Copyright ©2018 Film Companion.
Posted in: Cinema: Tamil, She Says She Says
She Says She Says: Mass, Masculinity & Thalapathy Vijay
Posted on October 31, 2018
Subscribe:
RSS feed
21 Responses “She Says She Says: Mass, Masculinity & Thalapathy Vijay” →
Leave a comment
Blog Stats
- 24,789,851 hits
Join 3,143 other subscribers
Other blogs
Recent Comments
 | Rahul on Election talk… for those… |
 | Rocky on Election talk… for those… |
| Rocky on Sajid Ali’s ‘Woh Bhi Din The’,… |
 | akemsk on Election talk… for those… |
 | Satya on Girish AD’s ‘Premalu’ infuses… |
 | mvky on Readers Write In #681: Smart G… |
 | abishekspeare on Election talk… for those… |
 | theeversriram on Election talk… for those… |
 | MuchMuchMurghi on Imtiaz Ali’s ‘Amar Singh Chamk… |
| Rahul on Girish AD’s ‘Premalu’ infuses… |
| Rocky on Election talk… for those… |
| Rocky on Election talk… for those… |
| Rocky on Election talk… for those… |
 | Madan on Election talk… for those… |
| Madan on Election talk… for those… |
Archives
Categories
Recent Posts
- Interview: Jithu Madhavan (‘Aavesham’)
- Readers Write In #688: Imtiaz Ali’s AMAR SINGH CHAMKILA Is A Biopic-Cum-Eulogy
- Interview: Manoj Bajpayee
- Jithu Madhavan’s ‘Aavesham’ is a fantastically written combination of comedy and action and drama
- Vineeth Sreenivasan’s ‘Varshangalkku Shesham’ is a middling, unfocused bromance that also wants to be a meta-commentary on the film industry
- Election talk… for those interested!
- Sajin Shrijith’s review of Jithu Madhavn’s ‘Aavesham’: Fahadh Faasil at his most electrifying and animated in a laugh fest
- Imtiaz Ali’s ‘Amar Singh Chamkila’ is a beautifully made biopic that showcases a man as well as morality
- Sajin Shrijith’s review of ‘Varshangalkku Shesham’: Vineeth Sreenivasan delivers his biggest, most wholesome film yet
- Amit Sharma’s ‘Maidaan’ is a sports melodrama/biopic that needed more consistent and engaging writing, but it has its moments
- Readers Write In #687: Trees that are trees, and trees that are not
- Readers Write In #686: Anand Ekarshi’s ‘AATTAM’- ‘An introspection’
- Interview: Elan (‘Star’)
- Interview: Priya Mani (‘Maidaan’)
- Interview: Sandeep Reddy Vanga (‘Spirit’, etc.)
- Book Excerpt: Bollypolitics
- Readers Write In #685: Aadujeevitham
- Readers Write In #684: The Hall of Thousand Pillars
- Interview: Aayush Sharma (‘Ruslaan’)
- Readers Write In #683: Tabassum madam ki jai ho!
- Kairam Vaashi reviews Parasuram Petla’s ‘Family Star’:
- Readers Write In #682: Retracing the past one year at a time
- Interview: Vineeth Sreenivasan (‘Varshangalkku Sesham’)
- Kairam Vaashi reviews Simple Suni’s ‘Avatara Purusha 2’:
- Interview: Choreographer Bhushan
- Interview: Mrunal Thakur (‘Family Star’)
- Sajid Ali’s ‘Woh Bhi Din The’, on ZEE5, is a sweet look at school days, filled with lovely, delicate moments
- Interview: Siddhu Jonnalagadda (‘Tillu Square’)
- Blessy’s ‘Aadujeevitham’ has its moments and gets an A for effort, but given the source, this should have been a far more moving film
- Rajesh Krishnan’s ‘Crew’ is an undemanding watch, lit up by the pleasure of watching stars having fun
- Interview: Vijay Deverakonda (‘Family Star’)
- Kairam Vaashi reviews Santhosh Ananddram’s ‘Yuva’: A ‘template debut-hero film’ that feels dated from the get-go
- Sajin Shrijith’s review of Blessy’s ‘Aadujeevitham’: A hard-hitting survival drama blessed by a towering performance from Prithviraj
- Interview: Arun Bose (‘Marivillin Gopurangal’)
- Readers Write In #681: Smart Gadgets, Dumb Humans
- Readers Write In #680: அற்புதமான நாள்
- Interview: Sara Ali Khan (‘Ae Watan Mere Watan’, ‘Murder Mubarak’)
- Interview: Anand Ekarshi (‘Aattam’, now on Prime Video)
- Kairam Vaashi reviews Sree Harsha Konuganti’s ‘Om Bheem Bush’: A silly-funny brainless buddy comedy which reveals its trump card not before testing our patience
- The TM Krishna affair… aka The controversy over Sangeetha Kalanidhi
- Interview: Girish Kasaravalli (the remastered ‘Ghatashraddha’, and other things)
- Interview: Imtiaz Ali (‘Amar Singh Chamkila’)
- Interview: Sidharth Bharathan
- Kairam Vaashi reviews Raj Guru’s ‘Kerebete’: An issue-based film with an interesting backdrop that doesn’t offer much on the subject but rather relies heavily on its twist
- Readers Write In #679: A Feast of a Song
- Interview: Shoojit Sircar
- Readers Write In #678: The Messiah Among the Sands
- Sajin Shrijith’s review of Ullas Chemban’s ‘Anchakkallakokkan’: A visually appealing film with a major attention-deficit problem
- Interview: Prithviraj (‘Aadujeevitham’)
- Readers Write In #677: Manjummel Boys – ‘Yeh Dosti Hum Nahin Todenge ,Chhodenge Dum Magar , Tera Saath Na Chhodenge’
Baradwaj Rangan 
rsylviana
October 31, 2018
Boy am I waiting for the comments for this video !!! 😀
Let the games begin!
LikeLike
Enigma
November 1, 2018
Isn’t Stalin (though he had a brief career in the movies) ‘Thalapathy’ and Vijay ‘Ilaya Thalapathy’? Has Vijay been promoted? There are also other junior thalapathys such as puratchi thalapathys and puthiya t I guess. No one can beat the Tamils when it comes to ridiculous monikers.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Anu Warrier
November 1, 2018
Somebody take this child and put her back in school! 🙂
LikeLiked by 2 people
e221
November 1, 2018
I don’t think that just being down to earth and relatable does not make one a mass hero. IMO Mass hero is a false narrative that’s being portrayed by media to keep their copies selling or now to get more clicks. So people easily fall into this narrative and take sides. Its like joker in the dark knight…”What would I Do without you?”…That’s exactly why the media needs a mass hero. If not Vijay they will create someone else…
Both Vijay and Rajni IMO has one thing in common. Exploiting their fan base in the name of political ambitions. Vijay will never join politics. Vijay’s movies now do more than 300 crores of business. How would you collect such a kind of money?
By supercharging his fan base and convert all that mindless enthusiasm into “duttu”..
mudiyale..times change actors change but we people never…My only prayer is Vijay sons should not come to cinema If so the media will be ready to give him “Ilaya thalapathy”
LikeLike
Voldemort
November 1, 2018
Enigma : Yeah Vijay was Ilaya Thalapathy. But he’s in his forties now and no longer Ilaya. So it’s only thalapathy.🙂
E221 : Agree totally.
His speech in the Sarkar audio launch was too OTT. Why the heck does he keep spouting punch dialogues?
LikeLike
Aadhy
November 1, 2018
Ah, happy to see fans of his audio launch speech here. I watch it every morning as part of my laughter-therapy routine. To Vijay’s credit, piss poor acting skills notwithstanding, must say he did a good job pulling off an ‘Oh I didn’t see this coming’ expression when the anchors asked him, “What would you do if you became TN’s Chief Minister? “. The whole audio launch was a well scripted and coordinated political stuntshow, which even the movie’s stunts and political punches will find hard to surpass.
I kinda agree with Namitha on one point : the dude does have a charm that’s pulling his ginormous fan base closer, though it turns unbearable when he over-cutiefyes it. And for someone in mid-40s who still dances like a dream, he sets major fitness goals.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Meera Corera
November 1, 2018
Oh and i thought she was going to call out the rampant misogyny in his movies 🙂 This was just pure fan worship…
I think Vijay should be called out for spewing his movies with his star strapping. Because he is mainstream mass hero he has decided to do one or two films that generate a lot of money… but the quality of his movies have spiralled downward… I mean after Sura anything he does will be better but still… we are now claiming to be content that Mersal is slightly better than Theri.. guaranteed that he cant mix star and class like Dhanush but at least a coherent narrative?
LikeLike
Meera Corera
November 1, 2018
Oh and am also a little confused by the objective of this video… Its not about Sarkar, it’s not really about Vijay the star, definitely not about Vijay the actor… what is it about? somebody pls to enlighten…
LikeLike
Ravi K
November 2, 2018
I found the video overly fawning, and without much depth. Even if the video was from a fan’s perspective surely you could have included specific examples, recurring elements throughout his films, etc.
And no discussion of the misogyny in Vijay’s films is complete without this clip:
LikeLike
e221
November 2, 2018
Adding to the above, I always thought Ajith as a Selfish person simply because he does not care of his fans, as he put out a statement recently that he has not recognized any fan associations and none are official. But considering how Rajni, Vijay are exploiting their fans, Ajith seems to be the least selfish one here.
“ummunu irundhu gammunu irundha jammunu vazhalam” – idhe kalvetule(Stone inscriptions) potta Nammaku pinnal varum sanadhigal idhe paathu payan peruvange…
LikeLike
Balu
November 2, 2018
Didn’t get the point of the video at all – unless it was just a video to express that she is a big fan. If being recognized as a mass hero was a just a simple matter of being macho on screen and humble off-screen, we would have one every Friday. Movies being art and subjective and what not, applying rationality on why someone became super popular is pointless. Rajni was kind of novel and Vijay is a decent copy but there were 100s of heroes that debuted in this period who could be better than either of them in many ways…but for whatever reasons most people chose them over others as their favorite “hero”. No amount of scientific study will help in identifying root cause 🙂
@Enigma – Rajni’s Thalapathy released just around Vijay’s debut and hence Vijay became Ilaya Thalapathy. I am unaware of any reference to Stalin since this moniker was right from when Vijay’s early days before any political alignment. Am sure one of the his sycophant producers/directors promoted him to Thalapathy – but to be fair Vijay’s box office status overtook Kamal long back and is considered genuine contender to Superstar’s thrown.
LikeLike
brangan
November 2, 2018
There is no “point” to the video. It’s just Namita doing a fortnightly riff on cinema from her POV 😀
LikeLiked by 2 people
Voldemort
November 2, 2018
Aadhy : Right. And he looks very good too, especially offlate. Doesn’t look like a forty something at all.
Meera Corera : When I first saw the title, I thought so too.🙂
And does anyone remember poor Dhanya Rajendran who just said that she walked out of Sura, only to be abused horribly on Twitter? What will it take for these actors to issue a press release asking the fans to not abuse anyone? Heck, he could at least tweet something.
LikeLike
Rahini David
November 2, 2018
There is a certain “If it is from FC, then it has to be in BR’s level” expectation in the comments. None of us are, no? Take that expectation away and what do you have? Some major fan-girling.
I liked this video. Not because I am (or ever was) a Vijay-fan girl, but because this video is quite different in content from the first two.
I’d think I would like to hear varying topics like what she felt about tropes of B&W movies, action movies in general, hero introduction scenes et al. In fact, I can even give a looooong list of what all topics would be fun for her to cover. I’d definitely be waiting and I most definitely would not insist that Namitha say what I’d say in her position.
When doing something like this, the pressure to say all that is to say can be enormous. Whenever I start to attempt a Reader’s WriteIn, a voice keeps asking “Have you researched enough and found all there is to say on that topic? This is BR’s blog and a certain quality will be expected from the readers.” That kind of bogs me down. So I like it that she does videos for a channel like FC and does not make it too analytical.
Yes, I feel that all peppy young girls seem to look alike and talk alike and dress alike. But then again, analytical middle-aged men also seem to look alike and talk alike and dress alike and I hardly complain about it. So that should be ok, I guess.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Rahini David
November 2, 2018
And I often wonder why people do away with the “Bambai City Chukka Roti Vuttan Paaru Sevatha Kutty” phase of Vijay’s career. Are his fans ashamed of that phase or what? I found that naughty part of his career was so much fun. He could not have and should not have gone on with it much longer than he did. He changing to “Poove Unakaga” phase at the right moment is basically why his career survived. But why not acknowledge it as the fun phase that it was?
LikeLike
e221
November 2, 2018
I agree with Rahini on this except one point. This video is really at BR’s level. A lot of thinking and hard work went into the script. It has a string of ideas that keeps coming and none of the same ideas are repeated. My only suggestion is to see if its possible to put this kind of effort and thinking on more talented and interesting artists than Vijay. What about a Video on Vijay Sethupathi or Fahat Faasil? To be honest, Its an amazing video with lots of ideas!
LikeLike
mailmanju
November 2, 2018
I sincerely hope Sivakarthikeyan does not inherit the ‘Ilaya’ thalapathi title.. He seems to be going the same direction though.
LikeLike
therag
November 2, 2018
Every industry has their cash cows. Vijay/Ajith and their fake rivalry is Tamil cinema’s cash cow. Showbiz is all about hype and Vijay basically lucked out with the timing.
People mostly watch what they are told to watch – the must-watch, don’t miss, forget-right-after movie this week. In Hollywood, this slot is currently filled by Marvel, whose mediocre films inexplicably make billions of dollars. Marvel is in that sweet spot where they benefit from the network effect and the Fear-of-missing-out. They know they can dish out some crap with some stupid jokes, and as long as the movie is light and inoffensive the people will turn up and the critics won’t mind. Disney as a whole is probably an example of this. While bankrolling Marvel initially was a huge risk, their films (even outside of Marvel) are mostly bland and politically correct. In other words, they make safe movies.
Vijay/Sivakarthikeyan films are as big as they are because of FOMO. I don’t think they have enough “fans” to get a 300Cr gross, but they have a critical mass of fans across all demographics to get them an opening and then FOMO takes over. The film industry does not care that they cannot act to save their lives and their products are turds. They see $$$ and do whatever they can to drum up the hype. Vijay makes mostly safe movies that are guaranteed to make $$$.
This Vijay-Ajith rivalry could have been a Vikram-Surya rivalry. But Vikram mostly squandered his opportunities and I don’t know Surya’s current position in the industry. Oh well.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Honest Raj
November 4, 2018
mailmanju: I sincerely hope Sivakarthikeyan does not inherit the ‘Ilaya’ thalapathi title.. He seems to be going the same direction though.
Sure, he deserves far better!
LikeLike
meera
November 5, 2018
Rahini: obviously am not expecting anything on that level but along the lines of what you have commented. No mention about earlier movies, middle phase… maybe am expecting an analysis but this is just a fan bite… that could be the issue 😐
LikeLiked by 1 person
Bore Adikuthu
November 14, 2018
People are taking this video a lot more seriously than it made clear it was supposed to be. It doesn’t care about going into depth or psychoanalyzing Vijay’s so-called “film career.” It’s just a 10 minute fangirl moment for Vijay fans to share to their friends.
On the other hand, though I can accept that this girl likes such a useless actor for some typical reason, how the hell are his roles diverse? A typical Vijay role calls for three main things:
cuteness
manly action
some half-assed connect to mainstream culture
Splitting these things into three roles for Mersal did not diversify or change his acting portfolio in any way. I’d like to know when Vijay hasn’t performed in a role reminiscent of what he’s been milking again and again for his entire career.
LikeLiked by 2 people