Thiagarajan Kumararaja exploded on the movie scene with ‘Aaranya Kaandam’, which was festooned with raves by the few who saw it. And then he disappeared. Now, there are signs of a resurrection. In the midst of shooting his second film, he shoots the breeze with Baradwaj Rangan.
Thiagarajan Kumararaja does not know if he is going to continue making movies. This is an odd statement from someone who’s just begun work on a breathlessly anticipated second film, but it seems to fit into his conception of himself as a rootless drifter. The philosophy informs his perceived place in the directorial pantheon: “Somewhere in the middle. There are always better directors. There are always worse directors.” The philosophy informs his romantic relationships. “They were great people, all. But I’m a bucket full of holes – nothing sticks, no one stays.” So it’s surprising when he says he once went looking for a design for a tattoo. It must have been a big thing for him, something so… permanent. But this anecdote isn’t about tattoos. It’s about cats. He wanted a cat tattoo because he really loves cats. “They live among us, but they have their own life, a discreet life.” He likes rats even more. “We can’t do anything about them. They are great survivors. It’s so exciting to see them.”
Exciting is a word Kumararaja uses a lot. It comes up when he talks about his childhood, which was the opposite of exciting. His parents thought he’d pick up bad habits if he stepped out, so he stayed mostly at home. There was a books phase – Sujatha, Rajesh Kumar, Kovi Manisekaran, Sandilyan – that didn’t last. But the real entertainment was the bus ride from his home in Porur to Santhome Higher Secondary School. He used to stand next to the driver, observing at what speed he’d change gears. “I wanted to be a PTC bus driver,” he says. “The idea of driving a bus was so exciting.” Trains, in contrast, held no appeal. “There’s no overtaking in trains, no excitement.”
He was never a good student, making just enough marks to scrape through, but around Class XI, he was drawn to theoretical physics. “Based on one assumption, you go to another assumption. That was very exciting for me.” Maths wasn’t. At least, the Class XII Maths teacher, a newcomer to the profession, wasn’t. Kumararaja failed the subject, failed Class XII. “If I didn’t like the teacher, I wouldn’t study.”
You might have seen the ad for Stayzilla that came out a year ago, with stop-motion animation and Gautham Menon’s voiceover. Kumararaja directed it. But he doesn’t do many ads. He took this one up because it was exciting. “It has to turn me on. Whatever turns me on, I’ll do that. If murder is going to turn me on, I’ll do that. Otherwise, I’m like a stone. I’ll just sit there, watch things happen around me.” He can afford to do this because he has a very simple lifestyle. He goes around in a bike. And his friends take care of what he calls “things.” Like his office. It’s a friend’s apartment. Of course he pays rent. “But not necessarily every month.” Another friend owns a clothing store. “They believe I will make money, so they are investing in me,” he laughed. Then he turned serious. “One day I will return everything tenfold.”
So how does someone so Zen end up making something as spectacularly lurid and blood-splattered like Aaranya Kaandam? “Usually, they say what’s in you comes out in your first film. But this isn’t like that. Just a few bits, maybe. The face the Jackie Shroff character makes, I make that face to my mother. And I am good at snarky comebacks, so all my characters speak that way. But I have a very different kind of relationship with people. That’s not what’s there in the film. I am not a violent person, so I like violent films. What you’re not in life, that’s what you’ll find exciting on screen.”
* * *
Which is not to say Kumararaja thinks Aaranya Kaandam is the most exciting film on the face of the earth. He knows a lot of people who hated the film. He read all those reviews and laughed, because they presented interesting angles. But he knows it’s not a bad film, and that is all that matters. No one has criticised the film more than him. The last show he saw, he ripped the film apart. Line after line, he kept talking to the screen, giving snarky comebacks. He’s good at that, so when he writes a scene, when he composes a shot, he sees to it – as much as he can – that there is no possibility for a snarky comeback from a smart aleck in the audience. “If I can’t think up a snarky comeback, I don’t think most people can.”
The film’s failure is one of the great tragedies of modern Tamil cinema. Kumararaja has a reason, and no, it isn’t God or destiny. “I don’t see a reason for God’s existence. There are reasons why he should exist but I don’t see a reason why he would.” He simply believes it was not marketed enough. Friends gave him other reasons. That there were no stars. That it was slow. That the music did not guide the audience, it kept the film from reaching out. But there is a flip side, Kumararaja laughs. “No one’s seen it, so everyone thinks it’s a good film.”
He likes good films. “I can watch the same film over and over. I have the same orgasm watching the same film a hundred times – probably different orgasms of the same level.” But bad films depress him. Literally. “I get upset when I see a bad film – whether from Hollywood or international cinema or from here. If I see a good film, it is so exciting. I get so excited about it. If I see a bad film, I go into depression for a week. I am not exaggerating. I avoid watching films unless they are certified by certain friends of mine who know my taste.” He gets depressed because the director who made the bad film believed he was making a good film. “There is a 100 per cent chance I can end up making a similarly fucked up film. I hate a bad film, so I don’t want my film to be bad and end up hating it. I’m very paranoid about that.”
This second film, he’s hoping people will like it. It’s got stars: Vijay Sethupathy, Samantha, Fahadh Faasil. It’s got PC Sreeram. And unlike Aaranya Kaandam, it doesn’t take till interval point to really get going. The drama begins in the very first shot. Perhaps in the very first line: “Dei rascal, marandhittiyaa da yenna?”
* * *
It’s a question we might ask of Kumararaja. He makes a film. He disappears. We hear he’s making something with Ajith. We hear he’s making a Hindi film. But this is what happened. Over two-and-a-half years, he wrote a mega-budget film. A new-ish genre that allowed him to play with screenplay structure. He showed it to actors who all said, “Namma oorla work out aagadhu.” Then, one day, he was watching The Circle, the 2000 Iranian film by Jafar Panahi where the narrative is handed over from one character to the next – a number of independent-yet-interconnected stories adding up to a powerful whole. Kumararaja was astonished. If Panahi could make this film with so little money, with so many censorship restrictions, then there was no reason he couldn’t make a movie. Even if no actor came on board. Even if there was no cameraman. He’d shoot it himself. He wrote a detailed treatment note – four independent-yet-interconnected stories adding up to a whole.
Then, the Stayzilla ad came along. It took six months. And in that time, Kumararaja split his treatment note into four parts, and handed three of them to three of his friends. He had the details of the scenes in place. He just wanted their take on it, their version. None of these friends knew what was in the other three parts, or how everything came together.
You may have heard of these friends. One of them is named Nalan Kumarasamy. One of them goes by Mysskin. One of them is the Ali Baba director, Neelan. One of them was supposed to be Anurag Kashyap, but Bombay Velvet had just crashed and he wasn’t feeling up to it, so Kumararaja fleshed out that part himself. Then, he rewrote what the others gave him so that the film has the same flavour throughout – but no, he’s not telling which friend wrote which part. He doesn’t want the audience to come with preconceived notions. He’s producing the film. But is he rich enough to produce a film? It doesn’t matter, he says. He’s motivated enough to produce a film.
Oh, another thing about this new film. It’s his homage to Samsaram Adhu Minsaram.
* * *
It’s not that Kumararaja is a big fan of Visu. But he is a big fan of that film. “It’s always about the work, not the person.” It’s not that Kumararaja is a big fan of Sridhar. But he is a big fan of Nenjil Or Aalayam, especially the way it is shot. It’s not that Kumararaja is a big fan of P Bhimsingh. But he is a big fan of Bagappirivinai. “I am a sucker for drama, and those black-and-white films had drama that worked for us. It probably had to do with the black-and-white. It was another world. Everything was in harmony. There was a strong story. The characters believed what they did, and so you bought it. Today, I am unable to buy that.”
The first film Kumararaja saw was Coma. Or maybe Superman. His mother took him along. Then there were the films on TV. Sholay, Deewar, both favourites of his, both released in the same year, both films he points to in order to underline the fact that commercially successful films can be artistically successful too. But most of the films he saw subsequently were with his uncle, who had dreams of becoming an actor and would drag his nephew along to the theatre. Kumararaja is a sucker for escapist cinema. He loved Annai Or Aalayam. He watched it seven or eight times. He loved Pattanathil Boodham. Your own personal genie. What more could a boy want? And then, Thiruvilayaadal. They’d show it on TV. And on Kandha Sashti and Panguni Uthiram, local temples would play the audio tape. He knows the dialogues by heart.
Then there was the editor who lived near his home, VP Krishnan, who worked on Andhaman Kadhali and never let anyone forget it. The jubilee shield for the film was prominently displayed in his living room. It was in Krishnan’s house that Kumararaja heard a song that remains one of his favourites: Ilayaraja’s Aasaya kaathula, from Johny. He wove the song into his script for the Nalan Kumarasamy-directed segment of the anthology film X: Past is Present. Kumararaja loves songs, he loves talking about songs. The songs of Uyire Unakkaga, one of the handful of Tamil films Laxmikant-Pyarelal worked on. The songs of Paadum Vaanambadi, the Tamil version of Disco Dancer. Sindhu nadhi poove from Shankar Salim Simon. Kann kanda dheivame from Keezh Vaanam Sivakkum. He used Bappi Lahiri’s Thaai Veedu song, Unnai azhaithathu kann, in Aaranya Kaandam. He loves the energy of the song, the way it sets the mood, the zone he wants his audience in.
The music, he hopes, will make people laugh. Or cry. Or uncomfortable, because it’s just not what they expect. Even his background scores are stamped with this philosophy. Like the Mexican music, in Aaranya Kaandam, that accompanies the introduction of the villains Gajendran and Gajapathy. They are important characters who can change the course of the film, but Kumararaja did not want to hint at the future, with menacing music. He just wanted to savour the present. He just wanted to revel in the way they walked into the frame. He wanted that joy.
Aaranya Kaandam was supposed to come with three songs. Gangai Amaran wrote one around the situation of the heroine playing a video game. Kumararaja wanted the sequence to look like a video game. He wanted to shoot it like a video game. Vaali wrote a song that was supposed to come on when the father and son stumble into the cocaine stash and realise they’re going to be rich. They were supposed to wear koothu clothes and prance around on a stage, pretending to be king and prince, with no audience watching. The tune was eventually reused for Konjum kili paada vecha in Kedi Billa Killadi Ranga. Kumararaja wasn’t satisfied with Vaali’s first stab at the lyrics. Vaali booted him out and ordered him to come back in a week. This time, everything worked. Kumararaja really liked this old-school behaviour, the way Vaali took on this challenge. “I really love that in a person.”
Kumararaja likes challenges too. The third song was meant to appear when the Sampath character jumps off the jeep and begins to run. He runs as fast as he can, but the world is very slow. The song was supposed to play out in slow motion. This number didn’t even get to the hire-a-lyricist stage. Aaranya Kaandam finally made it to theatres songless. This new film may have two songs, but they may be simply for promotions. The film may have older tracks like Shankar-Ganesh’s Panimalar song, Paniyum neeye. Kumararaja loves the stanzas. He wants it as the opening song.
* * *
A man with such a specific vision, you’d imagine, would be one of those who, in Class II, saw a film, was blown away by it, spent nights dreaming about it, and said to himself, “I’m going to make movies.” But Kumararaja’s flashback is remarkably undramatic. There was the time he thought he’d join an NIIT course and become an IT professional. There was the time, during school, when he took cricket coaching, and thought of becoming a cricketer. There was the time when he began to click pictures that he sold to newspapers, when he thought he’d be a photographer. There was the time he got his Visual Communication degree, a course he got into just because he’d heard that that was a way to break into advertising, a world where men walked around in ponytails. He thought thoughts like, “Why does an ad have to be about just one product? Why not two or three?” There was the time he became an assistant cameraman, an assistant director. There was the time he helped a classmate with a film project. The reason for this drifting? Well, if something isn’t exciting enough…
Then he got together with Pushkar and Gayathri, who were classmates at college, and wrote three scripts within a month. They even pitched these scripts to producers, but nothing happened and Pushkar and Gayathri took off to the US, to study, and Kumararaja retreated to his “stone state.” They came back. They made Oram Po. Kumararaja wrote the dialogues. He felt that he should ride that momentum, get a foot in the door while being around the process of making a movie. It made sense. He had a script. SPB Charan loved the dialogues of Oram Po. He decided to produce Aaranya Kaandam, which, at that point, in Kumararaja’s mind, was a racy film.
He wanted to make a really racy film, because we don’t really make those films and we think raciness means fast cuts and swooping camera moves. He wanted the plot to be racy. But while shooting the film, his impulses told him to treat it like a Western. Specifically, a Sergio Leone Western. Kumararaja loves Leone. He thinks the opening of Once upon a Time in the West is one of the two greatest opening stretches of all time. (His number two is the opening of Magnolia. He thinks Paul Thomas Anderson is the greatest filmmaker around today.) People don’t seem to be making movies for the big screen anymore. We have dramatic plots, but Kumararaja misses the cinematic approach. Not opulence like Devdas, but just an extreme long shot, say, which you hardly find. So that’s what he was after.
No. He doesn’t think all this name-dropping – Leone, Anderson, at one point even Welles came up – is alienating. “Maybe the technical details are inspired by their films, but my characters are very normal, the moments they go through are very relatable. The drama is very local.” You don’t have to look towards Tarantino for the explosions of pop culture in Aaranya Kaandam. (“Unakku Rajini pidikkumaa, Kamal pidikkumaa?”) You just have to look at Goundamani. Kumararaja doesn’t need Tarantino for the Chapter format either. What is the Ramayana if not a series of chapters, of which the Aaranya Kaandam is one? What’s interesting to him is the transposition. He takes the grammar of noir. He sets it here. He takes the femme fatale. He sets her here, where we only know the villi.
Or the oppressed woman. That’s what the Yasmin Ponnappa character was, at first. And then she’d fall for Sappai and then the story would hinge on this question: Will they elope, and how? But Kumararaja wasn’t happy. Because there’s nothing there for the audience. The elopement either happens, or it doesn’t. And what’s so great about that? “It’s like a woman being pregnant. There’s a 50 per cent chance it will be a boy. There’s a 50 per cent chance it will be a girl. But what if I say it’s a piglet? Now, that’s interesting. Otherwise, the audience is already ahead of you. You need to push it. Not surprise the audience for the sake of a surprise, but surprise them with something that fits into the flow of the film.” Hence the femme fatale. That’s what’s so great about masala. You don’t have to hew to a particular genre.
Kumararaja thinks of the audience as equals. If he thinks the movie works for him, then it does for them. Even with the swear words beeped out by the censors. That’s minimum damage. He can live with it, because if the characters don’t swear, then the drama loses impact, and because the audience is his equal, they can fill in the words anyway. They can read lips. They can hear the word anni in the first line and guess that the beeped-out word in the next line is…
Kumararaja wants to make a U-rated movie one day, a Disney film for kids. (He’s currently reading stories from the Panchatantra.) He isn’t against popular cinema. He’d like to do a big family-friendly commercial film – that is, to the extent that he can be commercial, with songs, with a big hero, with action sequences, maybe a heist movie. But Aaranya Kaandam wasn’t meant for family audiences and this new film, which is about 20 per cent done, isn’t either. The content is adult content. It’s meant for mature people, and by that he means a person who appreciates things that the person himself may not agree with, instead of saying, “That is wrong. It cannot exist.” Kumararaja believes such an audience exists.
And then he talks about the Lumière brothers. They didn’t make their films – the first ever commercial films – for an audience. The audience came to watch these films. So the film always happens first. The audience comes later. “We need to do something exciting for the audience to come and watch. So if we make an exciting project, if we make an interesting film, they will come to see it. Would you eat the same food everyday? No. I’m probably one of those people who’ll give you something different to eat.”
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.
Baradwaj Rangan 
ruzaikadeen14
December 3, 2016
What a truly, well, exciting interview!
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MANK
December 3, 2016
Thanks for the interview Brangan. A much over due one. Just when I thought that aranyakandam would be those one offs like aval appadithan, voila! Comes news of his new film. With VJS and fahadh, can’t get better than this. Would be anxiously waiting for this one
But he sounded evasive about his movie inspirations. Downplaying the Tarantino influences and calling rival PTA the greatest contemporary director, hmm. I thought the Tarantino influences on AK was unmistakable. not just for the pop cultural references, but also how some of the scenes directly mirror the scenes from Tarantinos work . I agree about the beginning of OUTIW though. That has to be the greatest opening.
And I wish there was more about his period of exile. It’s almost 10 years now. Apart from the big budget experimental film that failed to take off, I would have loved to know what else he was involved in and more about what happened to AK during and after release. Why we don’t have a proper DVD of the film yet
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Sharan
December 3, 2016
Photographs of him are as intriguing or i should say as exciting as the write up about him..
Dark films or i should say voice of rats and cats is forte of tamil cinema.. I think there is no other film industry in india with so many exciting directors who lights up dark zones of the society..
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Hariharan
December 3, 2016
I saw Aaranya Kaandam and really liked it. One of the honest films. I think it didnt go well because of politics in Tamil film industry. Even this year there are lot of good films which neither gets screen nor the push to get into peoples mind and hearts (Ammani,Uriyadi,Ilami etc. Even Aandavan Kattalai had a low key release. But it managed to pull it off). Atleast In chennai, Aaranya Kaandam got a decent number of shows for a week. I think casting of Jackie Sheroff backfired. He was a terrific actor. But I guess people thought it to be a dubbing movie. Or rather “A” certificate backfired(I think it deseved UA.I had violence but not lude comedy which deserves A).
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Hariharan
December 3, 2016
By the by, what was his feedback about Yennai Arindhaal, with which he was associated?Was he satisfied with the way his inputs transformed into screen?
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Yuva Karthick
December 3, 2016
Exciting!!
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arjun_shivaram
December 3, 2016
Thiagarajan Kumararaja – the name gives me a feel of mystic greatness. .
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Anu Warrier
December 3, 2016
I liked the man solely based on his interview. I guess one can be zen when everything is taken care of for you, though. Reminds me a bit of Thoreau and his ‘simple life’ when Emerson’s wife was busy cooking for him. 🙂
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Anuja Chandramouli
December 4, 2016
This interview was such a treat BR! Good to know that TK has not fallen off the planet and is actually working on his next. Excited about the Vijay Sethupathi and Faahad Faazil combo though I am not sure about cutesy lil loosu ponnu, Samantha. AK was a simply brilliant film but Ponnapa certainly wasn’t. Imagine Radhika Apte in that meaty role! Now that would have been something!!
PS: Remember these lines? ‘Ungalala mudiya lenna enna yen adikkireenga?’ How can you not love a guy who wrote that?
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the brangan fan
December 4, 2016
sir,
the hindu paper version is mutilated
for example, the word ‘excited’ is there only twice but it is still in italics and you’ve not even put the line in which you say he uses it often!
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Arun Pradeep
December 5, 2016
Excellent interview, with equally brilliant pictures. He seems like someone who lives life at his own pace.
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Ramchander Krishna (@ramctheatheist)
December 5, 2016
I like how you capture the spirit of the person you interview 🙂 More excited by it than by Thiagarajan’s next film!
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Raj Chandra
December 5, 2016
Actually it is Shankar Ganesh (yeah, they composed all the songs with the Hindi flavor because that movie was dubbed/reproduced in Hindi too at the same time).
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brangan
December 6, 2016
Ramchander Krishna: I like how you capture the spirit of the person you interview
Thank you. Old dog, old writing tricks 🙂
Raj Chandra: Actually it is Shankar Ganesh
Wow. Thanks so much for this. All these years, thought it was Bappi Lahiri. I know now what my friend felt when, after years of thinking the music of Chinna Thambi Periya Thambi was composed by Raja, I told him it was actually Gangai Amaran 🙂
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brangan
December 6, 2016
Also, frankly, I thought there’d be more comments here. In the sense I thought there’d be many people excited about this director… Could it be that the longer the piece, the fewer the people who read it?
Just idle wondering…
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hari ohm
December 6, 2016
If a friend would have said this ““They were great people, all. But I’m a bucket full of holes – nothing sticks, no one stays.”, we would have just shut him up by saying “dai rombha overa aadatha, indha peter laam vera engayaavadhu vechukko”. Also I somehow read this the way Kamal haasan would have said it :).
Down below he goes on to say this ““If I can’t think up a snarky comeback, I don’t think most people can.”. Idhuvum konjam overaah thaan irukku.
Apart from these two statements I found the interview quite interesting, thanks BR.
Also can somebody let me know where I can see the movie legally? Thanks
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blurb
December 6, 2016
brangan: I suspect it’s the current state of events. It took me several days to get out of Trump’s victory (for which this: https://www.amazon.com/Islam-Future-Tolerance-Sam-Harris/dp/0674088700 has been enlightening/sobering/cathartic/ and strangely, somewhat vindictive..).
Maybe people are in bit of a haze.
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Ravi K
December 6, 2016
IMO if TK was a Hindi filmmaker and he made something like AK in Hindi it would have been highly praised, rather than being some obscure film that nobody saw when it was released and is now hard to find. I think it’s a damn miracle when terrific Tamil films get major recognition. Hell, it’s a miracle when terrific Tamil films get made in the first place.
hari ohm wrote: ‘Down below he goes on to say this ““If I can’t think up a snarky comeback, I don’t think most people can.”. Idhuvum konjam overaah thaan irukku.’
Why wouldn’t he speak with some bravado or panache on occasion? Adakkamaa pesaradhu konjam boring-aa irukkum.
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Venky
December 6, 2016
TK studied in Santhome. He is my alumni 🙂 That’s a wonderful bit of trivia I am going to remember for a long time. It’s interesting how “stone state” word comes with associations related to drug use that we’ve forgotten what it is to be stoic. I don’t know if he consciously used this phrase..
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kart03ik
December 6, 2016
One of my top 5 movies for this decade is aaranya kaandam. Kumararaja creates a great great atmosphere, wacky characters, a topsy turvy plot which keeps you guessing and a delicious background score which kumararaja coaxes out of yuvan. This is the aval appadithan of the 2000’s. Maybe 20 years down the line it will be raved about and celebrated. Wish he shakes off his indifference and makes more movies.
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venkatesh
December 7, 2016
Great great interview with a truly one-off film-maker.
Glad that he is making another movie that has a chance to be released, marketed and seen properly.
What happened to AK was a tragedy. I have not been able to find a proper DVD (without everything bleeped out) of the film 10 years after the release of the film. Terrible.
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jaschek
December 7, 2016
This guys is mad, so mad I want to be him.
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Renga
December 7, 2016
Hi BR, Very intriguing interview with TK. Thank you for that.
And, still waiting for your second installment of your Bullet-point Report on Aaranya Kaandam ;)))
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Jagatheesan Rajendran
December 7, 2016
Super
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Selvin
December 8, 2016
Great piece this! I know he has just made 1 film, and probably would need to make half a dozen more to feature in a book. Something similar to the MR conversations. But, Can you come up with a mini book (10 pages) featuring these intriguing pictures plus the write up about the Aval Appadidhan guy! I’ll buy 10 copies 😀. Huge fan of this film and easily the best film I have watched in 2 decades (Tamil). Want to save it my archives!
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Aditya (Gradwolf)
December 8, 2016
Ravi said: “IMO if TK was a Hindi filmmaker and he made something like AK in Hindi it would have been highly praised, rather than being some obscure film that nobody saw when it was released and is now hard to find.”
I understand this sentiment but I think the meager response that AK got is an anomaly. It is such an accessible film when I look back now. Most film industries in India have a parallel wave making art films. Hindi had it in late 70s and 80s (and the Versova based indie efforts now) and other languages always had the so called “art” filmmakers. What’s great about Tamil is we stick to the mainstream and create something that is both accessible and is also cinematic genius. I wouldn’t want to lose it and it is evident from this interview and many others that TK has given that he’s someone from that school. Very few of these “filmmakers who are obscure and whose films remain obscure” would say they love Sholay and Deewar and Pattanathil Bhootham and Thiruvilayadal. TK is a filmmaker only the Tamil industry could have produced. Only here a Nalan Kumaraswamy can emerge who originally wanted Vadivelu to play the lead in Soodhu Kavvum. I hope with bigger stars in his next film, we embrace him better. It may be indie or art in its economics but AK is bonafide mainstream.
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zeroblogs
December 8, 2016
Gradwolf,
I think I disagree.
It’s clear TK expresses no interest or nor has any affectation of staying away from mainstream. For example, even in an earlier interview, particularly when lauded for making a movie without songs, he has talked about how he had originally conceived songs in AK but couldn’t shoot them. So I agree on that part.
But I think the movie itself tells a different story – in that it’s a marked departure in terms of style and there’s an art-house texture to it that you don’t find in the more recent successes of Nalan, Karthik Subbaraj and so on. (I like some of them more than AK but that’s not the point.) So I’m quite doubtful if it’d have worked well commercially even it happened at a different time. The movie does have several movie/pop-culture references but I’d argue the allusions are refracted by a certain ironic distance.
TK’s next movie might be different in this respect. He is a director of such an assured style so it’d be silly to patronize but I for one hope he has a more mainstream, approachable subject both in terms of setting and style.
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zeroblogs
December 8, 2016
Btw, AK is hardly an obscure film, it routinely gets very high praise and lands in all-time/decade’s great lists and so on, among movie junkies. I don’t see why its prestige (within Tamil movie circles) is any less than what it might have been if it got made in Hindi.
Obviously, I’m not contesting the point that not many saw it in theatres when it was released. Also agree that the actual number who got to the theatres would been different for a Hindi movie where even such works get marketed well within their own spaces and manage to do well enough (the audience base is bigger after all). Or even DVD sale for that matter. But in terms of audience response, I seriously doubt you’d get a better deal in terms of audiences’ response even when done in Hindi.
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brangan
December 8, 2016
Zeroblogs: I agree. When we talk of mainstream films, it means films that penetrate the mainstream — and none of these filmmakers have managed that. Even Soodhu Kavvum etc are urban hits and worshipped by cinephile fanboys, but they are not “mainstream” hits.
I agree with the general point Gradwolf makes, that these films are more ‘accessible’ than the non-mainstream films by some of the Hindi filmmakers. But as you point out, the pop-culture etc is filtered through an ironic gaze and not served straight (like, say, something a Vivek might have done in a comedy track).
I would say an AK exists in the same space as a Gangs of Wasseypur.
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Aditi
December 9, 2016
I felt such a sense of joy when I read that Nalan Kumarasamy and Mysskin are his friends. There’s something just so – for lack of a better word – exciting about three offbeat filmmakers being drawn to each other. Oh, to be a fly in the wall when they have conversations with each other!
I feel the same sense of happiness when I see the ‘usual suspects’ of these films being introduced in various movies. Like when I saw Ramesh Thilak in Kaaka Muttai after Soodhu Kavvum, and later in Orange Mittai. There seems to be an ‘inner circle’ of sorts in these films, and that is so inspiring. A group of people that come together and make good cinema. What more can one ask for?
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guerra
December 9, 2016
this was such a brilliant interview brangan. absolutely loved it. Thiagarajan Kumararaja sounds like a guy from a novel. such an interesting guy. Loved AK and looking forward to his new movie.
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Sathyajit Krishnan
December 10, 2016
Wow been waiting for years for some news about him. Disappointing to see that his “very complex” Hindi Film didn’t take off. Excited to see VJS & Fahaad Faasil working on the Next though.
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Gopinath
December 10, 2016
Sir when the second movie of Tk will released. did he said anthing about it.
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Ravi K
December 11, 2016
Aditya wrote: “Very few of these “filmmakers who are obscure and whose films remain obscure” would say they love Sholay and Deewar and Pattanathil Bhootham and Thiruvilayadal.”
Even people who make offbeat or arthouse films often grow up on mainstream films, or even B or C-grade movies, which are pretty far from arthouse films. These influences can manifest in weird ways.
I can easily buy a Hindi film like “Titli” on DVD (with interviews and a decent transfer), even though the film didn’t do well at the box office. Yash Raj Films even distributed it. With Aaranya Kaandam, there is no DVD or VCD. You are left with bootlegs low quality streaming links.
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Kannan T G
December 11, 2016
Happened to see stayzilla ad today.
2nd link is about its making and in its end i am not at all surprised to see the mentioning of “Tyler Durden and Kino Fist” (Had to Google about Kino Fist). No wonder a person like Thiagarajan Kumararaja attributes his work to Tyler Durden. Lets hope he creates a “Tamil Tyler Durden” in his upcoming movies.
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Sanjay Shankar (@sanjayshankar)
December 11, 2016
I agree that AK wasn’t marketed properly at first, but they didn’t even make an effort to release via Netflix or any other such medium. There was a butchered version on Vijay TV, which eventually made its way to the internet. After its limited theatrical run, I don’t think the director’s cut was seen by anyone. I mean.. is it that hard to put the movie on iTunes or Google Play in this day and age?
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KayKay
December 12, 2016
” but they didn’t even make an effort to release via Netflix or any other such medium”
Sanjay Shankar….I second, third, fourth, fifth that!
Unlike Bollywood, the Tamil Cine industry is still in the Stone Ages with regards to availing themselves of the myriad distribution channels available. AK deserves to be re-discovered.
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Rahul
December 12, 2016
Sanjay Shankar and KayKay, Visaranai is on Netflix Canada . Also, I saw Madras on youtube, very good print with subtitles.
By the way, what is the length of the uncut version of Aranya Kandam ? Is it close to 2 hours ?
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Sundar
December 12, 2016
AK is available in hotstar!
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Aditya (Gradwolf)
December 14, 2016
Sanjay, KK, Ravi: While Tamil film industry’s archiving is the absolute worst and stuff of legends (apparently an original copy of Hey Ram does not exist), AK is a different story on why it didn’t make it anywhere:
http://www.behindwoods.com/tamil-movies-cinema-news-16/spb-charan-wins-a-case-filed-by-director-thiagarajan-kumararaja-for-aaranya-kaandam.html
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chandra Prakash
December 17, 2016
Great Interview.
@ Aditya,
“While Tamil film industry’s archiving is the absolute worst and stuff of legends (apparently an original copy of Hey Ram does not exist),” it is possible , and despite being Kamal’s home production, I have strong belief to believe it.
When we were at Museum of Moving Image ( MOMI), NY earlier last year for Manirathnam movie series show with his live interaction with audience (Politics as Spectacle: The Films of Mani Ratnam), who screened Roja, Bombay and Dilse, I was awestruck looking at the quality of the screened film ( Bombay- tamil version) with full of those yester year grainy , streakiness of old multiple time used film reels, what surprised me even more was the presenter thanked Mani for providing MOMI saying they were thrilled at Mani’s Madras Talkies sending the original print from their movie production house.
i have a Bluray edition of Modern Times ( the classic of Charlie Chaplin, from 1930’s), the quality of this W/B, silent movie will blow you away, just crystal clear and amazes me about the all those yester year stalwarts, or so called passionate movie makers of India who never bothered to Archive the Indian classics in a better way.
It’s just pathetic state how the classic movies are archived in India,
None of the Kamal classics released as DVDs in 90’s ( Sagara Sangamam, Swathi Mutyam ,Nayagan, Moonram Pirai are decent version to be called as agood DVD despite having been released by some decent companies, even worst there is no original of what ever DVD version of Raja Parvai).
I was hoping Mani/KH would release a uncut director’s version of Nayagan on its 25th anniversary, never happened.
Thaai Veedu two songs indeed were by Bappi Lahiri, SG adapted them, known fact even during movie release time
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thai_Veedu
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chandra Prakash
December 17, 2016
strong reason to believe it
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Vigneshwar
December 30, 2016
Exciting interview.
The way he thinks is really exciting. And AK doesn’t take till interval to get going, it started with the very first slide “Yethu thevaiyo athuvey dharmam”. The style you have is different that makes things interesting (Never letting audience ahead of you).
Best wishes for your second movie.
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Karthik
February 1, 2017
I don’t assume there is someone fanatic enough to entirely comprehend this piece knowing what is elaborated. The print version which is shorter somehow missed reading when published.
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Aadhy
February 21, 2017
Just saw a picture from his new movie and it looks edgy af. Hope they promote it well and make a lot of people watch. I still remember watching AK in its first week with totally 7 others, in a shady suburban theatre.
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Vidhya
March 30, 2017
Thanks to Hotstar, caught this movie after 6 years of its release. (The slaughtered mutilated beeped out version)
And now Im off Hotstar (or Youtube or Amazon Prime) for a few days – as no other movie, even in its initial 20-30 minutes has been able to give that punch that AK threw in its first scene.
This is what Thoongavanam lacked – though it had the same “stuff”, chase, gangsters, double-cross, kid-in-the-middle, thinking-on-one’s-feet tropes.
What it did not have was this whacko TK at its helm!! And what a huge difference did that make (Infact, Thoongavanam wasnt bad, but this was badass)
Varanum…pazhaya TK vaa varanum.
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Just
April 15, 2017
One of the best interview brangan,its what i have been lookin for years,interview of TK and you made it super interesting.If you have video footage of this interview or any audio record please please upload it,it would be a really exciting one.
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Jayram
September 13, 2017
I am looking forward to TK’s movie now renamed Super Deluxe. And from the looks of Vijay Sethupathi in drag, I am more intrigued. Wonder if Fahadh Faasil is doing drag too.
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Devarsi Ghosh
October 1, 2017
I just watched Aaranya Kandam. Next thing I did was read your review. I wished it was longer than the bullet-point thing you did. And I missed what the Tamil dialogues meant — the ones you quoted in the review because there’s no translation beside it. But this interview was such a winner. I really like TK (to the extent one can be fascinated by a filmmaker from reading an interview) after reading this, and I wish he made more films between AK and 2017. Really looking forward to Super Deluxe.
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Muni Babu
January 16, 2018
Hey, you Thaigarajan ( Tyler durden ) Kumararaja ( Kino fist ) am feeling jealous about your approach towards life and cinema since I couldn’t make it, stuck up in so called mechanised job n life..
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boredguys
January 26, 2019
Sir….guess every top critic in the country got to see Super Deluxe (Raja Sen, Sudhish Kamath and Namrata Joshi to name a few). By reading this interview, he has opened up a lot about the movie even before the buzz it has now garnered and I feel you or your colleagues at Film companion must’ve gotten a chance to see the film. If so can you please let us know
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jishnu r
February 2, 2019
please do a video interview with him .you already interviewed, my favourite karthiks(subbraj,narain) thaanks for that
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bart
February 22, 2019
Vandhutanya, thalaivan vandhuthanya.. verithanama..
A trailer I clapped for….
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Srinivas R
February 22, 2019
Wow.. the trailer is just wow
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MANK
February 22, 2019
Phew! Idhu than trailer. Looks fantastic. . Great visuals and music.Now let’s see how the film turns out
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Aadhy
February 22, 2019
What an exhilarating trailer. It follows the pattern of the teaser (Vaembu) where a shot is repeated again and again, with each repetition revealing a bit more information than the previous. Here VJS’s narration has the same revealing pattern. I remember even Aaranya Kaandam’s trailer had Guru Somasundaram narrating the Ramayana.
Btw BR, any chances of you writing about Kumbalangi nights? I’m hooked to the soundtrack and trailer was impressive as well.
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shafeos
April 26, 2019
Read this piece after watching Super Deluxe (2019). This person is really a stormy film maker I’m already jaw dropping and waiting for his works. The impact he created with his movies on the first viewing, first day, in the big screen is incomparable to anything else in this medium for me.
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Sricharan RC
May 23, 2019
IF you dont have a problem , plZ share those pics orignal files as docs!
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