprised to find one.
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Hermoine Granger
July 25, 2016
Hi BR, As a long-time reader, just wanted to drop you a feedback that comments section format is just not working for me. I used to love scrolling through the comments and seeing what everyone has to say, and I’m just not able to bring myself to click through 147 responses page by page now. I’m sure you have this up for a reason, but I want to let you know that it makes life very difficult for regular lurkers on this page like me, who love the energy the discussion adds to your write-up. Hope you consider this request to revert back to the earlier format.
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blurb
July 25, 2016
Kadakumar: Liked your comment and the questions you put forth.
“A drone simply going through the motions could have dished out a delectable product with just these two ingredients. Squandering such raw material is unforgivable.”
This “how could they possibly go wrong” is an interesting question.
So – there IS a drone for a Rajini movie, agreed. Some usual ingredients in a certain order.
But with someone like Ranjith (whose directorial and story telling impulses are quite strong), I am not so sure you can call his movie making a drone going through the motions, no?
This movie didn’t work (for me) because the aforementioned drone (from the Rajini movie) clashed with Ranjith’s directorial impulses – pretty much brangan‘s title.
This might have been a very different film if Ranjith had just been allowed to be. I believe that everyone involved in a movie needs to make “getting in sync with the director” their priority. Because the director is the captain of the ship. HIS vision needs to be brought to life in the truest possible sense. One gets the sense that people would have not done that very wholeheartedly for this movie. In a project like this, which rides on big money, and the fact that it is a RAJINI movie would have had Ranjith’s each limb being pressured from different quarters to cater to various needs. I suppose that’s just the baggage of having to direct someone like Rajini. Even in the lovely interview with The Hindu, Ranjith had mentioned that in several places Rajini himself was skeptical about whether or not certain scenes will work. I feel such skepticism is not valid. That just means that the actor is still not 100% in sync with the director. But he absolutely has to be – because he’s bringing the director’s vision to life. And the director knows his vision best. I don’t know if this kind of an actor – director dynamic can ever happen in a Rajini movie.
I love “Ulagam Oruvanukka” song. But I HATED the way it was used in the movie. Like I mentioned in a previous comment, the last thing he saw before going to jail is his pregnant wife getting beaten up. He gets out of jail, and the first thing he does is go on an ego trip? I suspect this must have been a clash between the impulses of the actor and the director.
Of course a lot oc the Rajini movie sterotype can be broken*. But Rajini has to decide to do so himself. Only time will tell us whether or not he would be willing to. But my suspicion is that he will go back to his usual template.
Long answer short: IMO Rajini cannot be directed by any good directors anymore. Because of the sheer fact that it’s a Rajini movie squashes the director’s creativity.
Are we to blame for it? Maybe. I don’t know.
* Actually some norms were indeed broken in this movie; and I appreciate those things. For example, the music was very different from the regular Rajini film music; the women were much stronger.
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zaazooz
July 25, 2016
If you what to know what you have become!
Learn!
https://donraja.wordpress.com/2016/07/
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sanjana
July 25, 2016
The music is good. I loved all the songs.
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brangan
July 25, 2016
Hermoine Granger: I restricted the comments to 50 per page because people said it was becoming difficult to scroll through if there were more. If people prefer the older, run-on format, then I’ll just revert to it.
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shaviswa
July 25, 2016
Brangan – it would help to have a threaded discussion format where the threads are collapsed by default. Only those interested would open the thread and read the conversation within the thread. This would help avoid the comments section becoming very long or to page through comments 50 at a time.
The threaded conversation format also helps people respond to a person directly than use @ references. Yes – threads also lead to the alignment issues when they become very long conversations, but that could probably be avoided by being able to collapse/expand threads and sub-threads.
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adavadi
July 25, 2016
”To me, Thalapathy is a well-made film than Nayagan. .”
only to you thankfully
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brangan
July 25, 2016
shaviswa: Yes, there is an option to have threaded comments in WordPress, but I don’t know if this is going to be convenient. For now, let me just remove the 50-comments-per-page rule and see…
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hari ohm
July 25, 2016
why did attakkathi dinesh act the way he did in this movie? i could not make head or tail as to why he was “thuru/thuru” all the time? Any background to it?
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MANK
July 25, 2016
Brangan, no, we tried the threaded comments option before and it didnt work remember. it was very confusing.
Also the reason you switched to 50 cmmts a page was because it was taking a long time for the page to load (in the case of 100 + cmmts and if there are youtube videos linked), especially in a mobile phone.
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Aditya (Gradwolf)
July 25, 2016
Yep, not a fan of switching back and forth to older and newer comments pages.
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MV
July 25, 2016
Varun : Rajni is a class actor, compared to the other mass heroes in this Industry – would be the better statement. Coz Rajni is yet to move out of his comfort zone of acting (and this zone includes giving a subdued, fine performance where the script demands) – his dialog delivery still leaves a lot to be deserved. After all these years, Rajni is yet to try out the different slangs in Tamizh or even play a non-tamil in his films. Now isnt good diction a mark of a good, or as you put it – a “class” actor?
And Kamal dares to play George Bush – and rolls his tongue around “nuclear”
Was Rajni convincing as the genius Vaseegaran in Enthiran? Not to me – but Kamal could convince you that he is a sappai sappani or an effete dancer or a typical uncle-type who flicks laddus while endorsing a textile giant. On the other end of the spectrum – he can also smack of machismo with the “Kannu venumnu sonniyame” scene or the transformation sequence (just to mention the recent ones). Much of it could be gimmicky – still you know he could pull it off.
I feel Kabali is the Kamalhassan experience for Rajni – where a good effort and experiment ends up paying less dividends and causing more dissonance !
To the person who suggested that Kamal direct Rajni – __/__
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Rahini David
July 25, 2016
BR: If I might make a suggestion. Your blog has a lot of posts with 50+ comments and this format is not really helpful in those posts. It was REALLY needed for the Illayaraja thread and that is because it had 400+ comments. I have had trouble in the Bajirao Mastani thread and that was 300+ comments. Perhaps you can set it to 200 (or 250) comments per page for now and see it if works better?
That way posts with 60 or 70 comments will be spared. They aren’t that heavy for a 3g connection anyway.
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Harish S
July 25, 2016
@BR: a little late reply.
When I read the hindu’s version of this article first, I felt why BR went too generic in his write-up. IMO your style is making a simple remark following it up with a strong backing. Not just that. In the Hindu version, the context was often missing, thus that version seemed like a skeleton, while here it is completely fleshed out with intricate details.
That’s why I urged you to keep the word count (if that is the reason for the shorter version) while writing.
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Honest Raj (formerly 'V'enkatesh)
July 25, 2016
only to you thankfully
I’m sure there are many. 🙂
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Iswarya
July 25, 2016
Yeah, page-loading delays notwithstanding, the run-on format was better. This moving back and forth is getting annoying!
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vatsa
July 25, 2016
Rhythm is the issue in this movie for sure. But I felt the same with Attakathi. But it was fine probably because of new faces. Madras was much more in sync. Rajni being the protagonist subconsciously probably made the movie out of rhythm? I felt the movie was fine (not great), if you take Rajni and the hype factor out of your mind. I watched it first time after all the mixed reviews , so maybe it was alright. The only thing the movie seems to miss (from my point of view) is the plantation background (in a less emotional way) which may have added more weight to the subtext. He could have reduced some bits of the Thailand and maybe Chennai/Pondy footage slightly to accommodate these things. I found it refreshing to see Rajni movie having slightly serious poltical undertone rather than some naive punch dialogues aimed at few (like JJ, KK) to draw attention. Also, I feel he should do this quite often and work with new directors than his usual cohorts.
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Neena
July 25, 2016
MANK: excellent observations on some sequences in Kabali. I loved that both father & daughter seemed a bit lost and paranoid when they land in Chennai too; and nearly expected a shootout in Meridien. It’s part alienation from the ‘homeland’, or Ranjith may be pointing out that the Tamil identity is hardly restricted to TN or even SL. And partly, neither seems to used to not being in charge. It’s brilliant that Kabali relaxes quicker than his daughter as she continues to bear the burden of being careful and checking the door before opening etc.
You can observe the ‘mood piece’ in some scenes – when Kabali watches Meena tussle with a dealer from the window (without rushing to her rescue or anything, thankfully), when Kabali says he is only a rowdy (without the kind of ‘nallavara kettavara’ drama that ended Nayakan). Now, you and BR might say that that’s how MR establishes an emotional connect. But, to me, both Nayakan & Thalapathy seemed too easy, too melodramatic. In fact, Thalapathy fails to establish a connect because everything happens only to the point – there’s no sufficient character building. And there are never any character arcs – MR’s characters remain the same from start to finish. Velu Nayakkar may be the only mild exception, perhaps thanks to Kamal’s performance. I prefer MR’s romantic dramas so much more for this reason – his trademark witty banter and onscreen chemistry based filmmaking works better in that genre. Ranjith, on the other hand, seems to love making his characters as ambivalent and feckle as the plot allows. If nothing else, it’s not easy to predict what’s coming next in Kabali (or Madras or Attakathi). This is something that makes the movie-watching experience very interesting for me. This is not to say one is better than the other – but just that MR & Ranjith are very different filmmakers and each one’s style works differently for different people.
Just curious: it amuses me that you spell Rajini wrong (from the commonly accepted spelling) in most of your posts. Why?
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adavadi
July 25, 2016
I’m sure there are many.:)
still a minority of dishonest rajs
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Neena
July 25, 2016
Oops, sorry, the comment on the paranoia in Chennai sequence was by Aditya. Thanks for bringing that to attention here 🙂
MANK, again: yeah, loved the car-ramming and what preceded it; and the attack in Auroville as well. Note the sly takedown of that often revered commune – ‘ellam foreigners-a, athaam strict-a irukkanga’ – without making a big deal out of it. Also, the commercial/financial aspects you spell out make it hopeless for Rajini. For one, now they have to release every film in Hindi as well to cash in on the hype, but look at the kind of half-baked reviews and critiques that has lead to in the ‘national’ media.
blurb: the flashback technique may be lazy, but that scene was interesting for the kind of questions the students asked. ‘Why do you wear suits?’ ‘Why did you become a gangster even after you were educated?’ – of course, that’s a lazy technique too – to make it into a Q&A. But, the reason why certain kinds of dressing or strategies were adopted by political leaders in the past may not be evident to a younger generation of unconvinced followers today. And Kabali himself questions his relevance at the end. The Q&A scene hints at this disconnect. Also, Kabali believed his wife to be dead the whole 25 years he was in jail. He had time to come to terms with it. It’s then not odd that he gracefully accepts the song & dance on his return. Only the hope given by release and the hints dropped by Loga make him start thinking his wife may not be dead, after all. It’s to writer’s feminist credentials again that they make Loga’s comment on Kumudha possibly being sold into prostitution a hopeful one rather than a dreadful or disgusting one for Kabali!
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Neena
July 25, 2016
Ravi K: ‘gangster with a heart of gold’? I didn’t see that anywhere in the movie – only as an interpretation in some reviews; and the free life foundation was certainly not projected in a ham-fisted way. Ambedkarite politics is a lot about education as a form of defiance. So, it’s not surprising or odd that Kabali chose to fund a school for droputs. But, Ranjith is mature enough to not show the institution as some kind of utopia – kids there take up guns, do drugs etc. This is not to say that a Dalit or Tamil gangster in Malaysia would automatically be someone who funds education and abhors prostitution. Just that it did not come off as a contrived depiction of Kabali as ‘gangster with heart of gold’ and that it’s more of a reflection of an Ambedkarite politics that may not always have the best results as the film shows.
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Rahini David
July 25, 2016
“Rajni” became accepted spelling from Baasha, no?
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brangan
July 25, 2016
Neena: I loved that both father & daughter seemed a bit lost and paranoid when they land in Chennai too.
But Neena, this is all just conception. It has to be translated into EXECUTION, no? The Q and A scene with the free-life kids was so amateurishly staged. And the Meridien parts too — the performances by Dhansika and the guy she suspects were so Tamil-drama level.
The problem with this film is not the lack of ideas (if anything it has a surfeit of ideas). The problem is that these ideas have not been transformed into a good screenplay, this screenplay has not been shot well, not been enacted well, and the resulting footage has not been edited well.
In short, the problem is with the various departments of filmmaking. Not with the ideas. The problem is that this is only ideas, not CINEMA.
If we are celebrating this, then we should be celebrating Samuthirakani’s Appa too. For that too isn’t cinema by any stretch, but boy, is it filled with IDEAS!
In contrast, Attakathi was such a beguiling piece of CINEMA (and Madras, to a lesser extent).
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MANK
July 25, 2016
Honest Raj , yeah count me in 🙂 . whether one likes nayakan more than thalapathi is completely a personal choice. no argument on that. but from the filmmaking POV, there is no question that thalapathi is the better film . the technical and narrative brilliance of the film is simply unparalleled even today
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Neena
July 25, 2016
BR: yes, this movie certainly did not fare well in execution, going by Ranjith’s own style and standards set before. Whereas, a well-executed MR movie (Thalapathy) fails because of, IMO, bad writing. Saying ‘yenna, nee en nanban’ a million times doesn’t cut it for me – instead, why not show us how Surya gets convinced of Deva’s friendship over a couple of scenes? Karnan becomes dead-loyal to Duryodhanan because of the one thing he gets from him that he gets from no-one else: acknowledgement that his birth doesn’t mean anything when dealing with his skills. There’s no such rock-solid reason for Surya. This is only to say, cinema can work for people even when it’s not that well executed, and fail even when it’s well executed. Kabali is no great film, but it has a lot going for it despite bad execution.
Rahini: I thought it was Rajini. oh, well, it doesn’t matter – just made me curious.
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adavadi
July 25, 2016
BR: yes, this movie certainly did not fare well in execution, going by Ranjith’s own style and standards set before. Whereas, a well-executed MR movie (Thalapathy) fails because of, IMO, bad writing. Saying ‘yenna, nee en nanban’ a million times doesn’t cut it for me – instead, why not show us how Surya gets convinced of Deva’s friendship over a couple of scenes?
Karnan becomes dead-loyal to Duryodhanan because of the one thing he gets from him that he gets from no-one else: acknowledgement that his birth doesn’t mean anything when dealing with his skills. There’s no such rock-solid reason for Surya. This is only to say, cinema can work for people even when it’s not that well executed, and fail even when it’s well executed.
yes, it’s a horrible movie. Kabali may not be classic but it is better than thalpathy. brahmin propaganda in shobana not marrying rajini but marrying aravind swamy n rajini marrying banu priya… exposed mani ratnam…even the acting n masala compromises were difficult to watch…
compared to crap like thalapathy.. nayagan agni natchathiram is better
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Neena
July 25, 2016
BR: from your review of Iraivi:
“Happenings are stretched and meshed the way they would be in real life, and not compacted according to the page-per-minute requirement of screenplay-writing textbooks…And why is it that your films come together more in the head than in the heart?…For now, Iraivi is a fascinating film, and that’s enough.”
So much of your review there discusses the ideas in the film than how they actually were executed on screen. Obviously the execution did work for you because you write: “when the parts are so well-crafted, we don’t complain as much about their sum not adding up to a satisfying whole. I am sure that you will, one day, make that wholly satisfying film, but for now, thank you for these parts.” But, even the parts did not work for me – perhaps because of the performances mostly, but also because of how they were written – not as screenplay, but as ideas and then, as script.
In the case of Kabali, I think the ideas and the writing are good enough to deserve attention on their own, while acknowledging that it could have been much better executed. Just as Iraivi was worth looking at for its parts, even if the sum did not add up.
I haven’t watched ‘Appa’ but going by ‘Nadodigal’, it’s unfair comparison; because bad execution is not the same as message-hammering or pontificating cinema.
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vatsa
July 25, 2016
brangan,
Attakathi’s acting had similar moments no? But, it appeared fine because of new faces?
In Kabali, he seems to have been inconclusive by trying to tone down “hero” moments in quite a few places, which resulted in somewhat contrived scenes. For instance:
Free-life foundation scene is again a heavily toned down version of similar successful-man-talking-to-a-group-of-students. He toned it down by introducing a student who finished it course and he got confidence to get a decent life (he did not say that he will become engineer/doctor/…. whatever). Rajni talks after that … I don’t know why he did that.
When the main “adiyal” in Chennai says he jumped over the wall and saw Kumudhavalli and Penelope etc., seems to be a more toned down version of similar scenes in other Indian movies. It was weird and felt like Ramayana – Sita-Hanuman-Raman-Asokavanam kind in the least dramatic way. This scene is followed by Rajni without beard etc.,
The way he ended the movie with the toned down version of “nallavana/kettavana”
The mowing down with a car of the “supposed” killers of his wife lacked finesse as well or whether he meant it that way.
It felt like he wanted to weave Rajni elements also trying to tone it down for his own reputation/satisfaction? Given there was some amount of compromise already like the interval scene where Rajni was shot quite a few times and somehow escaped even after quite a few close range shots. Same with his wife and kid.
He could have spiced few scenes up a bit. Maybe Rajni has to do a movie with Karthik Subbaraj or someone who travels both worlds with greater ease than Ranjith.
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MANK
July 25, 2016
All this talk about Rajani not able to work with good directors anymore and audience not going to accept him in anything other than his usual caricaturish stuff makes me wonder about the time that thalapathi was made.sure he had not acquired the star aura he had today and didnt have such a multinational market.. there was no internet or 24×7 news channels at the time to add to the feeding frenzy. But still he was undoubtedly the biggest star in TN and along with Bachchan and chiranjeevi was the biggest star in country.he was no less a god of the masses even then.And i would say the audience of that time was much more conservative or Backward (for lack of a better word) in accepting changes in their hero’s characteristics. but look at how pathbreaking it was for the time – especially for a Rajni film- and the number of hot botton social issues that Mani tackled in the film without ever overdoing it.issues of Illegitimacy,pre marital pregnancy,caste and class divisions,widow remarriage, crime ,law & order etc…
Just sample these points
Rajni loses his beloved because he is from lower caste – unthinkable for the time, bcoz Rajni was the ultimate tamizhmakan who had all the high class fair maidens falling at his feet in film after film.
Rajani marries the widow of the man whom he murdered and already has his child – blasphemous in that day and age when he had nubile virgins licking ice cream of his face or waiting out in rain all day and night for him accept their love(brangan & co’s favorite Amala in both instances 🙂 )
Rajni being brutally beaten up by cops, Rajni remaining subservient to another don and doing his bidding, it goes on. it would have been far too difficult for an audience stomach these things at that time, but yet the film became his biggest blockbuster up to that point.
And i believe that today’s audience who are much more evolved – barring a few hardcore die hard fans – will be willing to accept Rajni as a character rather than the caricature he has been playing. look at what has happened to salman Khan- post films like dabangg or Kick, it was felt that thats all he would be accepted by the masses , but as with Bajrangi baijan or Sultan has proved, he can still be accepted in a character driven film – yeah one could argue that he is still riffing on the regular salman khan persona- that doesnt have to break the fourth wall to appeal to the masses.
Ultimately i believe its up to good or bad filmmaking as Brangan said, yes if the director is talented enough , assertive enough and most importantly is egoistic enough like Mani was – to say that i dont care if this is going to star the biggest star ever lived , i am going to make my movie and i am putting my stamp over each and every aspect of it. i have the biggest star so i Rather take advatage of the fact that i can get all the money from the market and i can invest that in making my film technically and aesthetically brilliant .
without a doubt, thalapathi was the most technicallly brilliant film made in this country up until that time and on par with any hollywood product of the times. even when one watches it today, the lighting and the sound design , etc is simply breathtaking.
i believe Ranjith is a talented director ,if he had held his nerve, this would have been a terrific film. because the film has the ideas , the substance, but as Brangan said it went awry in the making stage.
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MANK
July 25, 2016
*This is only to say, cinema can work for people even when it’s not that well executed, and fail even when it’s well executed. *
Neena , but thats always been the case right. Audience always prefer the emotional connection over and above the artistic or logical. people who connect with the film on a film making level are even less. otherwise Adoor gopalakrishnan or Shyam benegal would have been the most successful filmmakers ever.
Kabali is no great film, but it has a lot going for it despite bad execution.
yes it has, and as i pointed out earlier the bad execution is not uniform. there are some really well conceived and executed scenes, it just that the bad ones are really , really bad and shockingly bad for a director of Ranjith’s caliber. the film never catches an even rhythm. we have the superb scene with Rajni walking in to the house imagining his wife and it followed by the dreadful dinner conversation scene.this unevenness never let us settle in to the movie or have a connection with the characters. Also as you pointed out, there is a feminist POV going on in this film which, i dunno when was the last tme it was there in a Rajni film. and by keeping the film open ended, Ranjith shows that he was above pandering and he had a personal vision for this picture, otherwise he could have just faded to black with the iconic scene of Kabali – after killing tony lee- standing in front of the twin towers.
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Anuja Chandramouli
July 25, 2016
Damn it! I really wanted to love Kabali and go hammer and tongs at BR and everybody else here who dissed it. Unfortunately, in all honesty I cannot do that. It is too damn bad because Rajni’s performance in Kabali was incredible. Understated yet mindblowingly brilliant. Proof about what I have always maintained… Rajni would have been knee-deep in Academy awards, if we had not made a superstar out of him.
The supporting cast was brilliant too. I loved Apte, Dansika and Kishore. The few good elements in the movie were really really good. Kumudhuvalli is that rare Rajni wife character who does not adopt a deferential attitude around him but is clearly a big factor in shaping his persona. Nice touch. His badass daughter was cool too. The scene where Dinesh is attacked with bottles was gut wrenching.
I wish Rajni works with PA Ranjith when he is a few films older and wiser. He deserves a second chance. I wish he puts a board outside his house and office that says, “Shankar Not Allowed” so that we don’t have to see him embarass himself by romancing mannequins like Shriya, Ash and Amy Jackson (shudder). I wish he issues a summons to the likes of Karthik Subburaj, Rajamouli, Gautam Menon, Nalan Kumarasamy, and Dharani and orders them to make a movie that is worthy of him, I wish he would disown Soundarya and urge Dhanush to choose a few scripts for him. I wish he could go back in time and oust Kamal Haasan from projects like Sivappu Rojakal, Nayagan, Thevar Magan, Michael Madana Kamarjan, Vettaiyadu Vilayadum, Papanasam and grab these meaty roles for himself. I wish and wish and wish. Too bad it is all wishful thinking 😦
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Vivek
July 25, 2016
It looked like everyone, in the film, were super-conscious of the fact that it was a Rajini movie, not the least Ranjith. Where one sees glimpses of his talents as a filmmaker (the scene where they disorient and kill Attakathi Dinesh just using bottles was quite chilling), in many scenes where you expect, it is simply not there (especially most scenes, save a couple, where Rajini confronts his nemesis). I feel for Ranjith because I don’t think any of us can even imagine the pressure he would have had. I constantly kept going back to his earlier movie Madras, where scenes of conflict were more organic and yet gave you the chills. Had this not been a Rajini movie, I am pretty sure Ranjith would have provided a better treatment to the background of the conflict.
SPOILER ALERT
The trailer did not really help – it seemed to setup a move like Baasha but in reality this is more of the Don’s human side and his quest to find his love. Nothing wrong with that but would have been better to taper down expectations a tad. Just watch Rajini after he is reunited with his long lost love and how he exudes a genuine sense of warmth in the song that follows. Many such scenes are a throwback to the earlier Rajini (the actor). Rajini has truly carried the film well. Like Baddy says, the rest of the cast (save Radhika Apte) don’t leave any impact on you and that is a problem. A stronger nemesis with a more compelling conflict would have made this an excellent watch.
Lastly – the following is NOT directed towards the many good people here who write thoughtful stuff in response to Baddy’s review.
To the “social media critics” that make fun of the movie, to the point of demeaning the efforts, please take a good hard look at yourself before you let your wisdom loose. By all means, criticize, but do not demean. Not defending a Rajini movie, but defending a movie that is not as bad by any standards.
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Honest Raj (formerly 'V'enkatesh)
July 25, 2016
only to you thankfully
still a minority of dishonest rajs
Look whose argument is getting diluted.
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Aadhy
July 25, 2016
After Kabali revs the engine up, there is a small moment of equanimity before the car throttles ahead to the guitar riffs of Neruppu da. I loved that pause there,
In fact the entire stretch between Kabali saying magizhchi and mowing down Loga is well done (some ambient sound plays in the background). Just finding new bits to like after watching the movie a second time.
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blurb
July 25, 2016
Neena: Still, nothing. 😦 OK, so he may have had time to come to terms with her death. Still – how could he be so callous about finding out how she exactly died? How could he not want to visit her “samadhi” first thing after getting out?! For whatever reason, I was very invested in Kabali-Kumudha relationship even before the release. And these inane things were a hard blow!
Also, I don’t understand what it means to “stage” a scene. Is that different from screenplay? I thought except for the edits of whose face to cut, and the camera instructions (like zoom, moving) – the rest was pretty much etched in the screenplay. And, I thought the former was called “editing”.
Basically, if you have the screenplay down, you can get a theatre drama out of it, at the minimum, no?
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blurb
July 25, 2016
Neena: Yes, I do agree that the content of the Q-and-A scene was rather interesting. But it seemed forced – which I think is why it didn’t work for me.
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Honest Raj (formerly 'V'enkatesh)
July 25, 2016
Neena: yenna, nee en nanban
Such staccato lines are a trademark in Mani Ratnam films. They work in some films. In some films they don’t.
One last time on Devaraj winning Surya’s friendship:
Logically speaking, the premise is CLEARLY established in the narrative; it comes across as more convincing than the epic itself. Look at these lines:
Ooru peru theriyadha anadhai, kaalam pooram ulla irundhu sethuruppen … Un aala ulla anuppi enna veliya konduvandhrukka….
Later when Devaraj insists that he come and live with him:
Surya: Enna saakadaiyila irundhu thooki valathrunkanga. Ivangala poi…
Devaraj: Unakku ivanga ellarum irukkanga. Aana enakku nee mattum dhana da irukka.
These lines pretty much sum up the reasoning behind their friendship.
And not to forget Surya’s refusal of Kalivardhan’s offer to join him.
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Glitch
July 25, 2016
Neena, agree with you on “Deva en nanban” stuff not working very well in Thalapathy.
I’m curious to know what Mani has said about working with Rajini and vice versa. Anyone remember anything?
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Ravi K
July 25, 2016
Neena wrote: “the flashback technique may be lazy, but that scene was interesting for the kind of questions the students asked. ‘Why do you wear suits?’ ‘Why did you become a gangster even after you were educated?’ – of course, that’s a lazy technique too – to make it into a Q&A. But, the reason why certain kinds of dressing or strategies were adopted by political leaders in the past may not be evident to a younger generation of unconvinced followers today.”
For some filmmakers and TV writers it is common practice, at least in the US, to write a “bible” for a film or a TV series. This is filled with all sorts of backstory and character detail. What kind of lives the characters led before the time period depicted, what kind of music they listen to, etc. Some of this makes it into the final product in some form, but a lot of it doesn’t, and is merely a guide for the create as to what kind of people the characters are.
The audience doesn’t need to have all this information spelled out. Yes, the connotations of the suit are interesting, but surely that could have been conveyed without having a freaking Q&A scene with the protagonist. Texture and detail are great, but if the film is merely telling this stuff to the audience, the filmmaker might as well print out biodata sheets to hand out in the theatres.
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Kay
July 25, 2016
I have not seen Kabali as it is not showing in theatre here. This may seem a bit off topic but any good director’s should be able to direct movies on any different topic. For example Ang Lee’s has been appreciated for Crouching Tiger, Life of Pi, Brokeback Mountain. He also directed Hulk a commercial money maker which got mixed review from critics. I just saw trailer of his next Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk and it looks good.
The point is not every movie by a director will be hit with audience as at the end of the day what clicks with the audience. I get a sense that even South Indian movies are like BW in a sense that a director follows same formula of what has worked with an actor before.
I am reading in few of the comments that in Kabali Rajanikanth has been able to show his acting skills if that is the case then in his case should he not work with directors may be lesser known who will give him to act and not go through the motion of giving performance that he has given in past movie? People put actors on pedestal and worship them blindly for the movie they do. How about the same audience instead learn to appreciate different genres of movie so that the star/actor can truly show them what he can do with any storyline how simple or how complicated it is.
It has been interesting to read from Malaysian Tamil how they have appreciated the movie. The Malaysian immigration history is quite interesting.
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brangan
July 25, 2016
adavadi: Thalapathy is Brahmin propaganda? I think your beef is really with the Mahabharatha 🙂
Neena: “Whereas, a well-executed MR movie (Thalapathy) fails because of, IMO, bad writing. “
This means that Thalapathy — in your opinion — was NOT well-executed. Let me reiterate. Execution is not just cinematography and sound design etc. It begins with how the core, the concepts, the conceits are transformed into a screenplay, and then into shooting, and then into editing…
You cannot have a movie with “bad writing” and say it was well-executed. You can say it was well-shot. Or well-acted. But not well-executed, because the two parts to any art form are:
(1) conception (i.e. what’s in one’s mind, the ideas), and
(2) execution (how you bring it out from inside your head onto paper and make it art).
I’m saying that Kabali shows (1) but not (2).
Now, you may think that (1) is enough for a film. That’s fine. I cannot tell you how to enjoy a film. I am just saying (1) without (2) isn’t… CINEMA.
As for the Iriavi review, a film not adding up is very different from a rhythmless, (mostly) shoddily made and seemingly random film. The former still has evidence of cinema. It just means that the individual scenes don’t come together. Here, forget “coming together,” most of the individual scenes just don’t work as scenes at all. In the sense of (2). They may still satisfy the criteria of (1) though. But a lot of Iraivi, to me, was (1) + (2).
PS: To continue Ravi K’s example above, you may jot down a bunch of excellent ideas on a piece of paper and make a bullet-point leaflet. But that’s not the same as being a “writer,” which involves shaping those ideas into prose, with all the aesthetic and architectural capabilities you have.
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anandkumarrs
July 25, 2016
Excellent review Rangan! I think its time Rajini’s film is directed by a director and not his fan! Rajini pulls all stops but the script wanders and meanders all over the place! A very good opportunity wasted!
While on Kabali, please do read my take – “Abki Baar Kabali da” on a different note.
http://wp.me/p1dZc2-s4 Feedback most welcome!
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pato
July 26, 2016
We live in a world where BR is also a critic and this guy in the video is also a critic.
BR:One suggestion to you.To improve your audience reach,i suggest you make your youtube reviews in tamil. When you review a tamil movie in english,it alienates you from viewers.I’m not saying tamil movies should be reviewed in tamil, just a wish from your fan that you have a wider range of audience.
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Vivek
July 26, 2016
refute to agree on your blog. I would say its more of wrong expectations with audience expecting a typical Rajni movie with punch dialogues, actions etc. Ranjith was very clear from long time back that he loves the character Rajini played in ‘Mullum Malarum’ and would like to have his on screen presence in a similar role. It also takes courage for someone at peak of his stardom to do a role which he did two decades ago . The movie may not be great but at the same time cannot be underrated, Ranjith has brought the actor within Rajni which many directors did not care to focus upon . And something which I agree with you is “Whar Rajni did for the movie is more than what the movide did to him ” . .I also look that in a more optimistic fashion . Its a good movie which brought out the actor within Superstar and loved it ! Not sure if anybody would do this again in future !
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Sakkaravarthi Kaliannan
July 26, 2016
And censorship strikes again!!!
http://www.freemalaysiatoday.com/category/nation/2016/07/26/cops-requested-censorship-of-kabali-scenes-says-igp/
http://www.financialexpress.com/photos/entertainment-gallery/327455/rajinikanth-kabali-movie-climax-thalaivar-news-rajnini-mania-malaysia/
On a side note, does the climax make a difference though?
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MANK
July 26, 2016
I wish he could go back in time and oust Kamal Haasan from projects like Sivappu Rojakal, Nayagan, Thevar Magan, Michael Madana Kamarjan, Vettaiyadu Vilayadum, Papanasam and grab these meaty roles for himself
Anuja, that’s some wishful thinking indeed :). but you do realise that many of these projects were created by Kamal himself, putting his own money and talent in to it. so even wishful thinking has its limitations. if Rajni wanted , he too could have developed such projects for himself, but he never did. it was his choice to go down the path he did. As far as i can remember Rajni has produced 4 films – Valli,arunachalam,padayappa and Baba. rest my case.
btw this is quite interesting 🙂
http://indianexpress.com/article/entertainment/regional/kabali-rajinikanth-is-not-the-biggest-superstar-nana-patekar-2935869/
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Ragenikanth
July 26, 2016
boring movie ranjith failed big time
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brangan
July 26, 2016
I heard the film has been trimmed by 20 mins. Does anyone know what was chopped off? Thanks.
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Aditya (Gradwolf)
July 26, 2016
BR: Really?! Watched an interview yesterday of Ranjith and others where he said he had a LOT of material and had to chop it off. A lot of people who had problems with the incoherence of the film felt this was probably one of the reasons for it (and some pipe dreamers hoped if only Ranjith had made this a trilogy :). Nothing wrong with that of course). So interesting that he chopped off further.
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sabharinath
July 26, 2016
It’s quite amazing how this ‘Promising director – Big hero’ combo constantly misfires…. It’s not the first…. As far as I can remember, it started with ‘Rajapaatai’, then ‘Mugamoodi’,…. Then ‘Maari’, till ‘Theri’ in recent memory….. It has become quite a pattern…. That’s why, I was a bit sceptical about Kabali…. But, on hearing Ranjith’s on-field antics, like being strict with the superstar, I thought, Maybe…. This film will mark the beginning of the end of this infamous pattern, But…. it has strenghtened it…. Sometimes, it is confusing whether it is the film itself or the level of our expectations which fails to provide a wholesome movie watching experience….. Cos’ some films have their moments, which make them seem like…. not a bad film, but the wholesome feel is missing…. It happened in the case of ‘Yennai Arindhaal’….. But on the other hand, ‘Vedalam’ was a really satisfying watch…. It feels strange…. I think this might have been a wholesome film without superstar in it, as it would have reduced the expectations…. But these films made me realise, that a well made or even a not so well made generic film with a decent pace works better than an offbeat film well made in parts….. The ‘Singam’ franchise is a fine example…. Maybe, this is why mass heroes usually stay away from promising directors, as they understand the fact that they need directors who understand their image…. Once a hero attains an image, then it is all about brand enhancing through their films. No wonder why Ajith has become a real vedalam and has clinged on to director siva…. And Hari is Suriya’s permanent market redeemer…. Maybe, if ‘Irumugan’ turns out to be good, it might turn the tide…. Let’s see….
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Kartkum
July 26, 2016
BR – ‘For now, it must be said that Rajinikanth does more for the movie than the movie does for him.’ – True but what’s wrong in that and nice to see Rajni give more to the film and in fact has acted well with some effort and this compared to what he himself has admitted about Enthiran, where he has spoken about his reluctance in accepting challenging shots or makeups and has asked Shankar not to compare himself with Kamalhassan. One must really appreciate Ranjith on this part, although overall film is a little let down when compared to ‘Madras’. For me this is Rajnikant’s best movie after say Thalapathi, at least in terms of storyline. Intent was there but failed to execute in certain parts. I’m curious to know why Ranjith choose to show Kabali character more subtle instead of mass dialogues etc. That would have been a safer bet but I guess he didn’t want the film to be labelled as just another masala mass Rajni film and he succeeded in that but in a wrong way.
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Neena
July 26, 2016
blurb: people killed in racially/caste motivated massacres often don’t get honourable funerals let alone their own samadhi. Amir mentions this as something like ‘the police took care of all the bodies’. This is what I mean by good writing – the layers of text & sub-text, not hammered down your throat but included matter-of-factly in the script/screenplay/movie. And it is not only the content of the Q&A I found interesting, it’s the choice of the Q&A format itself – that exposes the tension between the older leaders of plantation origin and their people of the younger generation, born in urban housing complexes amidst poverty, drugs & violence.
BR: alright, to me, Kabali certainly went beyond being mere ideas and translated it fairly well on paper – but failed to a large extent in translating it to screen. An example of mere ideas, to me, would be Endhiran – where you have a great premise but make a generic cringe-worthy movie out of it. There was no writing there. Execution is hardly a technical term in cinema; and maybe what is considered ‘writing’ there is not the same thing I refer to.
MANK: what does establish an emotional connection is what I’m talking about – whatever Thalapathi did, did not establish an emotional connection with me, and that’s not because it was more artsy/logical than it was emotional. What Kabali does, does establish an emotional connection despite what I can clearly see are major flaws in the film/filmmaking.
Speaking of Thalapathi, Rajini is usually the ‘underdog. Surya’s angered speech to Subbu: ‘unakku enna venum? oru vella thol, naalu vartha english pesanum’ fits very well within the accepted norm for a mass hero in Tamil cinema at that time. The unwed mother repents her actions so much that Srividya is never seen not crying in the film. I dunno why this was so groundbreaking. I have had this question about the Karnan character in general too – he is the ultimate underdog in the Hindu canon. But, his story is one of how birth actually trumps circumstance, isn’t it?
Honest Raj: all those lines only ‘tell’ you things (as in a guide) – and even the telling doesn’t make sense. Devraj has so many people behind him (his wife, the Charlie & Nagesh characters) – what he tells Surya doesn’t make sense. What Kalivardhan says makes more sense, in fact – that the only reason Devraj wants Surya around is because he is fearless and like a bodyguard.
If MR relies on our knowledge of an epic to join the dots, one can’t really fault Ranjith for relying on our knowledge of Dalit history or the situation of Malaysian Tamils to get his film, can we?
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brangan
July 26, 2016
Neena: If MR relies on our knowledge of an epic to join the dots, one can’t really fault Ranjith for relying on our knowledge of Dalit history or the situation of Malaysian Tamils to get his film, can we?
I don’t buy this at all. This isn’t about MR or Ranjith. This is about an epic that most of us have been fed from childhood versus a very particular history of people from another country. Surely they’re very different things. I mean, Ranjith himself has said that he had to do a lot of research and he got to know a lot of things about Malaysian Tamils only after this research. So how can an audience be expected to be on the same page?
I get that you prefer Ranjith’s approach to MR’s approach, and I cannot argue with you about that. But to equate knowledge of the big story arcs of the Mahabharata with the history of Malaysian Tamils doesn’t compute at all.
There are some stories/narratives that are “archetypal,” for which explanations are usually redundant. Or at least, we can say “okay, this is why this is happening.” But this approach does not work when you deal with characters that are this specific.
Whether here or in Hollywood or in European cinema, the expectation that “the audience should be familiar with the political and cultural circumstances of this new place” does not work. It is the film’s responsibility to draw us into these specifics.
Now, about the term “execution.” yes, it is not a technical term, and I was just using it to delineate the two very distinct parts of filmmaking (or any art). I’m saying that the “ideas” part comes under conception, whereas embedding those ideas into a smooth narrative comes under “execution.”
Conception = this is WHAT the artist wants to do = INTENT
Execution = this is HOW he or she ends up doing it = RESULT
So if you feel that you did not buy Thalapathi’s narrative, then what you’re really saying is that it is not a well-executed film. Again, can’t argue with you about that. If it didn’t work for you, it didn’t.
The only reasons I brought up Thalapathi in this review is because of the 25-year angle, plus the fact that the lower-caste gangster angle is repeated, plus the prospect of a “different” Rajini. I wasn’t comparing the content of the two films at all.
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P
July 26, 2016
MANK: Awesome to see you fanboy over Dalapathy. Some brilliant points you made there, and it is one of the few timeless movies.
Unfortunately not available on Blu Ray or I would pay in gold to buy it! 😦
I recently made my 20 year old cousin watch it, (on youtube 😦 ) and he was so impressed with the staging of multiple scenes. He kept pausing and going back to scenes, and he was beyond amazed that it was made so many years ago on what was probably a super-minimized budget.
If only Kabali had lived up to that brilliance. Unfortunately Ranjith let down not just Rajini (which is forgivable, almost every director lets him down!) but also his brilliant ideas (truly brilliant idea- a Dalit don in Malaysia, who’s lost his family and they might or might not be dead!!!) and concepts (Dalit issues, colorism, feminism, racism, mafia et al) with mediocre writing, staging, direction and some really trash-worthy editing.
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Rahini David
July 26, 2016
Neena: If MR relies on our knowledge of an epic to join the dots, one can’t really fault Ranjith for relying on our knowledge of Dalit history or the situation of Malaysian Tamils to get his film, can we?
I disagree with that line, but not because of the same point that BR says about Mahabarat being something we are fed as children. I was fed a certain extent of Ramayan and Mahabarat as a child too and that is not the reason why I like Dhalapathy. It is a movie that made sense without seeing it as a reflection of Karna’s story.
The reason why Surya and Deva like each other as much as they do may not be spelled out that clearly, but I could BUY it considering where they are in their lives when they meet. Surya has a specific nature, he is generous and is violent on the face of injustice. Deva is like that too. Surya’s idea of what is right and what is wrong gels with Deva’s. Surya gets a certain exposure to more people, more power, more responsibilities, a sense of belonging and these are important to him.
With Surya, Deva gets a person who is not near him out of fear or respect but brotherly affection. That is not what he feels about the others who already with him who do as he bids them, but perhaps not with as much warmth.
It may be too soon that Surya says “I have only one thing to give you, that is my life” to Deva. But that was no deal breaker for me. If you are in a police lock up and think that you have no one, a person who rescues you may have that effect on you, no? Even if he was the one who put you there in the first place.
And I think a movie should stand on it’s own. If it can be watched only if you know certain history or certain mythology or something then it fails as a movie. I am not saying this about Kabali. Just about audience being expected to know stuff.
I have not met anyone who watched Iruvar without having heard about MGR. But with or without knowing about MGR, it should be a good movie. It is. Same with Mozart-Saleri movies, Romeo-Juliet stuff etc.
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Neena
July 26, 2016
BR: Well, yes, your reference was useful for me to further think about Kabali, MR, Thalapathi etc. Execution obviously contains many parts, of which I think writing was still strong in Kabali, but weak in Thalapathi. I may be wrong for I don’t know the technical/procedural aspects of cinema well. That’s just what it looks like to me.
Ha ha, it is a bit extreme to say that we shud know as much about the specific histories of Malaysian Tamils as we should about Karnan (esp, thanks to the Sivaji Ganesan movie). It’s a provocative analogy like you did with ‘Appa’. But, it’s also about what becomes popular knowledge and how. For eg, apparently Ramayana as we know it today was largely the doing of the DD series from the 80s. Read an article about it recently. And to be fair, Kabali does offer some context – the flashback, the scene with Jeeva’s mother, the drive back from jail etc. This specific history has universal resonances – with people who can identify with similar situations in their place – and they don’t seem to need detailed explanations.
Place – that’s the other thing that makes Thalapathi bland for me – the movie is set in nowhere – possibly to allude to its epic parallels. But, place matters, in making that elusive emotional connect. And specificity doesn’t make something less epic.
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Neena
July 26, 2016
Rahini: oh, it’s only because Thalapathi didn’t work for me independent of the epic identification that I said that. Same problem with Raavanan many years and films later. Thalapathi may have worked if Surya & Deva started out being with each other cautiously for the mutual benefit and then became closer. Even then, MR would have had to give up some of his trademark one-liners for a more conversational tone. If they had to start out being instantly loyal in the superlative, then at least give us a reason, a drama that we can connect with. Surya would have been jailed before, surely? There would have been other times when he was beaten up and then let out, or bailed out. That’s the impression the characterisation gives. So, when he says he would give his life for Deva who brought him out, I just didn’t buy it. Later pledges of solidarity & loyalty between the two also seem abstract. This is where I feel MR has been lazy in not rooting his characters in a specific place, history. The whole film has an unreal quality to it. Unless I read Surya as Karnan and reason that he must have been shunned by many others in his life for his low birth; and that Devraj as Duryodhanan who must be of high birth and that Surya must be touched by being invited to live in his house and treated as almost his equal; the movie doesn’t work.
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Anuja Chandramouli
July 26, 2016
MANK: Didn’t Rajni and Kamal have some sort of famous gentleman’s agreement where they agreed not to step on each other’s toes or play ball in the other’s court or something? Did that really happen? If it did, I think Rajni got the short end of the stick.
Kamal got to experiment and showcase his histrionic skills and Rajni has been stuck in the template masala movie rut though as you said he is a formidable actor with those remarkable quicksilver expressions. Did you read Balu Mahendra’s recent interview in the Hindu? He talks about what a brilliant character artiste Rajni is with the ability to pull off complex roles with effortless ease.
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Rahini David
July 26, 2016
Neena: The whole story NOT being set in, say, Madurai is precisely why I seem to have liked it. I’d have hated it if had come with “This murder happened inside Mappillai Vinayagar theatre” or “That song happened in Tamukkam Grounds.” I guess that is the how tastes will differ.
But I felt quite annoyed with Suhasini’s Indira where Aravind Swamy and Anu Haasan are members of “Keezh Jaathi.” A movie about Jaathi where all evidence of Jaathi was meticulously wiped clean.
And if Surya and Deva had got to know and trust each other more gradually, I would have liked Dhalapathy much better. That is for sure.
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MANK
July 26, 2016
Punee,oh i am a rapid thalapathi fanboy. no doubt about it. i have seen it so many times over the years and never tires of it.
And yes its shocking, that there is no bluray of thalapathi. Over the years i have bought a lot of DVDs of the film, they were all terrible. The warm golden tone of santhosh sivan’s photography is either very dark or a bland white in many of the ones i have seen. it is a film – like The Godfather movies – that if the color tones, brightness and sharpness of the picture is not correct, then it looks horrible. the best i have seen is the 720p HD version that has been uploaded on youtube. but even that has problems. but most importantly, its a film that should be seen on the big screen.
And you are right about Ranjith’s conception of Kabali. he definitely had the right ideas for the Rajni film he was going to make. Rajni playing his age with no singing or dancing with heroines who are only old enough to be his granddaughters – well in Endhiran 2 Amy jackson is the heroine, now 2 of them together would be a sight to behold 🙂 . no unnecessary punchlines or moral science lessons – especially for women, no flipping of cigarettes or starry tricks. An attempt to have Rajni play a character in a film that addresses some topical issues that is close to his heart. that’s why it is so heart breaking to see the end product
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Santhanam
July 26, 2016
From Nana Patekar implying that film is the biggest superstar to the passionate discourses here, Kabali and most films eventually converge on escapism. Whether or not Kabali in actuality does anything to improve the living standards of Malaysian Tamils is anyone’s guess. It would be the same for a film like the Hong Kong movie Ten Years or 12 Years a Slave. It is just a film. If it entertains you, good. If it makes you think of committing to a cause beyond the screen, great. If neither, look forward to the next Rajinikanth movie. Till the next big hype or the contrary, let’s not make it more than what it is, please. Life goes on and so do movies. மகிழ்ச்சி.
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Neena
July 26, 2016
Rahini: Funny you would say that; To satisfy my own placing requirements, I concluded from the bridges & the barely-there river that it was Madurai.
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n
July 26, 2016
Anuja, please dont excuse rajini from his penchant for success….seems rajini artsy efforts in 80s were all unsuccessful while kamal went from moondram pirai to salangai oli to pesum padam to nayakan…for success as well as awards
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MANK
July 26, 2016
Place – that’s the other thing that makes Thalapathi bland for me – the movie is set in nowhere – possibly to allude to its epic parallels. But, place matters, in making that elusive emotional connect. And specificity doesn’t make something less epic.
Neena, why do you say that. i dont think the setting of the film was in some lala fanatasy land that you have trouble identifying.The ambiance, the costumes, the sets more than signify that it could be anywhere in TN . of course some exaggeration is going to be there , after all its film and anyway Mani was going for an over exaggerated (epic ) operatic vision for the film, which is more than evident in the sundari kannal song .
I dont disagree that the location in which a story is set adds a lot to the film.A film like Gone with the wind, Doctor Zhivago or Casablanca are extremely specific to the locations that they are set.the same goes for Nayagan or Virumandi.
But again Thalapathi is not a location specific story. thats what makes it even more beautiful for me. i think it should work even if it is set in middle earth.
btw , Mentioning the actual location of the story is a much more recent phenomenon in Indian films,perhaps started in the 90’s. if you check out much of the old films especially Hindi films , they never name the city or state in which the film is set. and worse the characters hardly had surnames- so that they have pan indian or pan state identification-. they were always Mr. Rajesh or Miss. Mala etc..
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udhaysankar
July 26, 2016
The film rewards a second viewing. When I watched it first with the 3 a.m fdfs crowd, I could feel all the energy of the crowd around me waiting to erupt like a volcano. But, ranjith made us wait a lot and we remained dormant till the end, our energy and passion trickling out. But, when I watched it a second time without those whistles and hoopla I had more mental tolerance to listen to what the film had to say.
Standout moments for me.
1)Nerrupu daa merc crashing on bird ravi
2)When thalaivar enquires about his wife, and ‘thendral vandhu theendum podhu’ is sung by someone in the background. Awesome staging.
3)That slow reverse tracking shot by the dinner table when he holds the screen for a very long time.
4)When Valli advises him to dress up well and the rap portion in veera thurandhara resumes as thalaivar waltzes in a suit across the screen. The start of veera thurandhara is equally good. Ranjith always aces these montage sequences.
5)The foreign couple kiss and Rajni looks again at apte and smiles.
6)Thalaivar entering the house for the first time in 25 years to see apte everywhere.
7)The poosari being shot in his head. Very good build up to the scene.
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udhaysankar
July 26, 2016
MANK:I love thalapathy too and I think it will be thalaivar’s best collaboration ever and MR’s second best movie. The movie had lots of affecting moments. My favourite moment of all is the first scene of the pregnant girl standing exhausted on the tracks as she loses her boy (Exquisite framing there). The train moves slowly and the humming in Chinna thayaval starts as the song begins with the credit Rajnikanth. I haven’t seen such fluidity in storytelling in any other Tamil movie, ever.
But, if there’s one flaw in such a well made film, it has to be the way mammoty and thalaivar become friends. Still not sure why deva considers Surya to be his friends and Surya goes one step forward calls him uyir nanban in a matter of seconds. Crazy. One minot problem in an otherwise brilliant movie.
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MANK
July 26, 2016
Anuja ,According to Rajni – what he spoke at Kamal’s 50th anniversary celebration- it was his conscious decision to take the road that he took. he realized his limitations as a performer and decided he was not going to compete with Kamal in what Kamal was doing as he was sure he will come a distant second. kamal was talented enough to do both the class and mass stuff , but he wasnt. To quote what he said -Kamal did whatever i did too, but i never tried to do what he did , i had decided that my Route is different.
There is a story that Kamal told once in an interview – that how Rajni was inspired by Shatrughan sinha from whom he picked up the cigarette flipping trick and all those mannerisms. he asked Rajni whether he plans to do that for the rest of his career and Rajni said yes, those are the kind of things he wanted to do. Kamal said, ok then i will get into meaningful cinema and my films are going to be as successful as yours.
I think The gentlemen’s agreement they forged was in the 90’s about not releasing their films together on the same day. it was creating a lot of bad blood between their fan clubs.
Of course Rajni is a formidable actor. i am a great fan of his earlier work as an actor in those KB & Mahendran films his performance as the sadistic husband in Avargal is world class. yes the effortless ease that he displays in pulling of his roles is his great quality as a performer. well thats what made him a mass superstar in the first place you know. but i would like to say one thing, is that Rajni is a very different kind of actor than Kamal.Rajni cannot pull of a Nayagan or Tevar Magan as well as Kamal, bcoz he does not have that dramatic depth in him as a performer.his strength veers more towards the external manifestations of a characters – the facial expressions , the body language etc and he is really brilliant when he gets to play such characters – awargal, johnny, nettrikann, he is simply unstoppable. but he is not very good at characters which requires a lot of dramatic skills to pull off.
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Madan
July 26, 2016
“I wish he could go back in time and oust Kamal Haasan from projects like Sivappu Rojakal, Nayagan, Thevar Magan, Michael Madana Kamarjan, Vettaiyadu Vilayadum, Papanasam and grab these meaty roles for himself. ” – There are at least some of those that maybe he could have done but I think MMKR would have been way out of his zone. As somebody else pointed out, Rajini hasn’t really done different accents which Kamal does brilliantly in MMKR. As such, comedy is definitely Kamal’s forte. Not that Rajini can’t do it, but it is probably not going to match Kamal.
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brangan
July 26, 2016
MANK: his strength veers more towards the external manifestations of a characters
Agree completely. To give an example, Kamal is a Marlon Brando whereas Rajini is a Toshiro Mifune.
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Honest Raj (formerly 'V'enkatesh)
July 26, 2016
Neena: oru vella thol, naalu vartha english pesanum’ fits very well within the accepted norm for a mass hero in Tamil cinema at that time.
I thought it’s more of a reference to the Arvind Swamy character.
all those lines only ‘tell’ you things (as in a guide) – and even the telling doesn’t make sense. Devraj has so many people behind him (his wife, the Charlie & Nagesh characters) – what he tells Surya doesn’t make sense. What Kalivardhan says makes more sense, in fact – that the only reason Devraj wants Surya around is because he is fearless and like a bodyguard.
When you’re telling a story about Karna, the rest of the characters (including Kunti) become secondary. Sure, Duryodhana is almost inseparable when you talk about Karna, but the non-overlapping portions give undue weight to the film. That’s why all those backstories about Deva (like the bond between him and Ramana, why he parted ways with Kalivardhan, and all that) are conveyed in ‘lines’.
I missed this ‘line’ in my previous response: Munnadi ellam enna paatha ellarukum bayam irukkum, aana ippo mariyathaiyum sendhu irukku.
This is an implication that Devaraj is proud of the fact that there’s a change in the attitude of people towards him.
Why should Deva be concerned about Surya’s release?
Devaraj can be viewed as a man who cannot tolerate violence against women (even if they belong to his enemies) – he fumes when a neighbouring girl is raped by the Inspector, and when Bhanupriya complains about his men sexually harassing her. Given that Ramana had molested the wife of a slum dweller, lines like ‘Ramana senjathu thappu’ and ‘Nyayamnu onnu irukku’ very much make sense.
Karna accepting Duryodhana’s friendship vs Rajini accepting Mammooty’s friendship:
Mani Ratnam>>Vyasa
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n
July 26, 2016
rajini speedness n dialog is best for mass films.. we alway got that rajini style even in kali, parattai avargal if u observe .. his failures in actory films was itiching him when kamal got nation wide appreciation.. he went complete mass route
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n
July 26, 2016
brando comedies were bad except for The Freshman…like kamal in his comedies..
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brangan
July 26, 2016
Got this via email. Sharing with permission:
Kumaran: Hello Sir, Read your review on the film and I thought it was a brilliant review although it was disappointing to read. As a Rajinikanth fan, I was enthralled watching the film and the way Thalaivar acted. The intro where he takes a step out of the cell, then decides to take a step back again and reach up for the cross bar to perform two pull-ups at his age had me excited like I haven’t been in years. There were a good amount of such scenes (the one where he runs over that man comes to mind too) and maybe that’s why I came away thinking this film was one of if not my favorite movie experience. After coming back home and sleeping on the film and waking up to harsh reviews, I felt disappointed that others didn’t feel the same way. I understood there was a raw and realistic factor missing that was in Madras and Attakathi and I also understood that some scenes felt a little out of place, especially those with the villain late in the story.
But I also felt that this was easily one of Rajinikanth’s better films. Why do I say that? Because as a massive fan of him, I’ve seen his films in the 80s and many were awful films saved by his charm. I think the expectation just got out of hand and many were expecting a masterpiece classic entertainer…which technically speaking, majority of Rajinikanth’s 150+ films are not at all. Films like Manithan, Naan Sigappu Manithan, Pandian, Velaikaran and numerous others were fun to watch for fan of peak Rajini but terrible films overall. I think Ranjith had too much on his shoulders because frankly speaking, even an attempt at creating a film like ‘Thalapathi’ wouldn’t work today because people are repeatedly telling me ‘Kabali’ was slow. The audience today, won’t take a minute of slow pacing and allow the story to develop. That is what seems to be the prevailing concern. If a movie like Johnny or Mullum Malarum were to release today, many would say it is not what they wanted. It seems to me that the Superstar is stuck in a position where he can’t impress unless he somehow delivers a ‘Nayagan’…something that isn’t on his shoulders but more on the shoulders of a world class director, which Ranjith is not (although he is a good one). I hope to hear your thoughts.
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P
July 26, 2016
Neena: Like Karna, Surya has an ambition for power, (Manirathnam removed the vanity aspect of Karna for obvious reasons), it is to better his lot and the lot of his people, he sees Deva giving him that. Deva says that people used to fear him before, and now they respect/love him. To me that is enough of a base for their friendship. I don’t see how there could be a need for more.
And I liked the universality of that movie, it was of nowhere and of everywhere at the same time. In fact, considering I am from Mysore and all the scenes are shot in Mysore and surroundings, I always presumed that it was set in Mysore 🙂 Your mention of Madurai was surprising to me just now 😀
Dalapathy is a beloved classic not just because of the story but because of the beautiful way it was filmed and written, every scene a masterpiece. Kabali well, yeah, made 25 YEARS LATER with all the facilities available today could have been so much better. In the past decade I haven’t had any expectations from a Rajini film, but you can’t give that marvellous scene at the pet shop where he releases those birds and then peter into a Q & A session for a flashback. You just can’t. You speak of writing. I can tell you 10 different ways in which the writing of Kabali could be amped up to do justice to the storyline of just that flashback as conceived by the director.
From the fact that the film ended as it did, and the lack of Rajini mannerisms, it looks like the star gave complete freedom to the director and was willing to be binded by his vision. Unfortunately the director choked.
MANK: Its a goddamn shame indeed about the DVDs of Dalapathy. And I would love to read a longer piece (if you ever chose to write it) about your thoughts on the movie! 🙂
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Neena
July 26, 2016
MANK: I’m thinking why Thalapathi being not rooted in a specific place (and its associated culture, history, language etc) bothers me. You’re right – most films of the time weren’t place-specific – probably because they were shot in sets and outdoor shooting wasn’t easy yet. I’m thinking if there were any great films which were set in anyplace-TN – only 16 Vayadhinile comes to mind, and that was a much older film and dripping in rural flavour. It was easy to see that it could be any village in TN.
In Thalapathi, the setting doesn’t look like any village or town in TN. It didn’t have to be TN – it could have been Karnataka or Maharashtra or wherever. I looked it up and it appears much of the film was shot in southern Karnataka. But, the characters speak Tamil and in the absence of other information, we have to assume it was TN, which it didn’t look like. The slum housing looked more out of Bombay. The accents were generic. Which is perhaps why it looked hanging in the air rather than universal. Also, perhaps the superior cinematography makes it seem like a more recent movie than it was – hence, the expectation that its outdoor shooting be more nuanced as well.
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brangan
July 26, 2016
Just remembered that a lot of this discussion is in the book, so fishing out relevant questions. (Of course, I’m not saying that this is the gospel and so you cannot think any other way. Just saying this is what MR has to say.)
BR: When you make films based on a familiar arc, do you feel free to do some things because the audience already knows? For instance, Surya becomes Deva’s trusted lieutenant very quickly, and we accept this because we already know this is what happens in The Mahabharata. There’s no need for a protracted detailing of his rise through the ranks.
MR: The basic premise is that it should connect and make sense to someone who will not make the link to the original. There’s a musical montage that details this in a way. It sets the tone of what he does in Deva’s organisation. He’s someone that Deva was opposed to, and now Deva’s taken him in without batting an eyelid, and this is acknowledged by Surya.
Emotionally, all that’s important is the fact that this man has gone against him, and still Surya does him good and Deva admits that he was wrong. This is something Surya has never faced, so for him it’s a special kind of bonding. And there is a constant parallel to the epic. So whether you’re conscious of it or not, you are able to understand the bond between the two.
That’s all you need to say. Beyond that, there’s no story. There’s only explanation. And explanations remain explanations, and in such situations they are not necessary. People understand these things emotionally, and if something works emotionally it doesn’t have to be rationally explained.
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BR: So your location was Mysore and your characters are all Tamilian (even though the story takes place at an unnamed area). How important is geographical correctness to a film, especially considering the importance you give to visuals and backgrounds?
MR: Do you think all World War films set in Germany are shot in Germany? This is cinema. Our job is to evoke a place and a period. I don’t think it’s important where you shoot. What is more important is how you shoot. You’re not going to get any extra points for being logistically and geographically accurate.
What’s important is emotional integrity. It has to be plausible. It has to make people believe it really happened, and the background should enhance and not distract from the story you’re telling. It should not intrude and tell the audience that it’s the wrong place. But otherwise, a location is just a tool to tell a story. I’ve shot Bombay and Nayakan – both films set in Bombay, – here in Chennai for the most part, except for some patch work in Bombay. You have to have the confidence that you can do it, where it is logistically easier and budget-wise easier to execute your film.
In this film we went with Mysore because it was set in a small town in Tamil Nadu, and we needed a town that had a character, a definition, a town that wasn’t just random and which had a specific look. We looked around and landed on Mysore. It gave us all we were looking for – a waterfront, a river – and it became a very big part of the film. The slum, of course, was a set erected by Tharani in Chennai….
For the prologue with the Kunti character, we tried to make the train take a curved route, almost like a river. We had to search a lot in order to find a railway path that gave the feeling of the child being carried along in the water.
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blurb
July 26, 2016
I am beginning to suspect that I might like Kabali if I watch it again. I think the hype (and the craziness in the theaters) really colored my experience of watching the movie. More power to brangan for exorcising the demons and keeping zen!
When I replay certain things in my head, I get the feeling this movie requires multiple viewings. Especially, now that I am armed with better Malaysian Tamils’ history.
And, people are saying Kabali was slow?! 😮 I couldn’t fully keep track of what was happening. It just went by too quickly.
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Madan
July 26, 2016
“Kamal did whatever i did too, but i never tried to do what he did , i had decided that my Route is different.” – Wonderful self awareness, isn’t it? I would have said as much myself – that Kamal could at times compete on Rajini territory (not directly but through action films like Kaaki Chattai) but Rajini couldn’t have taken on a film like Appu Raja. But I didn’t want to offend the diehard Rajini fans. The man himself has said it, though,
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Honest Raj (formerly 'V'enkatesh)
July 26, 2016
There are at least some of those that maybe he could have done but I think MMKR would have been way out of his zone. As somebody else pointed out, Rajini hasn’t really done different accents which Kamal does brilliantly in MMKR. As such, comedy is definitely Kamal’s forte. Not that Rajini can’t do it, but it is probably not going to match Kamal.
Madan: To extract the best out of Kamal: The Comedian, one needs to look into various factors – the right script, dialogue, supporting cast that suits his comfort level, et al., Rajini doesn’t need tailor-made scripts to prove his worth, at least in comedy. Performing comic roles is a big deal when you don’t know the language. So, bonus points to him for that!
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Honest Raj (formerly 'V'enkatesh)
July 26, 2016
Wasn’t 16 Vayathiniley completely shot in Karnataka – Mysore, Kollegal, and its surroundings?
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Kid
July 26, 2016
Anuja Chandramouli:
“He talks about what a brilliant character artiste Rajini is…”. But what is important here is that Rajini, in those Balachander films or in something like 16 Vayadhinile, is extremely effective precisely because he is a “character artiste” playing a supporting part (and is, almost always, a villain) and is not a lead,. Amjad Khan was an extraordinary character artiste (he didn’t just make terrific villains, he also was a fantastic comedians in films like Love Story and Chameli Ki Shaadi), but that doesn’t mean he would have made for a fine lead-actor like Amitabh Bachchan. Rajini, in that phase, worked really well as a foil to Kamal’s characters, but that wouldn’t have been the case had he playing the central lead in those films. And this is precisely the reason why Balachander had no space for him in his films later on when he became a star; he had become fr too “big” to play a “foil” anymore and hence would have no sense in Balachander’s world (in other words, the Alex Pandian guy has outgrown the Moondru Mudichu world). And part of the problem of the problem is Rajini is simply not enough of an actor (this is is not to say that his “performance” hasn’t been remarkable in many films, but I would argue that in most of those films he isn’t really “acting”. That he can still be so compulsively watchable in so many films without really “acting” in most of those is possibly the greatest proof of his talent). This is also, in many ways, why Kabali is such a remarkable failure on so may levels (the first of which involves using the Masala tropes in a non-Masala world. Not that this can’t be done as a rule, both J.P. Dutta and Rahul Rawail have done it very well, but then Ranjith isn’t close to being Dutta even on a good day and he isn’t even equal to Rawail on the latter’s best day. And Ghulami is a film which should be made compulsory viewing to folks like Ranjith. It’s an astonishing mainstream film and and outstanding debut work where you have a very powerful socio-economic statement being made by the director- on slavery among other things, there is a scene in the film where the villagers set fire to the account books/ledgers of moneylenders which has direct parallels with that famous event of Dalit history- and the masala world being capacious enough to not not only include the director’s politics, but also enhance it and give it some real heft. In Ghulami, for instance, the Masala world of the film actually makes the politics of the film appear more universal without diminish the specificity of it. Rahul Rawail does the same in Dacait though he didn’t have Dutta’s skills as a filmmaker) is because he wants to apparently bring back the Mullum Malarum guy back to a world which he has long left (actually some of his efforts could have still paid off had Ranjith decided to tap into the lead character of another Mahendran film- Jhonny. Of course that would have meant making a different film, but). Well, Rajini can’t simply go back to being Kaali (just like the Vijay of Zanjeer or Deewar can’t simply return to that world in the avatar of Viju- I am talking about Bbuddah. That is also why Ravanaprabhu isn’t just a poor film, it’s a film which also means nothing, because it simply wants the Devasuram world as it was when the Mohanlal character left it limping away into the night). Rajkumar Santoshi understood this problem (though it goes without saying that he was greatly helped by the fact that the star at the centre of his film wasn’t just an extraordinary star, but also an extraordinary actor so much so that even in a role where would be seemingly miscast, he could, and still can, still have the audience completely enthralled) and so when he wants to reset the world of the angry young man in Khakee, he doesn’t set about simply reclaiming or restaging or even reconfiguring Bachchan and his persona, he wants to also mourn the loss of that world and that character. bachchan here isn’t an icon, but a hollow shell of an icon. There is a great moment in the film where the Bachchan character is looking at the family photos and albums and he suddenly says that he is nowhere in those “photos”. Well Santoshi is simply saying is that Bachchan can’t reclaim the world he has left, he, and us the audience, can only visit that world through his/our memories. And Santoshi’s masterstroke is to make this film centre around “loss” and “failure”. Just about every good guy dies here, just about every value, every faith is demolished here. The ending is not a happy one in any easy sense- it is instructive to note that Bachchan, the actor whose the presiding deity of the Masala universe, doesn’t even get to kill Devgn here. Santoshi gives Tusshar Kapoor’s character, an actor whose very persona is antithetcial to that of the Masala hero, the “right” to kill Devgn. Well, that’s because that world had no place for Bachchan anymore. he simply can’t reclaim it. He can’t anymore be a “winner” here. Khakee isn’t a tribute, it’s an elegy (it’s also possibly the most poetic Masala film alongwith Shol. Devasuram is another one though the poem here might actually be a dirge what with Oduvil Unnikrishnan character appearing like a spectre at one point and playing his chenda in an almost funereal ode to our bruised hero. And again, both IV Sasi and the writer Ranjith, don’t want to re-establish the Rajavinte Makan, Irupatham Nootandu world with Lal, they simply want to revisit it without handing over the reigns of that world to Lal). And because Santoshi fashioned it like that is precisely the reason why the film is so powerful. At the other end of the spectrum you had RGV where he makes Bachchan the god of his world (Sarkar films), but he also deconstructs that god (Nishabd, Aag and quite literally in Darna Zaroori Hai where Bachchan is actually a ghost). But Bachchan (and Lal) is that one rare whose is malleable enough to be both deified and deconstructed simply in a film (take the Balki films for example. With Mohanlal, you have that very rare star who can simply “disappear”, a very rare thing for a star to do. Then again Lal is also a beast of an actor. Mammootty is also a great actor in every sense, but he can’t “disappear” or go “undetected” the way Lal can)
Again, I doubt Rajini can work with someone like Subbaraj and Kumararaja (filmmakers vastly more talented than Ranjith). Yes, there films are haunted by Rajini’s presence, but Rajini can only haunt there world as a spectre, he can’t enter that world. Rajini doing the Jackie Shroff part in Aaranya kaandam makes no sense precisely because the part involves deconstruction of that archetype. He can’t to the Bobby Simha part in Jigarthanda for the very same reasons. Yes, those parts are “informed” by Rajini’s image, but if Subbaraj or Kaumararaja were to attempt masala films, they would simply use the Masala tropes for making their own kind of films which wouldn’t be even straight homages to Rajini in case Rajini were to star in their films.
I do think Ranjith has some talents as a director (even if I find him possibly the most overrated Tamil director), but I find him a very poor writer. I wish he would have gotten Kabali written either by Santoshi or Sridhar Raghavan. But even in the south, he can go to his namesake from Malayalam industry (the one who penned Devasuram). In an ideal world I would like to see Rajini act in a Ranjith (the Malayalam writer-director) script with Santoshi/ I.V.Sasi/Sibi Malayil directing (even if I haven’t seen a true-blue masala film by Malayil. I know Sasi did work with Rajini in Kali, but I haven’t seen that film. But in case Sasi works best when we works with a good writer). I also wouldn’t mind if someone like Suseenthiran (again a much better and far more versatile director than Ranjith) would take at a shot at the remake of the Malayalam film Black (it is no Devasuram, but is a very fine Masala film with shades of Road to Perdition).
“I wish he could go back in time and oust Kamal Haasan from projects like Sivappu Rojakal, Nayagan, Thevar Magan, Michael Madana Kamarjan, Vettaiyadu Vilayadum, Papanasam and grab these meaty roles for himself. I wish and wish and wish”-
With all due respect, I am glad that Rajini didn’t do these films otherwise those films would have been an assault on good taste and artistic sensibilities. For instance, for someone who has loves Rajesh Khanna at his best, it is painful to see him attempt the Sigappu Rojakal part in Red Rose (then again it is painful to watch him in any role in that phase). Rajini is simply going to play that part “straight” as a bad guy (unlike how Kamal played it) and the film would be wrecked.
BR: Loved your Mifune comparison with Rajini (i think Rathnam understood this point in Thalapathi, his own homage to Kurosawa). You can always find traces of Kabuki/Noh in Mifune’s performances and Rajini is also an actor of “gestures”. I would love to see Rajini play an erstwhile Kathakali artiste (again a art/dance form dependent on gestures. Though of course the problem would be how to make Rajini do the steps) who has turned into an underworld don of sorts, but who still longs to give one last great performance on stage…in a sense, a reworking of Audidard’s “Beat that my Heart Skipped” with an older hero (hope Lijo Jose Pellissery is listening).
MANK: Absolutely loved your comment regarding the “need” of Thalapathi to be space and time-bound. Masala film I think is like a Proust work, it folds time, space and genres onto themselves. It is also a resistance to the concepts of time and genre (or for that matter, realism).
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Ramanan Varadarajan
July 26, 2016
@brangan : while you’re at the topic of natural evolution of nayakan’s tinuanand’s assasination, can you explain me one thing? this might have been put across as a criticism back then, but am not aware of the response. how did tinuanand get a gun to begin with? he was shown as dusting off his dad’s belongings from the attic, and picked the loaded gun from there? that flies in the face of any logical evolution you allude to. contrast that with the level of detail shown in ‘the godfather’, where the young alpacino is handed a gun in the restaurant by a meticulate planning and hiding inside the toilet flush tank … because they knew he’d be frisked if he had carried it with him.
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brangan
July 26, 2016
Ramanan Varadarajan: Ah, but where’s the poetic justice in shooting your father’s killer with someone else’s gun? 🙂 This is so not a deal breaker for me, as it’s entirely possible that a loaded gun was part of his father’s belongings.
I find this far easier to accept than, say, Madhubala stumbling upon Tamil-speaking Janakaraj in Kashmir.
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n
July 26, 2016
whatever we say abt rajini.. have to take him over amitabh as actor….
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Neena
July 26, 2016
Thanks, BR for the book excerpt.
I don’t say a movie has to be shot in the location it tries to depict; it only needs to convince us that it is a believable anyplace or that it is rooted in some place. I dunno how a Bambai-kar felt abt Nayakan, but it looked real to me. Same with 16 Vayathinile. But, Thalapathi did not look like it was set in a real place within the context of Tamil country – which doesn’t have to be a karivelangattu village or Madurai. Films like Johnny, Mullum Malarum or Moondram Pirai are set in these hill towns/villages which are obviously in the Nilgiris – with tea estates, winches and ‘uyarama kuchi kuchiya maram’.
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Madan
July 26, 2016
@ Honest Raaj “To extract the best out of Kamal: The Comedian, one needs to look into various factors – the right script, dialogue, supporting cast that suits his comfort level, et al.” I am not sure I go along with that. I can see where you’re coming from, but maybe this is simply because Kamal has more upside in comedy and our expectations therefore are higher. For flat out comic timing, Kamal is imo quite significantly better. Rajini tends to perform the comedy also within a narrower band and doesn’t stretch himself (therefore has fewer ‘fails’ than Kamal). The quality of the film really doesn’t matter so much because Rajini doesn’t go to such great lengths to change his acting, indeed change himself as Kamal does. He knows what he delivers best and he sticks to it.
Also, with some (in)glorious exceptions like Uyarndha Ullam which was pretty painful, on average a Kamal film is made to a higher standard than a Rajini film. This is even more applicable to the films both made from the 90s and onwards. I’d say probably Nayagan onwards to put a time-marker to it. Kamal is more conscious of the product he wants to deliver from an artistic perspective apart from the commercial perspective. We have heard for years about his ghost direction of the projects he gets involved in. This is both his strength and weakness. Weakness because when he gets too self-indulgent, the director lacks the authority to pull him back. In a way, it’s like Aamir-Shah Rukh where the latter became more and more risk averse with every failure on his home production label except that I’d rate both Kamal and Rajini higher as actors compared to Aamir and SRK respectively. Incidentally SRK too is going through a bad patch and he too is not in great physical shape. Like Rajini he has relied heavily on sheer energy and as the energy ebbs, he struggles to match up to the image the audience has of him and the product they thereby expect from him.
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Madan
July 26, 2016
Sorry, meant to say, the films both were part of.
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Honest Raj (formerly 'V'enkatesh)
July 26, 2016
kid: Ranjith (Tamil) is a far better director than I. V. Sasi. And, Kaali is such a terrible film – a fine example of how to screw up the whole film when you get to work with the best team. I think it flopped in Tamil, but was a big hit in Telugu – with Rajini and Chiranjeevi.
BR: Great point about ‘poetic justice’. I love the way you keep defending Nayagan. 🙂
I find this far easier to accept than, say, Madhubala stumbling upon Tamil-speaking Janakaraj in Kashmir.
Yen Albert na kovilukku poga kudadha? 🙂
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JPhil
July 27, 2016
For @MANK and a few others who (probably correctly)rue that Rajini could have taken on other projects:Jeethu Joseph -in several Malayalam interviews like this one-explains that Rajini expressed a desire to do Papanasam but was sceptical that the scene where the man gets beaten up by the policemen would not go down well with his fans.The movie was then accepted by Kamal . Jeethu states that Rajini then reconsidered and asked to take up the project but by then KH had been finalised.
Everyone’s loss surely.And still sad to know that such a fantastic script gets turned down for so facile a reason .See the video from 1:29 to 2:21
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sridharvisu76
July 27, 2016
@brangan
since you are a film expert asking this question. There is a shot of someone in swimming pool while Kabali and his daughter are in the Le Meridien hotel.
Why is that shot in the film?
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Kid
July 27, 2016
Honest Raj: I haven’t seen Kali so I will accept your “judgement” on this particular film for the time being, but remember that folks like Sasi are very dependent on the writer (wasn’t Malayil dependent on Lohithadas…when one sees something like Apoorvaraagam, it’s difficult to believe this is the work of a guy who made Thaniyavarthanam. Every director is allowed to fail, but no one is allowed to fail like this! And Malayil, in recent times has failed quite miserably on more than one occasion. At this point, I don’t even know if he has another good film left in him. Then again when we thought Priyadarshan was finished, he came up with Kanchivaram, a film I consider to be his best and which I think is one of the strongest Tamil films from the last twenty years or so). The other issue was that filmmakers like Sasi were workmen like directors who created “art” only when they got a solid script – they often worked round the clock and had multiple releases a year so the quality is bound to suffer (not everyone can be Chabrol and even he wasn’t this prolific), even more so when you attempt so many genres. Now you might say that since we are bringing the writer into discussion, should Sasi get any credit after all?! Well, Salim-Javed wrote a number of scripts, not everything became a Kaala Patthar let alone Deewar. Often you got something like Imaan-Dharam where you see a lot of very interesting subversive ideas (far more than anything Kabali has to offer), but you don’t get a fully formed film. On Kaali, I just checked and found out that Mahendran wrote the script here (I guess that’s what you were indicating with the “best team” bit). Now I don’t know if Mahendran has ever worked in the Masala format (I have only seen three Mahendran films and I love all of them…Uthiripookkal is my favourite Tamil film of all-time- a film I find closer to the ethos of the 80’s Malayalam madhyavarti/middle-cinema than to Tamil cinema- and Rajini’s performance in Johnny is my favourite from his pre-Superstar phase) so I don’t quite know if he had it in him to write a good masala film. this of course does not absolve IV Sasi (assuming Kaali is a utter tripe), but considering that we are crediting the writer in one instance, it’s only fair to call the writer into question in the other instance as well.
But I of course absolutely disagree (and respectfully so) with your estimation of Sasi and Ranjith. For instance, I will very easily take Athirathram, Adiyozhukkukal and Devasuram (of course) and a few others films over anything Ranjith has made till now. And since we are at it, I find Devasuram better than every Tamil masala film (including Thalapathi…MANK and P, we will have to part ways here since I don’t rate Thalapathi that high though I don’t deny the film’s strength which you guys have discussed in your comments 🙂 . In Rathnam’s oeuvre, I prefer Iruvar, Nayakan, Kannathil Muthamittal, Yuva, Raavan, Dil Se, Mouna Raagam, Anjali and probably even Alaypayuthey over Thalapathi) other than Apoorva Sagodharargal (and here Kamal really makes the difference)- a caveat here, I have seen very little from the MGR-Sivaji period so when I talk about Tamil cinema, it excludes the pre-Rajini/Kamal period. I also think Devasuram is better than most Hindi masala works including some very important Bachchan masala films which I cherish and which have been part of my childhood even if I don’t belong to that era at all (for example, something like Laawaris, a very strong film with a very strong Bachchan performance, pales a little when compared to Devasuram and I say this as someone who saw Devasuram only a few years back …if my preference for Devasuram over every Rajini film which has him in the central role, other than possibly Endhiran- a film which I prefer to a lot of Bachchan’s work of the 80’s though certainly not all- and Johnny, seems blasphemous to you, preferring Devasuram over something like Lawaaris and possibly Agneepath would be considered equally blasphemous in a lot of circles…my parents would have scant respect for what I am saying here 🙂 i am making this point because i am not singling out or trying to belittle Rajini or Tamil cinema here. So my opinion may be devoid of any merit, but it’s coming from an honest place. But even otherwise (and i certainly seem to be an insignificant minority on this blog w.r.t to him) i don’t quite see anything remotely special in Pa Ranjith. Comparing him to Kashyap (let’s not even go to Rathnam) is comparing one of the most significant voices of contemporary Asian cinema to a guy making diploma-level films; one doesn’t need to even see a feature film of Kashyap tosee the difference, it’s very visible in something like The Last Train to Mahakali, a film he made for TV (now admittedly I am exaggerating things a little, but I am only doing so to get across a point. And of course BR was making this comparison in a very different sense though I disagree with him as well). The best I can say about Ranjith is that his films aren’t the works of a hack and he can sometimes come up with some potent images. That’s really it. For instance, when one sees something like Kirumi and then one sees Attakathi, one sees a wide gulf of understanding of cinema between the two filmmakers. Even wrt to lark-ish projects, I will easily take Chennai 600028 (and Vennila Kabadi Kuzhu and Kalavani) over Attakathi. With Madras I don’t see anything “new” here in any way. Again you might say that you should consider Ranjith’s importance within Tamil cinema…to which my response would be that why the bloody hell should we drop our standards for a Tamil filmmaker or film when we had something like Visaranai coming out of this industry just this very year. That we had Kaaka Muttai last year itself. Even in the more mainstream format we had Jigarthanda just a couple of years back. You had Kirumi just last year. You have filmmakers like Bala, like Selvaraghavan, like Mysskin. Rathnam remains as active as ever. Again, I would still see Ranjith’s importance in Telugu industry where you only get crap for the most part, but in Kollywood?! Really? Again if one prefers Attakathi/Madras to something like Kirumi or Jigarthanda or Iraivi or Porkkalam or Thavamai or Goli Soda or Pasanga or Aadhalal Kadhal Seiveer or Kuttram Kadithal, then of course one can understand him/her championing Ranjith. Again if someone believes Kabali is a better Masala-film than Pandiyaanadu, i would still understand his position on Ranjith even if I would completely disagree with him. But if it’s none of these, what are we defending Ranjith for? For making something better than Lingaa. Now Lingaa should become the bar for a Rajini film? I don’t even know what to say. That’s why, in a very bizarre or perverse sense, I find Neena’s defense of Kabali and Ranjith far more reasonable than something like “hey, but atleast Ranjith made a better film than Lingaa” because if someone does prefer Kabali to Thalapathi, he/she is bound to like Ranjith’s cinema. I may strongly, vehemently disagree with what she is saying, but atleast an attempt, however weak it would be, could be made to defend her position on Kabali and Ranjith…though it means comparing Kabali/Thalapathi and Ranjith/Rathnam on “her terms”. i can’t say i care for her opinion on the topic at hand, but I truly respect the “thought” behind that opinion). Now there is a good chance that I have a wrong understanding of Ranjith’s cinema. it also might be that i have a very poor understanding of Tamil cinema (or cinema in general), and so I am open to revisiting Ranjith’s films and be persuaded to change my opinion of his films
But, and I really don’t mean this sarcastically at all (apologies if it comes across that way), I don’t quite see a point in debating this particular topic with you (and I am only talking about this particular point) even I have rambled on for too long here (LOL) simply because our ideas about acting and cinema seem to be very different from each other. For instance, you believe that Rajini is a more natural comic actor than Kamal. On the other had, not only do I believe that Rajini has never been a pure actor (and I include his Balachander phase here. But even leaving this aside, and i am not talking about you here, if someone finds Bachchan minimally “good” in Deewar, it’s very difficult to find Rajini even passable in the remake…unless of course the viewer here considers Rajini a better actor than Bachchan and doesn’t consider the Deewar performance “good” to begin with. Now this kind of viewer has every right to have that opinion, but then I am quite frankly not interested in having any discussion on cinema with him because I doubt we would ever have anything remotely in common about our thoughts on ANY film even if both of us were to watch the very same film. I am not saying that his/her views should always be laughed-off, but I don’t know if I have the mental/intellectual ability to make sense of this kind of opinion and I say this without an iota of sarcasm. I believe that If one was to do an offhand thought-experiment of sorts, one would find that most people who prefer Rajni to Bachchan where acting is concerned would also, more often than not, prefer Rajini to Kamal on the same front) and “natural” isn’t a mode he operates in (though I do agree that the comic skills of Rajini haven’t been tapped yet) but also that Kamal is possibly one of the greatest comic actors in modern cinema (and I am not limiting myself to Indian cinema here). One of Kamal’s greatest strength as a comedian is that even while doing broad comedy (MMKR for instance), he makes it appear very “natural” in that world (though I must admit lately this hasn’t been the case). With Rajini, though even in a much more understated world like that of Thillu Mullu, resorts to a performance which is a little “out” of that world. Now Thillu Millu is an interesting performance and not without it moments, but I also find it a far weaker performance than that of Amol Palekar in the original (then again, even in Hindi cinema, it’s hard to find a better comic actor than Palekar- Bachchan might be the only one, or possibly Sanjeev Kumar- and even harder to find a comedy as good as Golmaal). The only area where I possibly prefer Rajini to Kamal is when he does Masala (Apoorva Sagodharargal is a notable exception though, but this is also a very atypical film for that genre), especially while doing Masala of the more overblown kind. Rajini is certainly one of the greatest “presence” to have graced the screen, but that happens despite the lack of his acting skills and not because of it. In the right film, he is a force of nature, but he is still not a very good actor IMO. That many excellent actors (though Kamal isn’t one of them…Kamal is far too intelligent an actor to be overshadowed by anyone) can easily be overshadowed by Rajini is certainly true, but that would not be because of Rajini’s acting skills. If ever a star has come close to personifying the quality of “je ne sais quoi” in cinema, it’s Rajini. i think no traditional notion of acting or performance is useful in understanding him. Watching Rajini is like watching performance-art or something like Kathakali refracted through the lens of an East Asian/Hong Kong action-comedy (also I think there is always an element of comedy even in Rajini’s serious performances once his Superstar phase begins…possibly even before that. That might be the reason why i believe Mahendran utilized this aspect of his persona very beautifully in Johnny).
A Rajini persona which deserves a film of its own is the one from Bhrashtachar…a very mediocre film (I understand that Sippy had an off-day here, but one wonders how this was such a poor work on stylistic levels. We are talking about a guy who made Shaan and Sholay here!), but not without its merits. Rajini is remarkably effective in this film even in an extended special appearance.
MANK: Apologies for not replying to your comment on the Great Grand Masti thread here (I stayed away from that thread because it threatened to devolve into something else). Will certainly do so in a day or two. But thanks for that comment on both Shantaram and Utsav/Eyes Wide Shut, much to chew on.
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Harish S
July 27, 2016
@kid: loved most of your view points (that which I could comprehend). But don’t you think you missed a beat when you included Suseenthiran into the list? The guy tried dambling with caste politics in Jeeva and failed miserably. I would go as far as to say Jeeva & Kabali have the same pluses and minuses. Both had an interesting love track that runs parallel to the main issue and both had very sharp oratory style of documenting caste issue.
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Madan
July 27, 2016
“I dunno how a Bambai-kar felt abt Nayakan” – Chiming in as a Mumbaikar. The landmarks quickly establish familiarity but the re-created Mumbai feels too sanitised to my eyes, not quite like the real, throbbing, hyper-energetic city I know. If you want to see Bombay/Mumbai on celluloid, it’s best captured in any number of angry young man/anti-hero films from late 70s through to 90s – Deewar, Arjun, Satya. I haven’t properly watched Muqaddar ka Sikandar but the title song with AB riding a Bullet through South Bombay again does justice to the city. When Kamal and Saranya make leisurely romance on Gateway or Marine Drive, it feels unreal because those places are never deserted unless it’s blazing hot or raining cats and dogs. I haven’t seen Bombay Velvet but it could be said that Mani Ratnam similarly wanted to use Bombay as a setting to shoot his tribute to Godfather (whereas Deewar was a pure Bombay film and Shashi Kapoor’s quip to the winning candidate in the interview is so easy to relate to for any Mumbaikar except the lucky ones who don’t travel by the local train).
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Ramanan Varadarajan
July 27, 2016
[sorry if this post is a repetition, faced many server errors]
@brangan : let me clarify, my emphasis was on that “firearms do not constitute deceased/bereaved/retired service men belongings or memorabilia” .. far from a trivial goof-up ,,. we have been taught enough commonsense by tamil movies that cops even have to handover the badge, let alone the gun and that too ‘loaded’, …:) is’nt it enough to show the dad’s uniform but some goon’s gun? that’s the level of detail that our bell.ratnam had, maybe he paid too much attention to his overall storylines and let such ones slide.
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blurb
July 27, 2016
Who dubbed for Aapte in Kabali, anyone knows?
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Ram
July 27, 2016
Bachchan namaha bachchan namo namaha. Lot of comic elements in that long post and seems to have no idea about tamil cinema. Watched Mullum Malarum again, rajini has done more here than bachchan entire career.
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varun
July 27, 2016
@ All..Who spew Hatred towards Kabali and Specifically Ranjith…I understand this forum is to cut and slice movies..But come on what are you guys doing here..Here is an Young director who is just 2 film old and tried something with arguably the biggest star in planet..Lets keep aside the movie was not up to expectation or as some say not a movie at all…SO WHAT? what u guys are trying to achieve by saying that Ranjith is Ok, BAD, Worst director here or Rajni BAD or Worst actor here..Its just a movie and their is a young director who from a humble background has done something thats the ultimate dream of every movie maker. Give him some credit here..i see someone writing pages and pages and for what? Constructive criticism is different but i see all hatred in this forum..As if the movie Kabali is a Spell that caused insurmountable sadness, misery in their life..That Ranjith should be banned from movie making for making a mess of a movie called Kabali..Come on guys…This forum whats wrong with the current society as a whole every where..Full of negativity..An young director has made a movie with the biggest star..It could be a hit or miss..The point here is we should appreciate him not as a film maker but as a fellow professional who did something in his work that only very few people has achieved..Lets appreciate it..Lets be optimistic about his skill as a director and be appreciative of the effort he made…We need lot of constructive feed back yes..But we need lot of positive appreciation and encouragement to an young talent…Kabali is not the best movie in Rajnis career..but definitely be in the Top 10 list of the actors career. Personally to me, This movie is better than all the movies that Rajni did in the past 30 years with the exception of Baadsha and Enthiran. Period. Just my opinion
@Kid..I am not going to make any case here..But do remember..Every one is entitled to make an opnion and so do you..Opinions of an individual are purely Subjective when it Comes to Cinema and they never can be objective as you are trying to convey in your lengthy lengthy words….A truelcinema lovers will never do grading of actor, director or even cinema. Any movie/actor that entertains and satisfies an individual emotionally is the ultimate movie/Actor for that individual. As I said Its all objective observations and their can never be concrete judgements and conclusions as you are trying to do.
My Request…Keep this forum filled with constructive criticisms and positivity please..
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rohitsathishnair
July 27, 2016
Ramanan Varadarajan:
Kelker was no straight cop, was he? So, isn’t it possible that the goons he sided with gave him an extra gun, which of course, he’d hide?
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MANK
July 27, 2016
Man, this comments section has really taken off 🙂
Udhayashankar,Rahini Neena & others, just to make one more point to ease your discomfort with deva -surya becoming friends aspect – apart from what what Honest Raj, Punee and Brangan(quoting MR) has already made here
Mammootty’s deva is in a long line of impulsive , self righteous, unpredictable Mani Rathnam characters who are full of themselves and are creatures of instinct. his predecessors\successors could be
Kartik in mouna ragam & Agni nakshatram
Revathi in Anjali
SRK in dil se
Aishwarya Rai in Iruvar
Surya in Ayudha ezhuthu
Mithun Chakraborty in Guru
the reason why that scene appears to be such a sore point is because it is the first instance in the film where we see Deva’s impulsive unpredictable nature, but look at his actions following that
he doesnt realise that bringing deva in to the fold and making him thalapathi is going to turn his own men against him, which almost leads to his death
he messes up sooryas relationship with shobhana with a hasty marriage proposal which he is so confident that it will not be rejected. he is so full of himself that he cannot believe that somebody would dare turn him down or that fact that they wouldnt see in Rajni what he see in him
after that he hastily arranges the marriage between rajni and banupriya, he doesnt pause to think whether they will be able too love each other or whether they want this marriage or not, he just wants to arrange a protector for Banupriya and get a wife for Rajni – in which he miserably failed before, it is completely about him being right
Look also how quickly he loses his faith in Rajni – almost as quickly as he bestows his faith in him, After the cops attack his wife and he loses his child, he is just so mad with fury, that the only solution he finds is to kill the collector. but Rajni rejects the idea.
now he takes Rajni’s rejection of his murder proposal to the fact that he still loves shobhana and perhaps more than the love he has for him. so all the proclamations he made to his wife – en thozhan, en kooda piranthavan , en thalapathi, all thats pfft now. now its Rajni’s turn to remind him of his friendship – en mele sandeha pedariya, nanbanena theriyuma unakku, sooryanu enna theryuma unnakku, en uyir venama eduthukko
now just see his reaction when Rajni confesses the truth of him and the collector being brothers, he makes a 360 degree volte face. he wants to give everything up and surrender to the police. so all his pride, his prestige,the violence against his wife, the lose of his child, nothing matters to him anymore. he is back to chanting – partha en thalapathiya to his wife again.
with that in mind, if you go back to the first scene in which both of them meet – in the rain , on the bridge-look what he says there. Ramana has been his loyal servant for 10 years and he doest know\care what he did, ramana hospitalku thirumbi varale, indha soorya irikka maatan. its a simple as that for him. so once he realise the the truth about Ramana- and violence against women is something he abhors more than anything else – Ramana’s loyalty is now betrayal for him and soorya has gone and done what he would have expected Ramana to do in the first place , so soorya is now his ramana and all the affection and gratitude he had for Ramana is transferred to surya now. thats how Deva works. he wears his heart on his sleeve and pretty much succumbs to his instinct on the moment.
so if you see the film for the second time – with this complete arc of his character in mind -, i dont think that scene outside the police station is that unconformable to digest as opposed to the first time where a little knowledge of the epic mythology would help.
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brangan
July 27, 2016
Varun: There is absolutely no “hatred” being spewed towards Rajini or Ranjith here. We are discussing the film, which worked for some, not so much for others. And the comments are far from ad hominem attacks. Even if people are “dissing” Ranjith or Rajini, it is only in the context of the film, his work.
Another point. This “pat on the back” mentality because one is still a young filmmaker is very harmful IMO. If one is to do what you ask — i.e. constructive criticism — then there ahould ideally be no room for pats on the back.
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Rahini David
July 27, 2016
MANK:
Point One: I am not the one who had a problem with the “immediate thick friends” business. A bit like kindergarten playmates but such people do exist. I have no trouble buying it.
Point Two: Athu 180 degree. Neenga mathematics la weakaa? 🙂
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sanjana
July 27, 2016
Palekar is best in films like Golmaal which I completely agree. And Sanjeev Kumar in Angoor. And his co partner Deven Verma.
I think even Bachchan does very well doing tongue in cheek comedy in films like Satte pe Satta, Chupke Chupke, even Bade Miya Chote Miya.
And finally there is Govinda who can dance like a dream and do comedy like only like he can.
In telugu, there is Sunil. For those who can understand telugu very well. Cant dismiss telugu films as complete craps but they are not outright craps as far as comedy is concerned. One should know the language very well to enjoy the funny dialogues and the way they are delivered. Take away Bachchan from many of his films, they are like telugu films.
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blurb
July 27, 2016
sridharvisu76: I agree, I remember going “that’s it?!”
Definitely needs another viewing. Let the madness subside first.
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Honest Raj (formerly 'V'enkatesh)
July 27, 2016
kid: but remember that folks like Sasi are very dependent on the writer
Yup, they hardly wrote, but we’re discussing about the DIRECTORIAL abilities of a filmmaker, no? Unlike the West, in India most filmmakers have always felt that scriptwriting is an integral part of filmmaking. The Malayalam film industry might be an exception though; in the 80s, they viewed a director as someone whose job is to just take shots. Even the artsy ones were commercially successful because they had strong scripts. The late Bharathan was a fantastic director (the likes of I. V. Sasi, Malayil, et al., are nowhere in contention).
Even wrt to lark-ish projects, I will easily take Chennai 600028 (and Vennila Kabadi Kuzhu
and Kalavani) over Attakathi.
I haven’t seen Attakaththi/VKK yet, but I bet somebody like a Venkat Prabhu would never be able to meticulously unearth the ‘rootedness of the milieu’. Guess what? Ranjith assisted him in Chennai – 28.
The reason why we (MANK & others) are inclined towards Thalapathi is because it’s easily the best film of Mani Ratnam to that point. It worked at all levels. Read the ‘prologue with the Kunti character’ part in BR’s comment above. That level of detail would not be present in his previous films. I’m not sure about MANK’s claim about it being the technically strongest Indian film to that point, but it was easily the best (technically) in Tamil cinema. Nayagan is not a patch on it. Mouna Ragam is clearly out of equation. Kannathil Muththamittal is a great film, and MR had advanced to a greater level when he made the film. But you should understand that the film came nearly a decade after Thalapathi was made.
Again you might say that you should consider Ranjith’s importance within Tamil cinema…to which my response would be that why the bloody hell should we drop our standards for a Tamil filmmaker or film when we had something like Visaranai coming out of this industry just this very year. That we had Kaaka Muttai last year itself. Even in the more mainstream format we had Jigarthanda just a couple of years back. You had Kirumi just last year. You have filmmakers like Bala, like Selvaraghavan, like Mysskin. Rathnam remains as active as ever. Again, I would still see Ranjith’s importance in Telugu industry where you only get crap for the most part, but in Kollywood?! Really? Again if one prefers Attakathi/Madras to something like Kirumi or Jigarthanda or Iraivi or Porkkalam or Thavamai or Goli Soda or Pasanga or Aadhalal Kadhal Seiveer or Kuttram Kadithal, then of course one can understand him/her championing Ranjith.
kid, you’re being a bit too harsh on Ranjith. Like BR said in the other post, Ranjith is a kind of filmmaker who knows what it means to DIRECT a film; I don’t see him merely as a storyteller. Yes, comparisons with AK at this stage would not make sense, but let’s see how he progresses in the years to come.
Second, I presume that you have no idea about rural TN. I think for most outsiders rural TN= Madurai and the surrounding districts (thanks to Bharathiraaja). Bhagyaraj brought prominence to the western districts. The eastern, northern and central districts have been grossly ignored all these years. Hope things will change with the advent of filmmakers like Thyagarajan Kumararaja, Vetrimaran and Ranjith.
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Honest Raj (formerly 'V'enkatesh)
July 27, 2016
rohitsathishnair: Yes, it’s also possible that the goons he sided with gifted him a trunk case that contained a cap and a khakhee uniform, along with a loaded gun. 🙂
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sanjana
July 27, 2016
Let us accept the gun thing as a goof than justifying it.
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ramvaradan
July 27, 2016
@Honest Raj : And, its not far-fetched to imagine .. that the goons might have had a soft corner for the bad Cop, so advised the family to keep the gun along with his memoroblia … 🙂 you can imagine the parallel side story that audience have to stitch to cover the flaw.
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lol
July 27, 2016
how about thalapathi entire climax.. worst climax ever..a cop out from mani
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aj
July 27, 2016
This movie felt a disappointment the first time, but it got much better the second time around. There is a lot more happening in the movie than can be grasped in a single viewing.
Yes, the emotional connect was probably not there in the last third of the movie, but I am more hesitant to criticize given my experience the second time. It really felt like more layers were unwrapped and unravelled.
The one real jarring note is the chinese villain spouting Tamil dialogues.
In closing though, this is a very good movie. Some scenes – especially in the first half and the India portion – are brilliant and Rajni has done an outstanding job in terms of being understated and vulnerable. When was the last time we saw him act with such depth ?
There is a disconnect between how over-analytical and nitpicking reviewers see the movie and how the general public likes it. This is easily Rajni’s best performance in a long time.
brangan, I love your reviews but I have to say that this one does not do the movie justice. May be you should try watching it again and see if changes how you feel about it. It sure did for me.
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Raj Balakrishnan
July 27, 2016
I am old enough to remember the reception that Thalapathy got when the movie was released back in the 90s (was in high school then). It was dissed by the tamil reviewers and hardcore Rajini fans were disappointed – like Kabali now. I don’t think it made as much money as ‘Mannan’ which hit the cinemas couple of months later. Mannan was a blockbuster, whereas Thalapathy did average business.
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Anon
July 27, 2016
Omg Mannan came AFTER Thalapathy? Man, that movie was ridiculous beyond belief.
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Raj Balakrishnan
July 27, 2016
@anon, yes. And I think it got glowing reviews and lots of love from the public!
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Neena
July 27, 2016
MANK: your character study of Deva is certainly helpful. But, my problems with Thalapathi & MR’s style in general go beyond just the ‘how did they become friends at first sight?’ question. Now, that you mention this pattern, maybe that’s what makes for adorable characters in the ‘light’ romantic dramas (Alaipayuthey, OKK & to a lesser extent Mouna Ragam) but becomes flimsy characterisation in the ‘heavier’ dramas.
Second time-a? I dunno if anyone here is discussing Thalapathi having watched it only once in their entire life :p I’m certainly not discussing it in detail having watched it only as a child in the early 90s!
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brangan
July 27, 2016
aj: When you watch an idea-filled film like Kabali or Uttama Villain, of course you’re going to notice more layers the second, third time etc. But that still doesn’t redeem the films from being just… “idea films.” Films that were conceived with a lot of ambition, but went awry in the execution.
And it all depends on what you expect from a movie. For some, it may be enough that you can say “oh, he’s tried to say this in this scene,” “he’s saying that in that other scene.” For others, this may not be enough.
This is not being nitpicky. This is about demanding that cinema be… cinema, with all the characteristics of the art form.
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bart
July 27, 2016
I watched it the second time. As aj mentions, the movie (esp. thalaivar) was even better. Leaving the movie aside, I was happy to see Ranjith tackling the post-release queries without much fear / apprehensions. Happy to see this clarity and confidence in a young film-maker who has probably faltered a bit given a golden opportunity. Awaiting his next.
1) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3f9Bwxufcm0
2) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D9kgQZYIlrM
3) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AI2m6YRrI0Y
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Aadhy
July 27, 2016
Not sure why, but I feel a strong urge within me to root for this movie and more for the director, even though the end product is not really satisfying. I don’t know if it’s because of the sensibilities Ranjith carries into his films, or the honesty with which he tries to stick to his script and characters, or for the kind of issues he tries to deal with, in his movies.
Not only that, even in his filmmaking capabilities, he has really shown remarkable ambition. Those deadly low angle shots of the wall in Madras, apparently a Macguffin for larger things at play, but still enticing the audience to think otherwise. Or the foreshadowing techniques he is so fond of, like in the Attakathi scene where Dina meets Poorni at the bus stop. It starts from a wide shot showing everyone at once (without revealing the presence of Poorni) and then zooms in to show Dhina talking, before zooming partly out to reveal the surprise entry of Poorni back into the narrative and then finally returning to the original wide shot to show a sense of ‘normalcy’ returning to the entire scheme of things. Maybe a lot of this ambition is not visible in Kabali, or was lost in translation from ideas to screenplay (presuming shot compositions are always written in the screenplay), or from screenplay to the frame.
But let’s take Kadhalum kandandu pogum, Iraivi and Kabali this year, all three carrying the tag of promising filmmakers who delivered smashing movies in their previous attempts (more commercially successful and widely acclaimed). This time around all of them evoked mixed responses with varying degrees of criticism and commercial successes. There is still a strong feeling to cheer for these filmmakers and readiness to forgive their flaws. I’m not saying these flaws shouldn’t be pointed out or criticized. Deconstruction and critical analysis is surely the way forward. Let’s take Visaranai and Uriyadi, which are, in my opinion, two finest movies of this year so far. Though I have massive respect and appreciate the directors for their work, there is still not a ‘rooting for the director’ feeling I get because almost everyone who saw these movies liked it, and those who didn’t see, didn’t bother about it. They didn’t open up a plethora of discussions in different blogs, about the content, form, ideologies and whatnot. I think it’s to these filmmakers’ credit that they have evoked such varying reactions to their movies so early in their careers. I hope they continue telling different stories with their idiosyncrasies and styles intact, and don’t fall prey to the idea of universal acceptance/acclamation.
BR: Did you do a review of Attakathi when it was released? I’m not able to find it in your archives, and I think it really deserves your views and thoughts, in a detailed piece.
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harish ram
July 27, 2016
@Adhay I had slightly similar train of thought. These young gen triumvirate get spoken more compared to any other maker in recent time due to their thought provoking yet unfinished output. The other makers who give at least one notch above quality products seem to not provoke any thought in the general diaspora. Maybe it signifies something about tamil audience that i can’t yet comprehend.
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brangan
July 27, 2016
Aadhy / harish ram: Excellent point.
Another thought I had: Had Ranjith made Kabali the same way but with a smaller star, would we still be as forgiving? In other words, is the “forgiving” due to Ranjith or Rajinikanth (especially considering the latter’s “resurrection” after a lousy run of films)?
It is indeed sad that films like Kirumi and Uriyadi and Nedunchalai (a magnificent B-movie) generate almost no discussion on this blog, but for these big films, everyone chips in and give hundreds of comments.
I mean, what an astonishing film Kirumi is.
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Aditya (Gradwolf)
July 27, 2016
Aadhy/Harish Ram: Good points. It’s not surprising or in any way suggestive of Tamil cinema or audience. I’ll quote something Stephanie Zacharek said on Twitter that I keep going back to: “What Pauline Kael said applies to (in the twitter conversation context she was having) books too: ‘Great movies are rarely perfect movies.’ More and more, I warm to imperfection, the right kind. The most interesting things tend to happen in the margins.”
I think these mixed response films or even polarizing films or the noble misfires do generate more debate and for the right reasons. It’s true for Rajini/Kamal/Ratnam (last year’s Uttama Villain for example) and the new directors. Ranjith has his heart in the right place, though he for some reason hasn’t shown the filmmaking mettle he did in first 2 films, in Kabali, he is second only to Mysskin in Tamil cinema for me, at the moment as the most interesting director brimming with ideas and unflinching dedication to his politics. Between Iraivi and Kadhalum Kadandhu Pogum, I’d take Iraivi for the filmmaking but to me, Kadhalum Kadandhu Pogum ultimately stood out as the better, wholesome film. But yes, these guys are the new big names at the moment.
BR: Apart from the obvious reason that these are star driven big films, it is also a fact that Kirumi, Uriyadi had very short run at the theatres. I hope more people catch them as they become available in the legal streaming sites around the world. Everyone chips in because, hey, for these films, by the time of their release, everyone felt duty bound to watch them.
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brangan
July 27, 2016
Aditya:it is also a fact that Kirumi, Uriyadi had very short run at the theatres..,
I don’t think that’s much of an excuse. If you can move heaven and earth to get tickets to watch Kabali, surely you can spare a few hours to watch an acclaimed film that you can get tickets for easily?
All these people on the web who keep talking about “great cinema” seem to do so only when the big names are at play. So okay, you don’t know anything about the film at first. But once the buzz gets going, if you’re such a vocal supporter of good cinema, then you should be able to find three hours on Monday or Tuesday to support these films that really need your support.
Because this also widens the discussion when we speak about “good filmmakers.” Most people only bring up the usual suspects, but what about an Anucharan?
And two, about Ranjith’s “unflinching dedication to his politics,” IMO what’s more important is that he show unflinching dedication to his chosen medium. Along with what he wants to say, he should focus on HOW he wants to say it. Which is why Attakathi is his best film, his most impressive calling card as a filmmaker. I was so disappointed with the way Madras ended, with that Karthi character teaching little children. It was like a crude PSA, and it was especially jarring after the great bits of cinema that came earlier.
Of course, I don’t deny that he is one of the more interesting filmmakers in Tamil cinema now, one whose work you really look forward to.
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harish ram
July 28, 2016
@BR I really hope Ranjith doesn’t end in the S. P. Jananathan league with the way he is emphasising more on the politics. I just want to say to him that if he believes in the attire politics of Ambedkar, then to convey his ideology, the attire here called as form in cinema is more important. That is why Attakathi was an exceptional film IMO.
Going back to the topic, if I could take a tangent to the imperfect-yet-interesting-idea films, the problem I had with Kabali was the lack of buildups to any important event in the film. The movie also isn’t trying to go the random act of events style as well. The people who defend Kabali say the movie has its motives hidden deep and one needs a second viewing to notice them. For them, the performances and the message were enough to connect with the film and to warrant a repeat watch for quenching the doubts that they had with the film.
Now if we take Iraivi, it had many sub-texts that need to be understood to get the director’s vision, if not agree to it. Here too there were splendid performances. So why isn’t Iraivi not getting the mass acceptance? Is it just SS phenomenon at play or something else?
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P
July 28, 2016
kid: I don’t watch Malayalam films mostly because I do not understand anything of the language at all. With Tamil and Telugu, I understand the language because growing up in Mysore we had friends and neighbours who spoke both.
Plus I am a verrrry visual person and I do not find Mohanlal good looking as a hero. Love him as a character actor in RGV films (for eg). I didn’t even watch Drishyam though my grandma kept telling me to, because I knew I will prefer it with Kamal 🙂
So I will never know if your “Devasuram” is better than Deewar and Dalapathy.
I don’t find your words blasphemous because I have many people in my own family who don’t understand my Rajni or SRK obsession, but honestly with SRK at least I have watched almost 95% of his films. With Rajni for most of my childhood it was just one film- Dalapathy. One character-Surya. I only had memories (that I kept revisiting) of Dalapathy that I watched just once at age 5-6 therabouts- my mom only took me to watch it because it was Rathnam and it was shot in Mysore, otherwise she has a huge distaste for Rajni.
Till date I love him because of that one movie alone. Rajini is Surya and Surya is Rajni for me. I find it very difficult to seperate the two. That is why I like him in movies that reflect aspects of that Surya personality, so I liked Kabali, bits of Linga (yes, I know!), some parts of Sivaji. I have recently caught up with other movies of his filmography, but I keep returning to Dalapathy. I have lost all perspective probably when it comes to the movie and wouldn’t be able to judge it in any other way 🙂 (the way you have!)
MANK: OMG! LOVED THAT CHARACTER SKETCH ON DEVA. PLEASE WRITE MORE I BEG YOU! 🙂
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P
July 28, 2016
kid: Like I said my singular frame of reference is Dalapathy, so I think for that film your line: “Watching Rajini is like watching performance-art or something like Kathakali refracted through the lens of an East Asian/Hong Kong action-comedy” just doesn’t hold true. nope.
look: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5CqJE4kabxY
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Varun
July 28, 2016
BR: The problem IMO is that we are too much Dependent on Theaters. There is no category of revenue called Home Video. Kabali and other big films either have star power or director reputation. Whereas Movies Like Uriyadi need positive word of mouth and nod from reviewers like you. Trust me, I watched Uriyadi after your solid recommendation for the movie and the director at the end of you review. And by that time, these good movies complete their lifetime in theaters due to Various reasons. Yes I do agree small and good films should be aggressively promoted in the Social media. But this reliance of Theaters/cable channels as the only source of watching movies should stop and other forms of movie distribution like Movie Rentals (like Redbox), Movie Streaming, Movies on Demand should be considered so that Movie makers have their own Platforms and reduce too much dependencies on theater to make a profit. Of course, the issue of piracy is always there but as Kamal said during his Interview which I remember way back in 2008 during Dasavadharam Promotions, to increase the movie distribution channels and the piracy will go away. By the way IMO, you are the Roger Ebert of India.
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Aadhy
July 28, 2016
BR: “Had Ranjith made Kabali the same way but with a smaller star, would we still be as forgiving?”
Probably not. But I believe the ‘forgiving’ may not be due to Ranjith or Rajni individually as much as for what Ranjith did TO Rajni, giving his role a certain dignity and sobriety.
Aditya : “I think these mixed response films or even polarizing films or the noble misfires do generate more debate and for the right reasons.”
I partly agree with you on this. When a movie works on a whole, it works subconsciously, ending with a really satisfying experience, without good bits sticking out here and there. Whereas in imperfect films, there are parts that are well made and parts that just don’t seem to belong there. So you want bring both to the table and that is when you suss things up and delve deep into what EXACTLY worked for you and what didn’t, which might be the other way round for someone else and a constructive debate kicks off. But in the case of better films, like say a Vidiyum munn, or a Rajathandiram or even Burma, this kind of dissection doesn’t happen in such a scale. We could still talk about how a lot of things went right for the movie in detail and debate about which was THE moment for you, but we don’t. There’s not even a buzz. People who watch agree it’s a good movie and just move on. I wasn’t active here back then so don’t know what happened. I’m just remarking about the social media junta in general, myself included.
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Ramanan Varadarajan
July 28, 2016
As a saying goes in Thamizh (I paraphrase) : Padichavan Pattai Keduthan. I adore the technical discussions and comparison of the directors, and their mastery of the craft,, But make no mistake it provides only good readership. For an audio-visual medium such as Cinema : I prefer to stick with my raw and gut feelings as influenced by what I am expposed to. I get the point only as long as it is conveyed right. For example : in the visual & sound of a tire screeching, even if it takes a second in the frame, I get that its trying to convey something.. But, if I cannot connect the dots with the context, then the meaning is lost.
Most of our discussions are centered around what they have “not” done with the movie Kabali.We like to talk about the Directors and Actors wiring them too much with their Image/Persona. That’s why industries such as Hollywood produce far superior scripts. Case in point : if you have watched “Burn After Reading” … Brad Pitt, a blockbuster actor, plays an idiot with stylized mannerisms .. and he gets shot while hiding in a closet, without much fuss and movie goes on. I love such Indie genres that we have in Thamizh and its not fair to limit actors to not try these, due to their stardom baggage.
I mean, its okay to have stars to have an image outside of a movie.. but once in a movie, they got to lose it.
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Anuja Chandramouli
July 28, 2016
Kid: I think you do Rajni an injustice by dismissing him as a good ‘supporting actor’ or suggesting that even in some of his remarkable roles he was not really acting. Allow me to point out that acting is never supposed to come across as ACTING because if it does then it is bad acting. As for MANK who says that Rajni is only good at pulling off the external manifestations of characters and BR who agreed with him, I say that is poppycock (pardon my language) because there is a lot of depth to his performances even when it is in the most masala/cash-in-on-his-superstar-status films.
I am not going to deny that Kamal Haasan is talented although I have always felt he is a better singer and dancer than actor (unlike Rajni whose only limitation is that he cannot dance to save his life). My main issue with KH is that he is so obsessed with gimmicks and affectations that are supposed to drive home the fact that he is ACTING and BRILLIANTLY at that, it leaves me stone cold. I can’t help thinking that it is all very superficial and only the more suggestible among the audience buy into the act.
Rajni on the other hand is no method actor because he does not need to be. There is something incredibly intuitive and organic in his ability to sink his teeth into a role and bring it to life. That is why it comes across as natural and effortless causing folks to say that he is limited as a performer. But even though Rajni’s brand may be about style and charisma at an overt level, make no mistake, deep down it is all about raw talent.
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Aditya (Gradwolf)
July 28, 2016
BR: That’s not much of an excuse for cinema lovers and cinema lovers, they’ll come. In fact I would add another movie to your under-discussed list – Oru Naal Koothu. But others, not so. Like I said, with these films one finds himself or herself duty bound to watch. Even the one movie a month people would join in the discussions here. Not being elitist, but it is how it is. It’s like you might still think Rome 2006 is the better Federer-Nadal match but the Grand Slam only watchers will live by Wimbledon 2008 🙂
But having said that, I’ll also make this point. Bollywood or at least Bombay has cracked it. They have a self-sustaining ecosystem by now where independent movies thrive, they have a voice and also a solid platform to push these to a wider audience. We need something like that in Chennai and that may not happen till our distribution system etc changes and/or more studios get involved. That ecosystem began with Kashyap and passionforcinema and places like those but now it its own organism. That is why a Court or a Fandry finds a wider audience, even Shaitan or Ship of Theseus or Aankhon Dekhi or even a Masaan. Yes, they have their fair share of misfires (in terms of the film not turning out as great as these insiders suggested) but there are more pluses than minuses to the whole program. The Madras ending rankled me too but then that’s the only part that rankled and it almost comes over the end credits. I wish Madras had the kind of reach Sairat did. I wish we had an ecosystem where Madras/Aaranya Kandam/Soodhu Kavvum/Pisaasu were pushed towards a wider non-Tamil audience the way Sairat/Court/Waiting got pushed down. This is most stark when I see a not so great product piggybacking on this ecosystem and coming across as severely overrated. That’s the time I feel, oh boy, I wish these people knew about a Mysskin or Ranjith.There are also systemic corrections to make and that’s where we do have a long way to go.
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Aditya (Gradwolf)
July 28, 2016
Also, Kirumi did have more festival runs and was received well in those fests. But Anucharan is still only one film old. So he won’t join in in these discussions yet IMO. Add to that, the very small reach Kirumi had and not to forget, it wasn’t unanimously well-received in the mainstream critics even. Not that our discourse is great 😀 but just that the ones we are including him with had it different. Maybe that’s how we circle back to the whole interesting things tend to happen in the margins point.
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Metafore
July 28, 2016
Greetings from a long time reader and first time contributor! The discussion out here is absolutely electrifying. At the risk of appearing an opportunist, here is my little imaginary take on Rajini’s stardom. Something I wrote on the fly. BR and others, would love to hear your thoughts!
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brangan
July 28, 2016
harish ram:I really hope Ranjith doesn’t end in the S. P. Jananathan
Haha. That may be stretching it a bit, as Ranjith is ten times the filmmaker SPJ is 🙂 (though the latter surprised me in Purampokku Engira Podhuvudamai, which had some unexpectedly good filmmaking).
My question is not about Ranjith’s commitment to his politics, but about the WAY he chooses to express this in his films.
There are only a few who are interested enough in cinema, who devour everything on the web, who read up on Malaysian Tamils before going to Kabali, who even understand that Ranjith is speaking about Dalits. (And I’m guessing that this is mainly the younger, social media-savvy demographic.)
To many people, these are generic narratives. In the sense that Baasha could have been Dalit too, the characters in Subramaniapuram could have been Dalit too — but they become “casteless” characters because the film doesn’t really comment on this aspect.
Over years, Tamil audiences have gotten accustomed to the fact that characters are “casteless” unless (1) specified in the character’s name (say, Vijayakanth as Chinna “Gounder,” or Kamal playing Velu “Nayakar” or Satyamurthy “Mudaliar” or Sakthi “Thevar” or Udayamurthy, son of Bilahari Marthandam “Pillai”), or (2) shown visually (Brahmin poonal or nine-yards sari or diction, Thevar moustache).
It’s easier with Christians and Muslims — the outward manifestations are easily put across, say with a character wearing a chain with a cross, or wearing a skull cap and doing namaz. (Plus, the character names are usually self-evident.)
So when one of these characters come on screen, the audience is instantly clued in, and they begin to follow the story with this aspect firmly in mind.
But to represent a Dalit on screen, what do you do? One way is to allude to this directly on screen, the way Nagraj Manjule does — or even the way Balaji Sakthivel did in Kaadhal. In the latter film, after Aishwarya’s chittappa cons the newly married couple into coming with him, he asks Murugan, “Nee enna jaadhi?” Murugan says, “Manusha jaadhi.” Chittappa says he belongs to the caste of lions and asks again what Murugan’s caste is. “Singamaa puliyaa naayaa panniyaa?” This itself gives us the general idea, which is then strengthened by the insult hurled at him when getting beaten up by Aishwarya’s dad: “eena jaadhi naai payale”
So even if the audience hasn’t realised they are watching a Dalit-Thevar love story this far, they do so now. There is no doubt at all.
Ranjith chooses a subtler approach. There is NOTHING overt. (In fact, you count on the fingers of one hand, the number of times the word “jaadhi” comes up in his films.) Instead, he festoons his films with “markers,” and my question is how many people outside of those already clued in to these markers (and some on social media) are recognising these markers and seeing Ranjith’s films as a celebration of Dalit protagonists.
And if vast masses don’t see the importance of what Ranjith is doing, then isn’t he having a conversation with just an inner circle?
So even with his commitment to politics, it’s going to be really interesting to follow his career and see if he is able to do for “Dalit cinema” what, say, Bharathiraja did for “village cinema” — i.e. bring these issues to the forefront not just with the facebooking and tweeting urban audiences, but in the interiors, where these conversations REALLY need to happen. Or if he’s going to be content telling “generic” stories whose “ulkuthu” (thank you for the word, Neena) is going to be evident only to a few.
About your second point: The people who defend Kabali say the movie has its motives hidden deep and one needs a second viewing to notice them. For them, the performances and the message were enough… Now if we take Iraivi, it had many sub-texts that need to be understood to get the director’s vision… So why isn’t Iraivi not getting the mass acceptance?
Most people — and I don’t mean this as a snobbish diss, though it probably sounds like one 🙂 — do not know much about the formal aspects of cinema. You can make this out by the loose way they talk about screenplay or editing or cinematography. For them, cinema = content, which is perhaps inevitable given that (some generalisation ahead) Tamil cinema till the 70s was very talky and it wasn’t till the arrival of Balu Mahendra/Mahendran that we saw some level of formal commitment to cinema. And even afterwards, the number of people who use cinema as cinema are a handful. We still rely heavily on story (as opposed to screenplay), dialogues and messages, and this is what has come to define “good cinema.”
As to why people did not accept Iraivi, my guess is that it was too alien a product. It did get a fair share of acceptance from the social-media crowd, but there was nothing in it for the masses. In comparison, Kabali has a huge star, action sequences… Also, IMO, Karthik Subbaraj is a cool stylist whose films lack the “warmth” Tamil audiences need. I’m not saying this is a bad thing. We need all kinds of styles. But his films may find it easier to attract audiences if they had something like say, the relationship between Kaali and Anbu in “Madras.”
That said, Iraivi contains one of my favourite stagings of the year. The shot near the end, at the railway station, where Arul’s hand drops to pull out the gun tucked into the back of his jeans — where we just see the disembodied torsos of all three characters — and then the camera rises as Arul’s hand rises and pulls up his shirt, exposing the gun, and he pulls out the gun and now we also see Michael’s eye line drop to the gun — and you expect the shot then — but no 🙂 — Arul’s hand falls and the gun goes out of sight (so we think, maybe he’s hesitating?) — Michael is now at the centre of the composition, the focus of the camera — you see him scan Arul’s face for a hope of forgiveness — but the fact that there’s none is shown to us NOT by a cut to Arul’s face but by Michael dropping the biscuits in his hand — and we cut to Ponni — because from Michael’s expression, we know what Arul is going to do and there’s no need to show the actual shooting — we need only the fact that Ponni hears the gunshot —
idhu… idhu… 🙂
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lol
July 28, 2016
”Rajni on the other hand is no method actor because he does not need to be. There is something incredibly intuitive and organic in his ability to sink his teeth into a role and bring it to life”
.. what anuja madam, kb films n earlier films i found kamal as natural.. rajini doing gimmicks and disrupting the experience with his usual limited acting tircks.. no surprise t me kamal was always considered better actor n won awards be it filmfare of malayalam, telugu n tamil or national awards over rajini, a limited actor
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lol
July 28, 2016
kamal has an even better version of rajini in him… be it indian .. n can do style / angry young man better in films like sathya than rajini who resorts to gimmicks n limited tricks
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Nerupuda
July 28, 2016
I understand there is no need to pat the back of Ranjith’s badly made movie. As a a function of an art this movie already making many people to think about the stereotypes and the need to break it. A discussion like the one happened for 180 degree is needed here. Nerupuda song had a different interpretation before the movie and after the movie. Fans stands divided on these lines
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Ragenikanth
July 28, 2016
A actor cannot sustain on top for 40yrs without know how to act, accept his success n move on the more it is said he keeps going heights
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lol
July 28, 2016
by the way kid seems like a big bachchan fan… nervous about rajini getting some acting appreciation.. really liked rajini in kabali….style as well as some scenes where he showed earlier form.. last 20 years of same old stuff also enhanced my experience wit hthis film
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Nerupuda
July 28, 2016
..just to add further we live in the age of mob lynching as well as trupm racisim. High caste people in one context become colored and dalit in another culture and geography. In this context Nerupuda song lyrics pour out the emotions just as the “straight out of campdon” does… it applies to every oppressed person. In this context Kabali has a lager appeal and only got wider acceptance due to Rajini factor.
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Ramanan Varadarajan
July 28, 2016
@Anuja : I think your comparison between KH and RK spot on gels with mine. Infact, I would go on to say, that if they pit against each other in a frame (which is done quite often among northy cinemas stalwarts) am sure RK will win handily. Besides being a natural actor, he defines well his limits and can perform well within his skin. KH on the other hand is sort of an explorer and can come confused, striing underpar at times. If you remember the Thevar Magan’s frames with SG? While it is quite difficult to upstage SG, I felt that KH did’nt hold onto his own at many frames together with the thespian. Part of the reason, maybe .. he was playing a hesitant, obedient Son…. maybe.It is fair to say RK would never pick up the roles/variety that KH took on.. but we are not talking about versatility, which is a bit overloaded term.
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nanda
July 28, 2016
Kamal could do Sigappu rojakkal, Moondram pirai, 16 vyaadhinile, varumayin niram sigappu, raaja parvai, salangai oli but can also do kalyana raman, uyrndha ullam, vazhve maayam, punnagai mannan… he has huge display of range and scale..in fact aval appadithaan 16 vayadhinile and kb fillms..perfectly captures how over the top rajini can be on the frame..this is why rajini himself confessed but diehards refuse to do so..
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Aditya (Gradwolf)
July 28, 2016
“And if vast masses don’t see the importance of what Ranjith is doing, then isn’t he having a conversation with just an inner circle?”
BR: One, I think the inner circle is bigger than what we think it is. It’s not really just the social media savvy or the urban crowd. Two and the more important point, that is probably why for all its flaws, Kabali, a Rajini film is a watershed moment no? Which is why I am interested in not just the filmmaking part of a filmmaker like Ranjith (the pros and cons of it) but also the academic analysis of his films. And to use your own term here, now that he’s got Rajini as a mouthpiece once, it will be interesting to see where he goes from here.
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naveenkrwpress
July 28, 2016
this thread indeed inspires me to watch the movie. Movie seems to have glimpses of Rajini not seen in many years and probably will never be seen in next many years. i dont think R can get into a character as much as K can. you need to build a character based on his personality not the other way , for any movie with R to click
he can definitely follow Big B’s choices which have mostly turned out to be good after he stopped being a badshah, shahenshah etc
found Madras too violent, Attakathi was more enjoyable. learning of the D angle in madras from this thread only, seems more academic
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Honest Raj (formerly 'V'enkatesh)
July 28, 2016
Quite an insightful article:
http://www.outlookindia.com/magazine/story/politics-tamil-cinema-eshtyle/227523
The author talks quite a bit about Mani Ratnam. 🙂
On a related note, aren’t the characters of Sangeetha, Surya, and Vikram in Pithamagan likely to be dalits?
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Prasanna
July 28, 2016
I read all the negative reviews before I finally watched it. Yeah It was not a great movie, it wasn’t a bad one either. Because for me bad patches of Rajini are ‘Pandian, Kuselan, Lingaa, Athisiya Piravi, Dharma durai, baba, muthu, Arunachalam and that sort’.
There were some soggy happenings every 15 mins or so, like that real life salute, that whole one to many discussions inside a hall, what is the benefit of those to the movie momentum. Fish curry comment at his friends place
At times nothing was happening in the movie (after Pet shop acton scene) and then suddenly too much was happening (Flash back Rajini episode). I liked the hunt for Wife episode, There are complaints it was stretched, It worked for me cos If it happened too soon, It might have been filmy.
My other complaint, why did he shave the beard, he was much more composed with it than without it during the climax. The tempo of action and violence in the first 15 mins was great, if the same speed was maintained through out and in the climax it would have been good for the movie, instead we get a Killu Billu type of action.
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MANK
July 28, 2016
People, let me make this clear, no one is a bigger Rajni fan than me. i simply adore the star\actor on screen and when i said, ‘external manifestations of a character’, i didnt mean it pejoratively and neither did Brangan. that’s why he compared him to Toshiro Mifune and not Jim Carrey. if you fail to understand what he meant, do watch Mifune in 2 of my favorite Kurosawa classics -Yojimbo and Red Beard, the actor is an effing genius, not even Brando could do what he does. That’s exactly what we wanted to say. That Kamal and Rajni’s skill sets are very different, not that Rajni is unskilled or bad actor. just they have different approach to portraying the characters. in the case of Rajni, he puts his personality and mannerisms in front and center of the character he is playing, because thats where his skills lie, while kamal does exactly the opposite. first approach is more effective in the case of some roles while the latter works better for others.
there are things that Rajni could do better than Kamal and things that Kamal could do better than Rajni. the much discussed MMKR itself is a perfect eg. just take the climax, where all the 4 different Kamals look exactly the same (save for the costumes). but still we get a perfect inkling of who is michael , madan, etc…, simply from their behaviour. that’s the genius of Kamal. Its not that Rajni cannot pull off a role like MMKR , but he cannot do it in the same vein as Kamal Just as Kamal can never pull off a Baasha, Padayappa,Netrikann or moondru mugham as well as Rajni
And Kid is not being disparaging when he was comparing Bachcchan and Rajni. you just have to watch Dewaar and Trishul along with their Rajni remakes Thee and Mr. Bharath. Just look at the famous ‘Confrontation with god ‘ scene in dewaar and the corresponding scene in thee, while Bachchan internalizes the character to such an extend that you feel the emotions right out of our body, rajni’s performance is just on the surface and rather like a bad joke on the original scene – well actually, the film thee itself is like a bad joke on the original. same goes for Trishul, Take the intensity that Bachcahn brings to his character and the hatred he has for the sanjeev kumar. compare it with ones between Rajni and Satyaraj, its more fun and games. the same goes wrt Nayagan, Tevar Magan, Virumandi etc, the characters required internalization and more dramatic skills as a performer. And no KH was not being overpowered by SG, he was just being truthful to his character. he was playing an educated, sophisticated, introspective character as oppososed SG’s raw, earthy , uneducated character. Its not that Rajni doesnt have it in him to play those characters. he could have played them, but not as well as Kamal.
But where Rajni aces Bachchan is in the remakes of namak halaal(velaikkaran), hum(Baasha), Khuddar(padikathavan). those kind of characters that requires more physicality, more extroverted performances. it is said that when Bachchan saw Baasha, he told suresh Krishna that he should have made Hum like Baasha, may be then Hum would have been as successful. but according me, even if they have made it like Baasha, there is no way that version would have been half as effective as the Rajni version. because the reason why that film works is because Rajni’s performance works which relies on instant transformations between the 2 personas and there no way any actor in the world could have sold the Baasha performance as Rajni did.
look what Kamal did (or had to do ) in Viswaroopam to register the transformations in his character, he has to go completely effete in one character to become masculine in another one. No need for Rajni to do anything like that. his personality and charisma itself is so overpowering the moment he cuts down on his energy, tone down his mannerisms, he completely becomes another character. no need for him to invent another one.
And no, there is no question about the versatility of an actor who can pull of characters as diverse as in Avargal, johnny, muruttukalai engeyo ketta kural, thalapathi or baasha .
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MANK
July 28, 2016
Kid, I dont think Devasuram is a better film than Thalapathi, whether its the screenplay or the making, thalapathi trumps devasuram. the one thing that devasuram has going for it is in the superb story and multi layered characterisation – of both the lead character played by mohanlal as well the other supporting characters-. of course the performances of the actors are uniformly brilliant – it was mohanlal, revathi, innocent, nedumudi and oduvil in their prime-. but i dont think Renjith created a good enough screenplay out of his original story concept, it could have been so much better looking at how much potentional the original story had.. it is more emotional and melodramatic than thalapathi for sure and it has some iconic moments of drama, but in totality , i would say it is not up to thalapathi. one thing though, i wish Rajni would have played a character like Lal’s Mangalassery neelakantan. he would be perfect for it.yes, Ravanaprabhu was ridiculous. it was totally unnecessarry. also, there is the case that mohanlal was hardly the actor he was from the time he made devasuram. Wonder, if you have seen Aaram Thampuran scripted by Renjith and directed by Shaji Kailas. that was a much better film than Ravanaprabhu and more of a spiritual sequel to devasuram. it didnt have the solid story and characterisation of devasuram, but it was a very well made film.
And Reg: I.V. Sasi even though he is one of the most technically competent directors ever to come out of the Malayalam film industry , i dont think Devasuram is one of his more technically accomplished works like 1921 or vartha.
But yes he would have been perfect to make a masala film out of the kabali scenario if he was in his prime. he had that uncanny knack to take contemporary political events and characters – with his regular screenwriter T.Damodaran- and create a mythical narrative with larger than life characters without losing the essence of the events or hot political issues that he potrayed like in Vartha, aavanazhi (Kadamai Kanniyam Kattupaadu), athirathram and so on.. unfortunately he is way past his prime and has not been active for more than a decade.
Again its not to say I.V.Sasi is a better director than Ranjith, just that he is a more solid masala filmmaker. as you rightly pointed out, Ranjith was trying to bring in masala tropes in to a non masala film while he himself was no good at handling masala. very similair to what Anurag Kashyap tried to do with Bombay velvet and failed. yes neither Ranjith nor AS can ever be true blue masala filmmakers as does Kartik Subbaraj. their cinematic DNA is very different. they make films about masala films but cannot make one themselves
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MANK
July 28, 2016
Athu 180 degree. Neenga mathematics la weakaa?*
Rahini, amma mannichidungo, well we all have our weaknesses, yours is misogyny , mine it seems is Maths 🙂
Anyway what i was saying there was Deva was back to his original position on his friendship with deva , thats 360 degrees right?, 180 degrees is his position from where he was suspecting him, why put maths over emotion .
btw this will interest you
http://www.englishpractice.com/common-mistakes/8-phrases-incorrectly/
Punee , thanks, well who would have thought seeing us fighting like cats and dogs in the Bajirao mastani thread that one day you would be fangirling over me like this. ha! our relationship seems to have taken a 360 degree turn oops make that 180 (Ms. David is watching) 🙂
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Rahini David
July 28, 2016
MANK: I’ve got 99 weaknesses but misogyny ain’t one. 😊
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Honest Raj (formerly 'V'enkatesh)
July 28, 2016
MANK: Is Devasuram the Malayalam equivalent of Thevar Magan?
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blurb
July 28, 2016
**Aditya (Gradwolf) **: Thanks for illuminating why Tamizh movies don’t do well at the pan level – I’ve always wondered about that.
Also, are film crit err…. movie analyzers usually touchy about their seats – it seems to be either the Aisle seat at the Multiplex, or Dispatches being made from the Wall Corner 🙂
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lol
July 28, 2016
i wont call baasha a performance… lol
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blurb
July 28, 2016
brangan: Your description of that Iraivi scene is truly revelatory. Thanks.
Who decides that though? Would it be the director who details out where the cameras need to be placed, and also sit in through the editing explaining this is how he wants it?
I frankly don’t understand what the different occupations in the cine field entail. I often wonder about it. I am one of those people who sits in the cinema hall until the last line of credits finish rolling. And I also less than thrilled when the movie plays in the background during opening credits.
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Madan
July 28, 2016
Great comment, MANK. In natural charisma, Rajini is near the top of any actor I have watched. I mean, otherwise there is no explanation for how he could pull off say the Padayappa stunts/style when he was nearly 50. Even if I don’t really care for that sort of cinema anymore, I don’t think I could fault the way Rajini carried it in that film even now. It’s not brawn oriented physicality like Arnold; more to do with how he carries off a certain attitude, energy, etc.
But, but, but, that is basically his trump card and in other aspects he isn’t particularly great, if that. He generally looks competent but that is also because he carefully plays to his strengths. Kamal tries a lot many more things and while some don’t come off well, plenty does and that way he has a much bigger range than Rajini or for that matter many other stars. I don’t think AB could match Kamal’s range, for instance (which is not to say I necessarily regard Kamal as better than AB). AB is just good in comedy; he’s not brilliant. Of course, I do get irritated with Kamal’s “Look ma I am acting” tendencies. He reined it in beautifully in the way he essayed the villainous Appu in Aboorva Sagotharargal (which is definitely one of my favourite masala films) so I wish he could have done that more often. But I understand his nasal, sandpaper voice is a drawback and it’s a credit to his immense ability that he can generally make us overlook that and even get used to it. Wonder what kind of actor he may have been with a lovely baritone like AB or the Puris.
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brangan
July 28, 2016
blurb: It’s hard to say how these things are decided. But it’s clear they had a lot of coverage. They must have shot the same scene with different camera set-ups, and the editor must have picked the cuts that gave the best rhythms/actor reactions — though the hand reaching for gun shot must have been a very specifically planned setup.
There are tons of resources on the web if you are interested.
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sanjana
July 28, 2016
So many interesting facts about how caste plays an important part in every second film in kollywood. Bollywood films are more generic in comparison. We hear sometimes about takurs and khaps. I am talking about mainstream films.
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sanjana
July 28, 2016
And that maybe the reason rathnam turned to Bollywood.
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Prasad
July 29, 2016
Excellent comments from all. My only question is where do Rajni and Kamal go from there? What is the roadmap ahead for them? They both are in a stage…almost impossible for anybody to direct as the expectations are so high. Very few might attempt
to take risk. Rajni, on one hand has such a larger then life image… difficult for anybody to make a script for him. Kamal on other hand has made such odd choices of films (Including heroines and puppet directors) last year ..(UV and Thoongavanam)….considering his stature! His last masterpiece “Virumaandi” came 13 years back in which he was in supreme form. Can he make one now or in future?
What kids of scripts Kamal and Rajni should choose? Very puzzling. And this is not hollywood …. where you get roles like Unforgiven a Gran Torino or even a Birdman where you get you play your age and being different and unique.
Any thoughts?
Also saw some discussion on AB and Rajni. Exactly AB was in the same stage in 1990’s with megaflops like Mrithyudatta and Kohram and what not. He got his second life through KBC which everybody knows. IF KBC wasn’t there probably not sure how his career would have been shaped as he was in dire straits that time.
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P
July 29, 2016
MANK: I always fangirled over you 🙂 Even when I disagreed. Yes, Bajirao Mastani made me lose my head, but even then I never hated you 🙂 I was just furious with you! 🙂
And yes, 360 degree turn works well for this editor 😉 Most English turn-of-phrases are more metaphorically precise than mathematically so anyway!
I was thinking about all this Rajni vs. Kamal and Rajni vs. Amitabh and Rajni vs. whoever and I realized that there is something of the Clint Eastwood about Rajni. He does a certain kind of film- he generally plays and replays a certain kind of character, and the audiences love him for it, while the snooty intellectuals look down on him or watch him vicariously like he’s a joke. Sure he’s no Al Pacino or De Niro but there’s a certain style to his soul, to his acting that is unrepeatable.
Also Clint Eastwood said, and I quote:
“Dustin Hoffman and Al Pacino play losers very well. But my audience like to be in there vicariously with a winner. That isn’t always popular with critics. My characters have sensitivity and vulnerabilities, but they’re still winners. I don’t pretend to understand losers. When I read a script about a loser I think of people in life who are losers and they seem to want it that way. It’s a compulsive philosophy with them. Winners tell themselves, I’m as bright as the next person. I can do it. Nothing can stop me.”
(I think it applies to Rajni too- though he’s too self-deprecating to ever say it out loud :p )
I just hope that Rajni takes up roles like Unforgiven, Gran Torino, Outlaw Josey Wales ….or wonder if that is too much to ask…
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bumblebee
July 29, 2016
But in Kabali, when we hear the words “untouchable, a.k.a. Kabali” – sung in a seductive hip-hop style in the song Veera Thurandhara – they could simply mean that no one can touch… the man’s gangsta coolth. Maybe a mega-budget star vehicle cannot really accommodate a filmmaker’s personal politics. Maybe we have to wait for Ranjith to make a small movie without a Karthi or a Rajinikanth to see him tackle these issues in an overt manner. (Only the smaller films like Gouravam seem to talk about caste openly.)
I don’t get this emphasis on overtly talking about these issues. How much really can the case be overstated here ? I thought Ranjith was as explicit as can be allowed in a mainstream superstar film. If we are using songs as an example, there were multiple references to the context of the film like ‘para isai adithu nee paatu kattu’, ‘mettu kudiyin koopadu ini naatukulle kekadhu’. I mean the entire ‘Ulagam oruvanukka’ song was on the theme of ‘Kabali’ being a champion, liberator or beacon of hope(if you will) for the oppressed and also subtly re-iterating the earlier bird lines – ‘paravai parakka marakathey’. From what I can see a lot of careful thought has been put into the songs with a lot of awareness of the film’s intent and context.
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bumblebee
July 29, 2016
To me Kabali and Thalapathi are dramatically different movies. Judging one using the other as reference may result in a reductive reading as the premise, intent, & context are quite different. A film like Thalapathi that I watched as a child(completely missing the whole Mahabarata connection, but hey it still worked for me) is I feel at its core an emotional movie, making it easier to watch from a generic audience standpoint. Whereas this move is at its core a political movie. It is a movie of self assertion. I’m not sure if it can be understood divested of its politics. The subtext is the subtext in Thalapathi where as here it is pretty much the text. In the multiple references to oppression, in its call for self assertion it cements the director’s intent. They way I read Thalapathi is there is a ‘Deva’ to liberate ‘Surya’ and lend a helping hand; Kabali drives home the point that forget about the ‘Devas’ of this world, stand up and liberate yourself. It is a much more powerful film, I feel, for doing this.
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Madan
July 29, 2016
“I just hope that Rajni takes up roles like Unforgiven, Gran Torino, Outlaw Josey Wales ….or wonder if that is too much to ask…”- lol, this is more or less what I was about to say the moment I read your comparison of Rajini with Clint Eastwood. Also, Eastwood sees himself as a filmmaker-actor rather than superstar and doesn’t mind playing foil to Hilary Swank (who is the ‘real’ winner in Million Dollar Baby). It’s been way too long since Rajini tried playing foil, so if he does subscribe to a “celebration of winners” ethos, it is one where only he and his well wishers are the winners, not him helping somebody else in their pursuit of victory.
I do find that losers quip re Pacino and Hoffman pretty uppity of Eastwood to say. Like how the loser in …And Justice for All didn’t have any point to make, for instance? Or Lowell Bergman in Insider? Hoffman’s role in Marathon Man…I could go on. Um, maybe Pacino/Hoffman have a greater appetite for complex characters than Eastwood and with all due respect to Eastwood, I would like to see them essayed too and it’s really too bad if he doesn’t.
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Ramanan Varadarajan
July 29, 2016
bid adieu to the overchattered blog, will miss it, had fun, btw, when you hang around in brangan’s blogsphere, you get to know a bit more of cinema, its shades, dirty secrets, and the worldwide parallels. that’s job well done.
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P
July 29, 2016
Madan: Its interesting that you found what CE said to be uppitty, because I found it to be a truism. People are not used to superstars/big stars being anything but magnanimous I guess..
Maybe Rajni can’t/won’t play a Million Dollar Baby but he certainly can make an Unforgiven. That would be the climax of his career. If someone with the right mind gave him something like that. Or better, an Outlaw Josey Wales. ❤
My “wonder if that’s too much to ask” is directed more at Indian film-makers than at Rajini, because even a Pa Ranjith to whom Rajni has obviously submitted couldn’t make cinema befitting the man. I’m starting to wonder if all these new age film-makers are highly over-rated and if Rajni would do much better for himself if he went back to say a Rathnam for instance.
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MANK
July 29, 2016
Honest Raj, no not exactly . devasuram is set in a rural feudal background , otherwise there is not much similarity between the film with Tevar makan.
the film is about Mohanlal as an arrogant, violent(sometimes racist, chauvinistic) feudal lord , his fall from grace and ultimate redemption .
The character arc of mohanlal is rather similar to M.R.Radha’s in Raktakaneer. a bad guy becoming good after he is physically incapacitated. here instead of leprosy, he is handicapped after a fight with family enemies. He is nursed back to health and reason by Revathi – a danseuse whom he had insulted and humiliated once.
its also a riff on the the siva parvathi or siva sakthi myth with mohnalal being convieneintly named Neelakandan. the larger than life character was a huge change for mohanlal who up until that time had mostly played true to life down to earth characters
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Ravi K
July 29, 2016
I think Rajini is more than capable of doing such roles, but is he WILLING? Are there any filmmakers willing and able to do it? And will audiences accept it? I think if the marketing of this hypothetical film makes it clear that this isn’t the same old Rajini film (and doesn’t try to make it look like one), it COULD work.
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Madan
July 29, 2016
“People are not used to superstars/big stars being anything but magnanimous I guess.” – It’s not about being magnanimous. He’s just fabricating a stereotype to make an argument about why he makes the kind of films he does. I am fine with Eastwood saying he doesn’t want to make films about losers. But I just cited two of Pacino’s iconic roles where he was NOT playing a loser. For that matter, Michael Corleone in the first Godfather movie is not a loser either, he does a fine job of taking over the reins. So it’s just a lazy stereotype that Pacino loves playing losers and I was surprised that a filmmaker of Eastwood’s stature would help himself to THAT.
“I’m starting to wonder if all these new age film-makers are highly over-rated and if Rajni would do much better for himself if he went back to say a Rathnam for instance.” – Maybe it’s too late for that. One of the reasons why I have been reluctant to go watch Kabali is just from the trailer I could make out that Rajini’s voice has given way. It is not what it used to be (and it was in fine fettle even on Endhiran). So that is going to hamper him going ahead too. This is also why AB has become very hit-or-miss in recent years because his instrument sounds weak at times. The voice is an underrated aspect of acting imo; people talk much more about the eyes, hands, body language etc but the voice is the most potent instrument to convey expression (which is why a singer doesn’t need anything more). I think Rajini has had a long reign at the top and therefore also lots of opportunities to extend himself as an actor. If he didn’t do that, it can’t be blamed only on the filmmakers. Even in his pre-release interview, Pa Ranjith dropped plenty of hints that Rajini was a reluctant passenger on board this experiment and that it may have been done more at his daughter’s instigation. Understandably so; this has become unchartered territory for him and he is caught between wanting/needing to delivering a hit and also responding to the criticism that the films he stars in are increasingly pedestrian (however unjustified or not the criticism may be in relation to the general quality of mass films in TN). Lastly, Mani himself seems to be in a very different orbit now and may not be interested in a Dhalapathi redux.
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MANK
July 29, 2016
Madan, Punee, well Kabali could have been Rajni’s unforgiven. it is a in very similar vein. just like unforgiven was a revisionist take on Clint’s cowboy persona from his spaghetti westerns, Kabali too could have been, to the series of the famous Rajni gangster films like Billa, Ranga, Baasha.
But Rajni’s problem is a little different. he is still the god of the masses and there has hardly been any dent in his popularity. Clint could turn around his image , bcoz by the 90’s he had lost much of his stardom and the audience was willing to accept him as vulnerable and sensitive.. also he was a filmmaker and could create good films for himself – something that Kamal has been doing for a long time. But Rajni has to depend on others and god knows he(or his advisers) is not a good judge of material. even if he was , there is no guarantee the the filmmakers he choses are going to execute the material to its full potential.
As for Clint’s uppity statement, i think he made it at the height of his action hero prime in the 70’s. its natural he must have been very dejected and bitter about being dismissed as a B movie actor and director by the critics, while the likes of Pacino & Hoffman got all the laurels during the time. later he did play losers in Bridges of madison county, True crime and million dollar baby
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P
July 30, 2016
Madan: When CE speaks of playing a loser he doesn’t mean in a literal win-lose statement of course. He means it in the style of a character. As MANK pointed out CE has played someone who “lost” in Bridges of Madison County and even Outlaw Josey Wales or few other movies, but that is not what he, or I for that matter am referring to here.
Rajni “lost” his girlfriend, his mother, his best friend, even gives up his “power” in Dalapathy, but did he play a “loser”? I don’t think so 🙂
MANK: While I agree with your points, I don’t think CE is/was bitter. He probably was tired of answering the stupid questions of journalists which mostly center around “So when are you playing something “different”?”
As for Rajni, yes his script sense is really bad. Wish he had better. I feel the same for SRK 😦 All that talent, wasted 😦
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P
July 30, 2016
MANK: You are wrong about the time frame. He made that statement in his book Clint: The Life and Legend (1999) when asked about his role in “Beguiled” 🙂
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Ravi K
July 30, 2016
I would liken Rajini to John Wayne, more than Clint Eastwood. Wayne was a star who was much more wed to his all-American hero image.
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Madan
July 30, 2016
@ MANK: Ah, that context makes it more understandable. In any case, reading up the book from where the quote is source “Clint The Life and Legend” it appears that the author intended to bring up his petty side for public consumption so perhaps the author agrees with me that it was not one of Clint’s shining moments.
I think you summed up Rajini’s problem very well. One other thing he could have done was to cut his fees and act in films with ensemble casts where he wouldn’t stand out and thus allowing actor Rajini to flourish. But as you said, he doesn’t seem to have much sense of his own of what will or won’t work. And ultimately that is an important part of what makes or breaks acting careers. If Michelle Pfeiffer had accepted even one of the many iconic roles she turned down, perhaps her career would have taken a different trajectory. Perhaps…or perhaps she would have screwed them up. Nobody knows, but that sense of role selection is also important; raw talent is not enough. Rajini is like Rajesh Khanna with amazing longevity and greater self awareness. Maybe if he too had been rich like Rajesh Khanna and not hailed from a humble background, he would have let the publicity get to his head too. But because he truly is one of the masses, he has been able to appeal to them for a really long time; those words don’t do justice to his longevity.
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Madan
July 30, 2016
If I may allow myself a self-plug…
I have written a novella on a subject that is kind of the polar opposite of Rajini, lol. It is about the challenges faced by a talented artist who does not receive recognition/success commensurate to her talent. What does such an artist get by on? These are some questions I have attempted to ask and answer in the novella through, of course, a fictional account of a ghazal singer. If the story interests you, you can find the link to read it here below:
The link is a dropbox link, so if you are not comfortable using dropbox, drop in an email to madanmohan85@gmail.com and I will get back to you with a PDF attachment. Hope you enjoy reading.
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Varun..
July 30, 2016
Kabali just beat Bajirao Mastani(320) as the most commented and discussed BR’s move review ever and that too in a week.. Kabali da… Just a lighter note on a very serious thread…
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sanjana
July 30, 2016
http://www.newindianexpress.com/opinion/Kabali-lays-bare-Malaysias-apartheid/2016/07/28/article3550129.ece
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ramu
July 30, 2016
Actually I can’t believe Ranjith did such a weak script after making Madras. Remember the issue that arose around Madras that it was stolen from another aspiring director ?? I guess it was titled karupar nagaram ? Hmmm…
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MANK
July 30, 2016
Punee, I am surprised that Clint said about beguiled . It’s one of the most un Clint like film-he was an immoral, promiscous, manipulator of women in the film – it was a character that would have suited Pacino or Nicholson more
And I agree with Ravi K, that Rajni is more John Wayne than Clint Eastwood. Though both are Republicans, Clint is a soft conservative and never plug his politics through his films. John Wayne was always the Republican conservative hawk shamelessly plugging away his politics in film after film.
Madan, Rajni did try to do ensembles. Both chandramukhi and kuselan was an attempt towards that. Their Malayalam originals were ensemble pieces. But look what happened, the moment Rajni signed on, the director, producers and distributors got greedy, the movies got completely overhauled.they were all made. sold and promoted like every other Rajni film. As long as Rajni does not take the initiative to rein in this system or the system itself complements Rajni s intentions, a low budget effort with Rajni playing in an ensemble is not going to happen
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Madan
July 30, 2016
MANK: Good point. And yes, he will have to take the initiative in rein in producers and insist that he wants to make a low key ensemble film, not a blockbuster. I am not sure he wants to. I mean, even Kamal can’t resist the opportunity to hog the limelight. Remember what GVM had said about Vettaiyadu Velaiyaadu…
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Raghul
July 31, 2016
Sorry guys,
BR has to toil through 320 chats in thread and two parts of on-line chats, in order to own his review on Kabali. Pathetic. Yes if it is said and accepted that Rajini is losing to gauge the pulse of his fans, then I would say after this tumultuous success of kabali (which will surpass Sultan and Baahubali), BR should accept he loses the pulse of the audience for whom he is writing his reviews and not to satisfy his intelligentia.. Yes it is not long back, because of his nice review of “Uthama Villain”, the pain I had in the theatre.
Though I disagree with many of his views, Just one response to his comment on the climax. The way the Tiger character was made from the initial scene, the Malaysian people approaching him to take further lead to safeguard their legitimate political rights, with the cognisance of the supportive Tamil police officer when the plot was sketched… all these scenes are not generic in nature and had definite relevance to the climax which was 100% correct and the confidence Rajini had to keep that climax and the way the movie was accepted enormously – shows Rajini and Rajini fans have grown up mentally!.
Just recall the climax of American sniper – there came the end abruptly but again it was apt for that character played by Bradley Cooper.
To err is human, but to admit and correct is divine..
Prejudices crept in to the ‘neutral-to-play’ humans, it is a doom…
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Rahul
July 31, 2016
Mank\ Punee, This probably does not have much to do with your discussion, but I disagree that Clint was not the best fit for The Beguiled . He is just awesome in it, and the minimalistic way he has played his character, a good looking asshole with no redemptive qualities , enhances the overtly allusive, dripping with subtext feel of the movie. A scenery chewing actorly actor like De niro or pacino may not have fit well in this fabulistic landscape.
By the way, Sofia Coppola is remaking the beguiled. I can understand why lovers of the original may be wary , but at least Elle Fanning is in it.
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babbuly
July 31, 2016
I am surprised that there are so many negative reviews for this movie. I liked the different avatar of Rajini and I thoroughly enjoyed his acting. I thought he looked he really good with this new salt and pepper look.
Contrary to what people are saying, I did not get bored watching this movie I think people who did not like this movie, who are either hardcore Basha, Padayappa Rajini fans or the not-so-hardcore fans from other parts of India, who just went and saw this movie because of the hype it created and ended up being disappointed.
I saw this movie after reading BR’s review and other negative reviews and went with an open mind without any expectations and enjoyed the movie.
Having said that, based on the mixed reviews(mostly negative) for Kabali, I am not sure how enthiran 2.0 will work. Shankar must be confused now. He will probably want to change the script or re-shoot most of the movie based on the response for Kabali. If people think Rajini looked really old even in his old age look in Kabali,people might not accept his young Rajini romancing Amy Jackson. Shankar should probably change Rajini’s role to a 50s or 60s guy in Enthiran 2.0 and change the romance between Rajini and Amy to maybe a matured romance track.
I wish Rajini does hardcore action film like Liam Neeson’s Taken movie. Currently, the only director in south who can make a big budget movie with Rajini is Rajamouli. I don’t see any other director rising up to the occasion to make a Rajini movie.
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MANK
July 31, 2016
Madan, yeah i know. he was concerned that he was not present for about 20 mins in the second half. that was quite shocking for me. i never thought kamal was somebody who was petty about the amount of footage he had . he always seem to be driven to deliver a good product in totality .
Rahul, i was talking from the casting POV, that clint was not the first person whom you would approach for a role like that. he was the embodiment of the virile macho cool and here he was as a handicapped( rather impotent) no good character. i have no complaint about his performance which was superb and suited the film tot a T.And yeah i am not at all looking forward to the sequel, i thought the original was perfect enough, wonder why its being remade , and with Colin Farrel , oh no way
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maha
July 31, 2016
I dont believe Gatam menon… kamal does not appear for first 30 minutes and in 2nd half 20 minutes in Manmadhan ambu…which is his script…
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Kannu kutti
July 31, 2016
BR, do watch pelli choopulu a telugu indie film that was released this Friday. Have heard so many good things about it.
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Kid
August 1, 2016
Harish S: Thank you Sir. And those comments of mine were all over the place so I do see why it would be to difficult to completely follow what I wrote there. On Suseenthiran and Jeeva (though I preferred this to Kabali) I completely agree with your assessment, but I didn’t mean to say the Suseenthiran should attempt a caste-based subject or anything but that I would like to see him do a film Rajini provided he has a solid script in hand because Suseenthiran is a masala director (of course he is a very good director even otherwise…VKK, Azhagarsamiyin, Pandiya naadu, AKS, Jeeva- this is some range).
lol: I hope you realise that I have had nothing but great things to say about Rajini even if my understanding of “him” might be different from yours. Also, a Bachchan fan is never jealous or insecure 🙂 !
Punee: I never said that Devasuram is better than Deewar (it’s not a patch on Deewar)… the film I had mentioned was Laawaris. And it’s not “my” Devasuram; I don’t follow any other language except Hindi and English so I have to completely depend on subtitles for viewing films in other languages. As someone who was born in a small town in UP in the 90’s, cinema meant only “Hindi films” to me for the longest time (Amitabh Bachchan was, and still remains, my biggest reason for having an interest in cinema). The encounter with regional films and world cinema (though I had seen a few Hollywood films) happened very late (in Std. VIII). But since then I have always tried to watch as much regional films as possible.
Also Thalapthi is a very atypical Rajini film, it is hardly the definitive Rajini film and it is not a representative of his persona (this was pretty much the reason why the film didn’t do as well as expected on the box-office). The “performance art-action comedy” bit is what you almost always get when you watch Rajini’s Superstar-phase films (and actually even before this…I think this his dominant persona once we get past Polladhavan in his filmography). One of Rajini’s great strengths as a star in the his overblown masala films since Annamalai is that he always seems to be “in on the joke” (this can’t be said about many other South Indian actors who operate in the same genre and have modelled their persona on similar lines) and that’s precisely the reasons why inspite of being an actor who is so much about “mannerisms”, his performances appear to be the least “mannered” when compared with similar actors (Chiranjeevi, Balakrishna et al).
“Like Karna, Surya has an ambition for power, (Manirathnam removed the vanity aspect of Karna for obvious reasons)”-
This is a terrific observation Punee. As you mention, Rathnam does not cast a halo around Surya … in other words he isn’t interested in showing the Karna which people want to see. This is precisely what Rathnam does in Raavan(an) as well…he doesn’t go for an easy “subversion” of the epic where Raavan is supposed to be all good and Raam a bastard of a sorts. Again Rathnam doesn’t subvert/invert the notion of good/bad wrt the epic, but that he deals with that notion in a certain “abstract” sense (he operates in the same mode in Dil se)….in the sense that who is good or who is bad in Raavan(an) doesn’t really matter after a point, but what matters is that we get to see Ramayana through Ravana’s eyes and the one which takes place in Ashok Van. I think a lot of people wanted that easy “reversal” of roles in Raavan and when they didn’t get that, they were miffed.
MANK: Reading your commentary on Thalapathi throughout this thread has been an absolute pleasure (and an education of sorts). Thank you. Also didn’t know that IV Sasi was one of the most technically accomplished Malayalam directors… wow, that’s something. On the rest of your comments, I would have to respond in detail.
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MANK
August 1, 2016
*One of Rajini’s great strengths as a star in the his overblown masala films since Annamalai is that he always seems to be “in on the joke” (this can’t be said about many other South Indian actors who operate in the same genre and have modelled their persona on similar lines) *
Kid, that’s absolutely right , and its not just chiranjeevi or Balayya the great, but even other Rajni contemporaries like Vijayakanth or Sarathkumar. look how they take their silly ridiculous images so seriously,they even launched political parties purely based on that.I am glad that Rajni had the good sense to stay away from politics or rather party politics.he knows that, what he does on screen has no relation to reality and he, the person is very different from the larger than life image that he is propagating through the screen. and i suppose its his spiritual streak that is responsible for that. no matter how ridiculous one find his films, i believe Rajni is a very reasonable intelligent person. he is just giving the audience what they want .he is no way delusional as rest of the bunch. i believe thats what has kept him consistently, successful and humble all these years.
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P
August 1, 2016
kid: I am happy to know you liked my observation about Surya 🙂 But my understanding of the obvious reason is that it just wouldn’t do to show Rajini as a vain person.
I observe things about Dalapathy because I just love that world. And I love those people. I wish I could live in that world 🙂
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blurb
August 2, 2016
Watched it another time. Most of it still didn’t work.
The couple meet after 25 years, and she just got to know her baby is alive; and how could she not.. – tsk, never mind 😦
So depressed 😦
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Akhilan
August 3, 2016
Just managed to catch the movie and found it extremely exhausting…
Totally agree with blurb. Kabali and Kumudavalli meet after being apart 25 years; she discovers that she has a daughter, and yet, I felt nothing for the characters in that scene… (a microcosm for the entire movie perhaps) It just came and went without providing any poignancy or emotional heft whatsoever…
Also, I found it rather off-putting to see the majority of the ‘gangsters’ wearing frankly IMO ridiculous tattoos and heavy jewelry… I mean why…?? In what ways does it add to their character…?? Kinda reminded me of your review of Brothers BR where you talk about Jackie Shroff’s character shown to have crucifix tattoos all over him and yet it failing to tell us anything about what religion actually means to him… It’s all just so superfluous and clichéd…
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brangan
August 3, 2016
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Ragenikanth
August 4, 2016
karu is a failed filmmaker he needs visibility n he chose the right platform attack a rajini movie n you are there , made BR to take notice of him which itself is a acheivement
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Billa
August 4, 2016
சில வருடங்களாகவே உங்களின் விமர்சனங்களை படித்து வருகிறேன். அருமையா எழுதுறீங்க SIR.
காரு பழனியப்பன் சொல்லும் வார்த்தைகள் உண்மையாக இருந்தாலும் கூட, அட்டகத்தி’யை எப்படி ஒரு அரசியல் பேசும் படமாக எடுத்து கொள்ள முடியும்??அதில் ரஞ்சித் அரசியல் ரீதியாக எதையும் பேசியதாக தெரியவில்லை.
ஹீரோ மாட்டு கரி சாப்பிடுவதால் மட்டும் அரசியல் படம் ஆகிவிடுமா என்ன?
ஒரு இளைஞனுக்கும் அவன் விரும்புகின்ற பெண்களுக்கும் நடுவில் நடக்கும் சுவாரசியமான கதையே அட்டகத்தி. அதற்கு மேல் ஒன்றும் இல்லை.
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brangan
August 4, 2016
Ragenikanth: Maybe Karu Pazhaniappan failed commercially, but I think he’s one of the better filmmakers of his time. I’m especially fond of Pirivom Santhippom.
Also, I appreciated his taking up the “U certificate” point on public TV. I don’t think many others have had the guts to bring this up.
Billa: I too didn’t see anything political in Attakathi, and I’ve always been a bit confused by that ‘maatu kari’ scene. I’ve seen (and know of) many Tamilians — from many classes, castes — eat beef. So is the point the fact that Iswarya Rajesh says “I will cook this for you (at home)”? Meaning, others may eat it (at restaurants etc.) but only Dalits cook it at home? Is that the part that “identifies” these characters as Dalit?
But yes, even if this were so, it’s not really “poltical” (unless, of course, we say everything personal is inevitably political).
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Ragenikanth
August 4, 2016
BR , couple of good films and then they start preaching there are few others like karu , the only problem with this people they are not consistent is that they all seem to open up only with rajini movies & none opened when vedhalm & theri was given U Certicate which were more violent n as you know vedhlam was with Jazz clear political connection their as well.
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Honest Raj (formerly 'V'enkatesh)
August 4, 2016
Even Kadal was certified with a “U”, no?
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blurb
August 4, 2016
What was the reference about Endhiran to SunPictures is-to Kabali to ?
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blurb
August 4, 2016
Sorry – my previous comment didn’t some stuff — not sure. Here’s the full one.
What was the reference about Endhiran sold to Sun Pictures, and Kabali sold to JaPictures?
And, did I hear it right? Is it JaPictures?
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Ragenikanth
August 4, 2016
blurb, Enthiran was produced by Sun Picture not sold to them, JAZZ recently ventured into distribution close to the ruling party in TN this is 2nd movie 1st was vedhalam
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pato
August 4, 2016
@blurb: In 2010 DMK was in power in Tamil Nadu and owner of Sun pictures is Dayanidhi Maran who is the grandnephew of then chief minister of Tamil Nadu M.Karunanidhi.
Distribution rights of kabali in Tamil Nadu was bought by Jazz cinemas whose owners are close to current chief minister of tamil nadu J.Jayalalitha.
Both the movies were released by distributors who are close with the ruling party.
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Ravi K
August 5, 2016
Enthiran was initially produced by Ayngaran/Eros, but then sold to Sun Pictures.
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Jay Manickam
August 8, 2016
KABALI, A Movie every man with certain IQ. , can understand after seeing the movie at least two times. I accept there are lots of cuts. still they try very best to convey the story. Thats why astounding success . Makkal theerpu Makesan theerpu. Bad reviews by foolish and jealousy choothias. venomous to the core.Those hooligans must leave this job and better start begging. thats fits for those swains.
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Raghu
August 9, 2016
@MANK : Loved your comments throughout, especially how you compared Rajini with Kamal, as also Bachan. It was one of the most brilliant analytical comparison pieces i ve ever seen.
However i don’t really agree with your comparison of Devasuram with Dalapathy (ofcourse i don’t mean to argue against your views/likes). I sure like dalapathy, but would easily prefer devasuram over dalapathy any given day. Dalapathy though for all its technical/cinematographical excellence, Devasuram i think is a far superior film. It’s sheer intensity, emotional depth are all simply way beyond thalapathy. It’s not just that devasuram contains some iconic scenes( as you’ve said), i think almost all its scenes are iconic.
It’s the first time i am ever hearing someone say it’s screenplay isn’t the best.
I think apart from the brilliant perfomances of Mohanlal and others, the biggest strength of the movie is it’s flat out brilliant screenplay.
Ranjith, in general has been a good scriptwriter when in form, and I V Sasi mostly a good director in his prime, but no individual work of theirs in their entire careers comes anywhere even remotely near what they have achieved in Devasuram. They both have outdid themselves in a huge way in this film.
Among Mani’s works too i would place dalapathy somewhere towards the middle (ofcourse below Nayagan, KM, Iruvar, MR and the likes).
Devasuram is a film that consistently comes up among the say top 10 Malayalam movies ever, in most critic’s as well as public’s list. I think it is to Malayalam cinema what Godfather is to Hollywood.
Below one of the most outstanding scenes from this masterpiece (that is watch up to 2:10 mins after which it cuts on to the next scene here) :
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=KWtzS_Wch1s
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MANK
August 9, 2016
Raghu, thanks for the compliments. appreciate that.
As for you preferring devasuram over dalapathi, well thats your personal preference, wont argue with that. But just to clarify a few ponts.
Reg: It’s the first time i am ever hearing someone say it’s screenplay isn’t the best.,
let me say i was making that observation wrt the original story of the film. it had such an original story and concept that the screenplay does not do full justice to that. which has been a major problem with Renjith all throughout his career. he is great at thinking up great concepts – as in Spirit, mayamayooram, pranchiyettan, nandanam etc, but their transformation into screenplays are always problematic. even if we side step his worst indulgences – extreme melodrama overtly preachy tone and pseudo intellectual dialogues – i always felt the screenplays never fully explore the potential of the stories that they are based on. Mercifully Devasuram was at the beginning of his career and he was just beginning to acquire his indulgences and on its own its a good screenplay, the characterisations are terrific.. if you say that Devasuram is his best screenplay, then i agree. if you say that it was the best screenplay possible from the story, then i would say its not. i believe someone like MT or Lohithadas could have written a far superior screenplay. you just take the climax of the film. that seems to be straight out of any average stunt picture – having revathi kidnapped and tied up and napoleon beating lal to pulp-. its completely at odds with the tone and quality of the rest of the film.
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Raghu
August 9, 2016
Mank, though i am totally disinterested in discussing the possible drawbacks of a nearly 25 year old well established and most loved classic in malayalam like devasuram, i’ll say this.
That i don’t think great movies need always have great/extra ordinary climaxes. Devasuram climax may not be too ingenious but nevertheless it’s brilliantly taken, the fight, the atmosphere, buildup and the final act. The whole movie was build up for this final showdown.
There may be certain films whose climax takes us by surprise or something very different. But it’s not a necessary thing. Be it Mahanadi or Virumandi, or be it Lohi’s His highness or Amaram (although i don’t consider lohi’s these 2 works to be particularly great), or MT’s Thazhvaram or Anubandham, the climaxes are nothing too special or unpredictable or anything, but they gel with the film well and the film’s are overall rated high. Ofcourse there are many great films that we can point out like this.
And reg indulgences i think every scriptwriter be it Lohi or MT has some of that. But you’re correct that Ranjith has bit too much of it. But that has been a problem for Ranjith only well past his devasuram days, so it has not been a problem at all in that film.
Anyway let’s move on despite some small differences on this or any movie.
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pato
August 9, 2016
Check this out. Frank interview by madan with ranjith about the movie. Ranjith openly admitted that for both madras and kabali he made compromises for commercial reasons. For madras he included catherine tersa (casting misfit) as the film was dubbed and released in telugu also.
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Raghu
August 10, 2016
And coming to think of it, just wanted to add one more thing (please excuse me for being continuously off topic). MT or Lohi are great writers but if they were the ones writing the screenplay for this story it certainly wouldn’t have ended up as Devasuram. Probably it might still end up being a great screenplay and a great movie (assuming lohi or MT to be at their very best in their prime days), but it wouldn’t have created this force of nature that is the Neelakantan of Devasuram, that malayalees know and love. It would have been something that’s gone completely tangential to this or an entirely different movie with a very different mood, specifics and ambience.
The raw energy and unpredictable-ness of Neelakandan and the mass hysteria that this film even after many years generated/generates is unparalleled in malayalam. I think the whole movie from the first shot up till the ultimate legendary finale of devasura-yuddham and the parting shot, was nothing short of absolute brilliance and is always considered as a flat out masterpiece.
Although this movie also unfortunately led to a spike of larger than life heroes ( although Neelakantan in devasuram himself was a very powerful yet well rooted man) in Lal’s later career, it also shows how influential this movie always has been.
Though both Lohi and MT have created unforgettable characters and films, a film like Devasuram is truly not their ilk, and it’s a once in a lifetime cinema not just for the makers but also the viewers.
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Raj
August 10, 2016
@ BR: The politics behind Attakathi is not in the beef eating scene…The whole movie shows how the youngsters from the Dalit society approach their love interest and their love life. There is a big perception in society where all eve teasing and any indecent approaches to women are attributed to Dalits. The recent speculations even before Swathi’s murderer was arrested too many theories in the caste angle was prevalent. This movie was an attempt to break those stigmas in society– Ranjith too in one of his interviews had mentioned that he wanted to show this angle to the society…. In that angle Attakathi was a much closer movie to the lives and practices of Dalit people… To understand Dalit politics we need to understand who are they, what is their lifestyle, their music [its pure from the heart- gaana songs] and Attakathi tried a lot to establish that… Obviously with Kodambakkam filled with caste politics it had to be implicit….
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blurb
August 11, 2016
I watched that Karu Palaniappan video again. I wish he could have elucidated why he thinks Attakathi is a political film.
I was also put off by the host mispronouncing kalai as kaLai. James Vansanth kittendhu training eduthukkanum pola irukku 😀
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udhaysankar
August 24, 2016
There’s a bonus song released by santosh on YouTube moments ago. Aside from the songs, the visuals in the background certainly prove that a lot of footage has been cut out of the final version due to time constraints. It shows radhika and thalaivar spending quality time together, getting married, etc These scenes could have been vital considering the meagre amount of time it makes us spend with them, before the reunion. Sigh. If only Tamil directors have the habit of releasing a director’s cut.
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Tina
August 26, 2016
So spot on! Just watched the movie (hic!)
Saar. When you are looked upon as a revolutionary, what are the things that would come up in your head when you are meeting a long lost loved one? OK, you feel vulnerable, check your looks, etc.
But shouldnt you be more worried that your significant other still shares the same ideology as yours? And why would she? Given that it took her child and man away from her.
And kumudavalli is shown as being away from Malaysia, to a land where she belongs. And in rather soft surroundings. Why would she feel the same way still, far removed from oppression? Would she still buy the coat thingie?
Everyone could, wear a coat today. We have come that far, no?
Kabali wonders what his wife must be thinking the night before he meets her. Instead he should have worried about what all she has been thinking leading to that point.
Like a lot.of things in the movie, the wife too became superficial.
Sigh! What a movie it could have been.
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Amit Joki
August 29, 2016
For all those who loved Kabali:
Kabali 2 is ON! Dhanush is producing it under his Wunderbar films 😎😎😎
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blurb
August 30, 2016
Is this for real? After 2.0, Thalaivar will be directed by Pa. Ranjith again, under Wunderbar Films?
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blurb
August 30, 2016
Sorry, just saw Amit’s comments.
So, yay! 🙂
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Raghul
August 31, 2016
@BR
On linking Karu. Palaniappan’s video in the blog:
Two qtns: 1. Why Karu. Palaniappan did not notice and mention that none of Udayanithi Stalin’s either produced or acted movie got tax exemption ? So KP’s views were also politically motivated !. Arasiyal illatha manusane illai, That is the fact.
When a slew of actors already get remuneration well above Kamalji, why do you still bracket Kamal and Rajini on their remuneration ?
They are of two different genres as on date and are at two extreme levels of popularity!
Whenever Rajini leaps a few steps forward, always there is a mention about Kamal ! Is it warranted hereafter ?
On 25th Day Kabali is the 2nd biggest boxoffice hit (only after PK) – that too.after all the negative reviews…
Kudos…
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KayKay
September 18, 2016
After 368 comments,many of them excellently articulated, my own 2 cents arrives with all the freshness of moldy bread.
I just saw this, determined to wait until the euphoria had died down and I could view it without the cacophonous clamor of water cooler critics at work coloring my perceptions. Plus, knowing the tweaks to the version shown in Malaysian cinemas, including a bone-headed caption in the epilogue explaining Kabali’s fate, I decided to wait for the version as originally released.
SPOILER ALERT (at this stage does it matter?)
To paraphrase the Joker from The Dark Knight:
When the unstoppable force of a young film maker with a distinct authorial voice and a specific narrative agenda meets the immovable force of an Iconic Super Star with a rabid fan base with equally specific requirements on what they expect to see, then something’s gonna give.
In this case, both caved in somewhat.
Probably conceived originally as a Godfather 3-ish tale of an aging gangster wanting to go straight and reconnect with his family, Ranjith was most likely arm-twisted by Producers wanting to cash in on the next Big “Rajini Blockbuster” into incorporating Godfather 2-ish arcs of a Gangster re-establishing his power base by eliminating his rivals in it’s first and last 15 minutes.
Needless to say, these 2 arcs are stitched together haphazardly and the seams show.
The Pet Shop sequence, which provides the movie’s “mass”-iest moment (cut into the trailer, the better to mis-market the film as Baasha 2.0) has no relevance to what subsequently transpires, a sombre, moody and even melancholic drama on loss and redemption.
Layer in the socio-political reality of disenfranchised South Indians (reaping the fallout of decades of entrenched Affirmative Action policies tailored for the majority Malays) into the narrative (a pungent concept that required a film maker better attuned to the specific cultural milieu here in Malaysia) and the resultant hodgepodge is an uneven cocktail, interesting for a single swig, but not one you’re inclined to experience again.
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blurb
January 11, 2017
Why is #Baasha trending in Chennai?
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Vidhya
March 24, 2017
Atlast I watched Kabali on Amazon Prime Video app – in two parts over two days, after tucking the entire family in bed. And then waitinf for some me-time to rush here to comment.
That I watched it in two parts says something about the film – I had never been able to hit the pause button with say, Onayum Attukuttiyum or Premam or even Vettayadu Vilayadu when I happened to watch them in the wee hours of the night after a back-breaking day. But with this one, I was ok with stopping midway. (That I came back the next day to catch the remaining also says something about the film though 🙂 )
This review perfectly sums up the movie’s strength and weakness. However the movie seemed to work better when viewed in absolute serenity without the wolf-whistles or tweet notifications. Scaling it up to a silver-screen (well that’s unavoidable) with so much hype and hoopla must have been its major undoing.
The songs and bgm – man, when you hear them on your earphones with the visuals unfolding on the mobile screen, they did give you goosebumps. Im assuming the dts dolby versions would have drowned the subtleties.
BR was the only reviewer who found Dhansika ill-at-ease and she was just that. But her statuesque frame did give her the required heft. But I wonder why they chose to dub her voice, she has a nice bold unsweetened voice that would have served the character better than this sweet Apppa tone.
Infact the side-characters were all stiff – perhaps in awe of the Star dazzling in front of them. One misses Raghuvaran or Sarath Babu or Prabhu or Prakashraj or even Saranraj who are Rajni’s contemporaries and hence could hold their own in his presence.
And what a presence that was! A die-hard Kamal fan like me who even refuses to follow Rajni on Twitter just to make a point (kiddo me), welled up when he says Innum ennalam kodumai pakkanumo naan. Today he is embroiled in yet another controversy raked up just because it’s him (the SL houses for tamils issue)…
There’s a lot left to be desired in this movie – but the few whiplash moments & emotional tugs at the heartstrings were enough for me to rate it better than all his post Thalapathi movies.
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sanjana
March 14, 2018
Speaking on it, Radhika Apte said, “It was my first day at shoot. A famous actor down south came on the set and started to tickle my feet.” “We had never met before and my instinct reaction was to slap him,” she added. Although she didn’t divulge the name of the film or the actor, we must applaud her for her bold action. She definitely proved that she is a no nonsense girl. And she is not one who will think twice before putting you in the right place if you mess with her.
Who could be this actor?
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sanjana
March 14, 2018
I put this comment here because Radhika apte acted in Kabali too. I think the actor referred to must be childish or drunk. That maybe the reason she did not make it into a complaint.
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hari
March 15, 2018
Sanjana could very well be Prakash Raj in Dhoni, just asking?
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Honest Raj
March 23, 2018
@Sanjana :
https://www.thenewsminute.com/article/watch-when-radhika-apte-snapped-big-telugu-star-tickling-her-set-78175
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sanjana
March 23, 2018
Even pinkvilla readers started guessing.
https://www.pinkvilla.com/entertainment/news/radhika-apte-reveals-she-slapped-famous-star-401043
She should have named the person instead of allowing people to guess. Everyone becomes a suspect from A to Z.
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Sifter
May 21, 2018
Late by almost 2 years, but I wanted to watch this film at my own pace 🙂
You are very kind with your review I must say. This was utterly boring, laughable, amateurishly (worse than a middle school play) staged (!) film for me. The dialogues, the narrative disjointed, the actors completely unconvincing, etc., etc. Everything looked staged, everyone wooden, Rajini, to an extent, saves it.
—But where Ranjith scores over Manjule is in his refusal to show stereotypical portrayals of Dalits (that is, if we want to read his characters that way.) These characters aren’t in villages, performing lowly jobs that no one else will do (or touch). In Attakathi, they harbour naïve ideas of romance (just like everyone else) and go chasing women, without a care that caste might come in the way.
Ranjith scores? Really? I mean, Really? Most (if not every) Tamil movies has this concept or something similar to this concept (?). A good for nothing boy, uneducated, a rowdy, speaking uncouth Tamil, a boor, dark skinned, jobless (wearing the colour of his skin, his status, his character or lack of it as multiple chips on his 56 cm or inch shoulder–however he sees it fit ) chasing a fair skinned, preferably a brahmin, doctor/ engineer/ software engineer or some such loosu ponnu, who is rich to boot and has boor for a father/ uncle/ brother, expecting/ demanding/ forcing/ belittling/ taming her to accept his love with a dance and a song without a care for anything in this world or even for her.
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