Spoilers ahead…
Read the full review on Film Companion, here: https://www.filmcompanion.in/petta-movie-review-karthik-subbaraj-rajinikanth-simran-anirudh-tirru-trisha-vijay-sethupathi/
One way to view Karthik Subbaraj’s Petta (Neighbourhood) is to treat it as Rajinikanth’s Petta. Superstar is in super form, and it’s a thrill to be reminded — in this age of disposable stardom — of enduring screen charisma. To hook you with a look at this age, at this stage of his career — you can forgive any number of Baba-s and Lingaa-s. He’s lit beautifully, and the heightened pace of his movement (something we missed in his recent films) brings to mind the Rajinikanth of old, when he spoke so fast that the words sometimes tumbled and merged into one another like socks in a washing machine. A lot of this, I bet, also has to do with the director, a self-confessed fanboy. When the rest of us saw Lingaa and decided we didn’t give, um, a dam, he tweeted: “#Lingaa is a 3hr emotional talk between thalaivar and a fan who was heart broken when he was ill.Others won’t get it.HE is back & We luv him” One way to view Petta, then, is simply as a shrine to a star, by a fan. Others won’t get it.
And what a shrine it is, harking back to the very first “Rajini moment”, when a newcomer flung open those gates in Apoorva Raagangal. In Petta, Rajinikanth plays a hostel warden, and his name is Kaali, which is to this actor what “Vijay” is to Amitabh Bachchan. The cigarette toss makes a smashing return, as does the “paambu” joke. The sun-splattered lighting scheme appears to be an homage to Thalapathy. A watch sales and service store goes by the name of “Muthu”. The nunchaku bits bring to mind Paayum Puli. My favourite nod, though, has to be Anirudh’s number, Marana mass. It isn’t till the end of the film that you realise the song is a tribute to (and an extension of) a famous Rajini number that was equally percussion-heavy and also sung by SP Balasubrahmanyam.
Continued at the link above.
Copyright ©2019 Film Companion.
Baradwaj Rangan 
SingaRoma
January 10, 2019
Ipdi panna “apdi pannirikkalaame!”… apdi panna “konjam ipdiyum pannirukkalaame!” …. there’s no doubt the hardcore rajni fans are super satisfied with the movie. And this is exactly the core set that was never satisfied with any movie after Padayappa IMHO
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Ramesh
January 10, 2019
I kind of expected this…its nearly impossible to make a good Rajini film today..by good film i just mean good entertainment..Many of my friends were super excited about the the prospect of Rajini-Karthik Subburaj combo.. but i had this gut feeling that it wont work.People felt he shoudnt work with the likes of KS ravikumar and he should consider young directors.They were excited about Ranjith..then they felt Karthik Subburaj.None of these worked out as expected.As a fan i would expect to Rajini to rest.
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Ramesh
January 10, 2019
@BR I would like you to do your fav top 10 Rajini films
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Sri Prabhuram
January 10, 2019
Well then, let’s see if Viswasam can be any better.
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Anil
January 10, 2019
Petta – Scene-after-scene build-up Mania for Rajini. The plot never throws a challenge or conflict. Antagonists were scared and ridiculed.The final twist ridicules the compassion factor of viewer. Karthik Subbaraj might pat himself as smart-screenwriter but he should realize that by than half the viewers walked out presuming film ended. They literally are bored by then and they care little about how things end then on. The Fan-boy in Karthik Subbaraj has eaten away sensible storyteller. (Buildup > Conflict) Nawazuddin & Vijay Sethupathi were wasted and In fact everyone is wasted including Karthik Subbaraj himself. Anuridh’s BGM needs a specialist post-mortem by itself.
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Anu
January 10, 2019
I really liked this movie. I thought the first half was a good set up n it brought to the fore all that we have been missing. Regarding Nawazuddin I think the intention was for him to be small, meek forgettable and not a match – for his actions to therefore have been a surprise. Rajini and Malik did not think of getting rid of him Cos they thought he wld just run off. N this is why he worked for me.
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Marcus
January 10, 2019
#BumbleBee … Anyone seen it here?
Bumblebee’s Ending Explained
Charlie came to the realization that Bumblebee had a greater purpose beyond being her friend and, overlooking the Golden Gate Bridge, said her farewell to him.
After saying goodbye, Bumblebee goes on to scan a 1977 Chevrolet Camaro – his form when he meets Sam (Shia LaBeouf) in the first Transformers film, which this film is set before.
Just as the director Travis Knight is credited, we cut to two sequences.
The first is Bumblebee being reunited with his master and friend Optimus Prime in a forest, when Optimus reveals that more of their Autobot allies are heading to Earth – we then see them entering the Earth’s atmosphere.
Finally, we see Charlie once more, where she finally finishes working on the Corvette car that she and her beloved late father had been working on together. The final shot is Charlie driving off into the sunset in her car.
https://www.mirror.co.uk/film/bumblebee-ending-explained-post-credits-13828569
So effectively, Knight loops it back to the first Transformer film, making #BumbleBee a perfect retro spin-off in some ways.
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aiswaryasea
January 10, 2019
The review also seems to be rushed, came here to be BRfied. Always come back to the review for beautiful sense of reflection , disappointed ! Common man can make those Ram exile connections, expect more BR.
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jewelsofsayuri
January 10, 2019
“The only actor capable of taking Superstar on is… Superstar himself” is not something that I agree with. Ramya Krishnan and Raghuvaran were great matches too
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Sakkaravarthi Kaliannan
January 10, 2019
OK this is completely unrelated but Mr. Baradwaj please join Letterboxd.
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krishna prasad
January 10, 2019
Guess this was one movie I was looking forward to as much as your reviews. Think this will be the last of such a movie for the last of the superstars. Doubt there will be any other such movie by the superstar and of course there s not gonna be another superstar. The movie scene has completely changed, to first maketh a superstar and then celebrate him. So one shud simply enjoy the feeling of being witness to sometime special.
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Anuja Chandramouli
January 10, 2019
I really really loved Petta. And it has been too long since I said this about a Rajni film. As a lapsed Rajni fan (when you act in one Shankar film too many it happens), it was nice to go right back to the Annamalai, Baasha phase when I was a proper Rajni fanatic. Guess, you have to be that person to truly appreciate Petta. The first half was absolutely rocking and I love how ‘Marana mass’ it was. Not since Dhil, Dhool and Dhilli has a tamil filmmaker made such a sumptuous, masala feast of a film. So kudos to Karthik Subburaj for that. In the theatre where I was watching Petta, we were all infected with Rajni fever and were cheering, screaming ourselves hoarse for every single scene. It was such an amazing cinematic experience and an incredibly special one. Rajni is one actor who has always made me laugh and cry along with his characters and I became completely nuts about Kaali (Petta Velan). Bless you Karthik Subburaj for giving us our Thalaivar back.
It is so annoying that people go on and on about his style which is dazzling of course, and forget that the man is one of the greatest actors of all time. I don’t think there is an actor who is as sublimely effervescent and effective as he is in any film industry. Examine just about any scene in Petta and you will see what I mean.
The second half worked very well for me but on a different level. It was great to see Subburaj’s unique little quirks, eccentricities and flair on full display. There is a funeral scene which was insanely good, strangely moving and bad ass as well! Loved every scene with Rajini and the terrific VJS. I thought Nawazuddin did a fantastic job as well and was a really intriguing character. What a treat it is to see Rajni cross swords with behemoths like VJS and Nawazuddin. In retrospect, the editing could have been tighter but with Rajini in such amazing form, who cares? We fans simply cannot get enough of this Rajni! Hope he does more films like this.
I am on such a Petta high and can hardly wait to watch the film again and again. And again.
PS: Did I mention that I really really loved Petta?
PPS: BR! How could you go to a Rajni film and hope to get Subburajfied? Are you kidding me Sir?
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Chenthu
January 10, 2019
I was definitely satisfied with the movie mainly because it didn’t try to hard. I felt kabali and kaala failed trying to potray the actor Rajini and the entertainer Rajini at once whereas here it was outright the swagger Rajini. It was no-nonsense, plain and you see is what you get kinda movie. I really liked the Nawazudin Siddiqui character as well, it really felt lifelike giving the glimpses of Raman Ragav (not so psychotic) a coward but a ruthless cunning fox.
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sabman
January 11, 2019
The Morricone score seemed apt to me because the first half felt like a western with an outsider coming into a remote town and using violence to set things right. Even Rajini’s dialogue about wife children sentiment was reminiscent of Clint Eastwood in Unforgiven: “Any man I see out there, I’m gonna kill him! Any sonofabitch takes a shot at me.. I’m not only gonna kill him, I’m gonna kill his wife, all his friends, and burn his damn house down!l
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zapbrox
January 11, 2019
BR: You had mentioned that your review ratings are not relative to other movies, but rather its about what the film and the filmmaker set out to achieve and how well they accomplished it. The director had clearly stated that this is a tribute to Thalaivar with a mix of his signature touch but at the end of the day it was going to be an out and out Rajini film. In that regard, the first half of the movie was Rajinification at its finest and the second half had both Rajinification and a bit of Subbarajification. Yet your title itself starts with more of your expectations than what the director was going for. Even going by your review and how the film turned out, one would say that the director did achieve what he set out to do and the the film would comfortably land at 3 stars. Being a Rajini fan myself (Not the type that likes Lingaa or a Baba), the first half of the movie was one of the most fun times I have had at the movies watching a Rajini film.The slow build up and the tension increasing 30 minutes prior to an interval block that ended on an absolute high.
And you mentioned about socks getting merged into one another, can you tell me the brand of that washing machine…:)
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jaga_jaga
January 11, 2019
The final twist (unraveled in the last scene) is typical Karthik Subbaraj showing off!
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Chandra Prakash
January 11, 2019
Can any one comment how does this fan boy’s attempt compares to Gautham menon’s handling of his idol Kamal Hasan’s Vettaiyaadu Vilaiyaadu ( although GVM is not as hard core fan of his idol as K Subbaraj is about his idol), I thought GVM did a reasonably good job on Kamal Hasan bringing a a decent movie out of KH after sometime.
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Ashwini
January 11, 2019
I somehow feel you work very hard to keep a dilike or bias against Rajini from creeping up in your reviews of his films. I found it disappointing that you reviewed the movie as the director’s fan than the super star’s. While appreciate your efforts to to be neutral, not so much for ur rating. Living abroad, the folks left the theater dancing and in jubilation. That says much more about the movie.
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brangan
January 11, 2019
zapbrox: Well, the film makes it clear that it’s not just a simple Rajini homage (which is why it’s always better to see what the film actually is than what the director claims it is). Had it been a “regular” Rajini-style 90s film, there would have been a duet or two, some solid emotional development in the flashback scenes (which are now played with a half-wink, lile that great “should we kill him?” scene).
Hence my contention that KS is not all there… the second half is definitely a KS film and not just a Rajini film — it’s both, which is why it works much better for me.
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Siva
January 11, 2019
Marcus: #BumbleBee … Anyone seen it here? ”
Yep. Last night at Palazzo IMAX.
Loved it. And ‘I am in love(!)’ with the cute as a button plus a terrific performer that is Hailee Steinfeld ❤
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Siva
January 11, 2019
BR: ” When the rest of us saw Lingaa and decided we didn’t give, um, a dam, he tweeted: …. ”
We did not just ‘not give’ a ‘damn’, but a ‘dam’ — because K.S.Ravikumar’s Lingaa builds a ‘dam’ !!!! 😉
Pun received 😛
Saar …. Enna Oru Buddhisaaliththanam! 😀 😀
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Siva
January 11, 2019
So, in the past, I have read this guy’s reviews and have thought, okay — may be he is verrry strict :@
But now, I honestly have a genuine question to the lot of you here:
Is this guy legit? How do I interpret this?
He gives Petta a scathing review — with a rating of 1/5 — complete with a full on Rajinikanth bashing.
https://www.news18.com/news/movies/petta-movie-review-rajinikanths-gimmicky-journey-is-a-yawning-bore-1997851.html
And then somehow not satisfied yet, he goes on twitter/facebook and posts the following:
Uhhhh …. what? o.O :O
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V
January 11, 2019
To those who really liked the film – the reactions may be slightly different when one watches it after the initial weekend (unless of course you are the kind of fan that got Rajnified even before the film started).
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V
January 11, 2019
Chandra Prakash: Kamal fans are never the Subburajesque type (contrary to Rajni’s) and it is a Kuruthipunal that would get more patronage than a Singaravelan (oh that reminds me: Singaravelan was when RV Udhayakumar made a similar claim as Karthik Subburaj – to have brought back the handsome Kamal of yore!!)
So GVM’s take was quite balanced – where the villains did get one-up on Raghavan, more than once.
Ranjith, who tried to show a vulnerable Rajni, still gets trolled by his fans, so it appears that one can never attempt that on the Super star. Infact way back, Nattuku Oru Nallavan was panned by fans mainly for the scene where when the villains molest Khushbu, Rajni doesnt swoop in to save her, but gives her empowering instructions to defend herself. (Trust me – this was brought up in so many reviews and opinions as a weak point in the film) And then Rajni, who had no other go, went on to do Mannan.
I dont know, but Ive always liked level-headed tributes. A wheezing Amitabh in Khakee seemed more heroic to me, than the swaggering Bbuddah Hoga Tera Baap AB! It is because people dont accept Rajni as a flesh-and-blood mortal, do they rip him apart for some of his off-screen decisions & unfairly so. Paavam avaru! This film is going to do wonders to his already exemplary brand. However it is going to make him more vulnerable in real life. (Latest: looks like he gave reporters the slip when questioned on his Political foray & this finds mention as a nakkal comment on an FM channel this morning!)
His next is with Murugadas – konjam kannu kattudhu.
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praneshp
January 11, 2019
@chandraprakash: Speaking as a rajni fan as well as a lover of Karthik Subburaj movies, the first half was outstanding in what it sets out to do: get us Rajnified. If that’s what you are looking for, this is the movie you want to go to, it scores a centum in this regard.
I loved everything KS has made so far, but to go into this movie expecting it to have the elements that make him a good director is a fool’s errand. The director pretty much states outright in the first frame that it’s a tribute to the superstar.
As a lover of GVM movies but not KH so much, my opinion is that this is a better attempt than VV. I associate Kamal with movies like Hey Ram and Virumandi, VV doesn’t really stand alongside those.
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krishna prasad
January 11, 2019
@siva, I too was very surprised reading it but was not sure whether to get it to this thread another critics opinion. As they say ‘ to each his own’. But I’ve read some of his other reviews and have hardly come across a good word for anyone. Just reminded me of my English lecturer in college, in whose class,the highest score never used to exceed 50/💯. Am not a die hard fan of any actor/director but one should give credit where it’s due. (Of course there will always be personnes, critic r not, who think they are the only ones right and remaining couple of millions aren’t)
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hari
January 11, 2019
Spoilers ahead
Not that it matters in a Rajni movie, why does Petta wait 20 years to take revenge?
Final twist was just meh, why oh why? Nothing would have changed without the twist other than to say Petta is a nallavan aana avalavu nallavan illai.
I felt pity for all the other characters in the movie. All the other characters were just “sullans” in front of the superstar. VJS made to look like a adiyaal was such a downer for me.
Nawazuddin looked like he moved directly from the sets of Sacred Games right into this set.
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Enigma
January 11, 2019
@Siva, Gautam Bhaskaran was kicked out of The Hindu as he plagiarised a western critic’s review of Alexander and posted it as his. The guy has no credibility.
LikeLiked by 3 people
Voldemort
January 11, 2019
While I do not have a clue about this person Gautaman Bhaskaran, he’d do well to say “Petta”, not “Peta”. Peta (or rather PETA) is a joke of an animal welfare organization.
Read that 2nd tweet in that context, and boy, was it hilarious! 😛
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Voldemort
January 11, 2019
Oh and as for the third tweet, I think, after such a long time in cinema, it is difficult for any actor to disappear in a role at all. Amitabh Bachhan, Rajinikanth, Kamal Hassan or any actor who has been doing movies for decades – however nuanced they try to make each portrayal or show variations in their acting style, it will ultimately remind you of at least one film in their long oeuvre. Moreover, when a lot of actors play parts that are close to their offscreen persona, it is impossible to just forget the actor and focus on the role.
Looks like this person is doing this for negative publicity, because that, in the end, is also publicity.
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abishekspeare
January 11, 2019
Am I the only person who got the thalapathy reference in the scene where rajini is travelling in a train with a newborn baby wrapped in a towel? XD
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Prasad
January 11, 2019
hmmm, sounds like a half hearted review. was truly expecting a more elaborate review considering the “specalities” the movie is..
LikeLiked by 1 person
meera
January 12, 2019
Rangan sir.. this review somewhat dismissed the movie.. not fair and not done!
Petta was marana mass… no doubt about that. But there were several key points and rajnis acting was top notch! The director has not been blinded by the star but has used his stardom to propel the movie forward. My only qualm about the movie was VJS. He is a terrific actor but in this movie he looks almost resigned and he has to work on his body language. When VJS and Rajni share screen space we automatically focus on rajni so Vijay Sethupathi has to work on his facial muscles to make us move our eyes but it seems like he doesn’t even want to try. I was most disappointed about this lack of performance. Because of the story several characters get left behind but they work well within their space and are weaved in and out appropriately. All in all this was a total entertainment and perfect 10 Thalaivar movie!!!
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mrinalnarayan
January 12, 2019
Petta is that huge Rajini cut-out in Albert theater that has Subbaraj’s sambavams glittering on it.
Felt, “Getha Nadandhu varaan, Gate eh ellam kadandhu varaan” is like the pillayar suzhi for Rajinikanth references, giving a nod to his debut shot in Aboorva Raagangal.
Like @abhishekspare pointed, I too felt a Chinna Thayaval reference with the newborn baby in the train. I feel that can be taken as the vintage Rajini ending and 90s version starting, the flashback also comes to end at that point.
There are also few nods to Subbaraj’s movies — The villain remarrying a widow with the kid (Jigarthanda) which was a nod to Thalapathy, so it becomes a nod within a nod.
Like the review says, I also wish I saw more of Simran and Trisha like how Ranjith handles his female leads. Simran here could totally ask “Unnai ondru ketpaen, unmai solla vendum. Ennai summa aada sonnal, Enna aada thondrum?!” to the director. Malavika Mohanan managed to shine a bit with what was given.
Petta in a nutshell —> https://twitter.com/ennabravopo/status/1072702231730782209?s=19
Reintroducing Rajinikanth by Karthik Subbaraj. I still haven’t figured out how to embed tweets on WordPress.
Wouldn’t it be interesting if something like this gets made with Kamal as well — a tribute film. Karka Karka Raghavan blended with Sakthivel from Thevar Magan and it’s better if someone else does it instead of Kamal himself 😛
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Honest Raj
January 12, 2019
I kinda expected this from you. When Rajini made Lingaa, people wanted him to play his age and do sensible movies. When he made back to back films with Ranjith, you were not happy because the filmmaking was not upto the mark. I’m not even going to talk about 2.0 (knowing your love for Shankar). Perhaps, it’s burnol moment for that sickular actor and his fans. 🙂
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petta paraak
January 12, 2019
I LOVED Petta! What a lovingly made film and a massive massive tribute to two things – the icon of Rajinikanth and Thalapathy. I caught so many Thalapathy references (lighting, BGM reworked from Thalapathy BGM in multiple scenes with Nawaz in it, scene after scene paying homage to Thalapathy – the ponnu kekura scene, Malik dying just like Deva. No wonder KS said thanks to Mani Ratnam in opening credits). No misogyny, no cringe – women never put in trouble to showcase hero’s bravado (instead, it was the men or both men and women). Fan or not, can’t help but enjoy all the Rajini movie refs – I had a total blast. Best mass movie eva!!!! If THIS doesn’t work well at BO, I don’t know what to say.
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Selva Ganapathy V
January 12, 2019
BR: This is going to be a long one. But I can’t help myself. Please do reply. I am utterly disappointed that critics have only managed to scratch the surface of the film in their reviews. Not a single mention of the possible symbolisms in the film. To truly appreciate this film, we need to give the filmmaker the benefit of the doubt. Is it not better to assume that all the elements in the film were purposefully put there rather than dismissing them as half-hearted subplots? Shouldn’t we try to find a unifying thread that the filmmaker may have given us? I did notice such a thread. I would like to know what you think about it.
I feel Petta is a meta film about the state of mainstream Tamil films and filmmakers. It is about how violent mass films have taken over Tamil cinema, dehumanising the audience. And how Rajinikanth returns as the guardian angel of whatever good is left in mainstream cinema.
This way, the half-hearted subplot about ragging could actually be about the struggle young filmmakers face when coming into the film fraternity. And the half-hearted subplot about the canteen contract could be a metaphor. Where he compares cooking to filmmaking. “Love oda samaikanum!”. And half-hearted subplot about the love triangle is more about two types of filmmakers. Ones who love it and ones who just desire it. Anwar I feel symbolises filmmakers who make films for the love of it. Rajinikanth asks him ” Appo nee love kaagadhaan vandha? Padikka varala?” to which Anwar responds “Aama”. Michael on the other hand is jealous of Anwar’s love for cinema. He is even seen copying in an exam which could be interpreted as stealing scripts. And the half-hearted subplot about sand smuggling could be about power struggle over control of Tamil cinema landscape. It could be that Rajapandi represents filmmakers during director Mahendran’s period who made traditional art films with empathy. And his two sons Devaaram and Singaram represent filmmakers who tried to take over by making mass films with violence. They lack empathy. They only want to conquer. His daughter poongodi on the other hand carries her father’s traits. Rajapandi is okay with their sons taking over the land as long as they do not kill Poongodi (meaning if they let art films survive). They kill Rajapandi, hence ending the art film era. Rajinikanth helps poongodi and Maalik get married. Which could mean Rajinikanth was able to combine traditional cinema and violence successfully in his films. And he conquers the land.
The massacre at the family function could be interpreted as traditional values being destroyed by violence. Hence wiping Rajinikanth out of the picture (This is probably during the time of Baba).
The childbirth in the train could be the birth of a new generation of filmmakers. Someone asks Rajini “Paiyan amma maathiriya illa Appa mathiriya?”. This leaves Rajinikanth worried. They decide to raise the child without being told of his past (Without exposure to violent films).
Singaram becoming powerful could be mass films taking over cinema. His two sons representing two types of mass films. Arjith represents social message films and Jithu represents violent gangster films. Which is clearly spelled out when Shanmugam introduces these characters. Singaram wants Anwar killed so as to destroy all hopes of good cinema.
Meanwhile Rajinikanth has spent 20 years away from the mass hero scenes. (Could be since Padayappa 1999). He has been trying to get over his past. He says to Mangalam “Kadandhu poradhudhane vaazhke”. I feel Mangalam (The half-hearted heroine) represents spirituality. Rajinikanth’s new love. She restores his youth and cures his headaches.
It’s not until Anwar is touched, does Rajinikanth become a mass hero again. He gathers all his students in a hall and says the next two hours they will be locked in this hall and that he is taking control. He is talking to the audience i guess (Theatre? Hall?). This is when Petta (The movie within the movie) begins.
When he decides to take revenge (conquer mainstream again), the district collector (Guru Somasundaram) warns him that his oponents have become too big and a defeat could be devastating (This is if the movie Petta fails). It’s pretty clear what they are talking about. Now Rajinikanth takes Anwar along on the ride. It is only fitting that Shanmugam, played by Karthik Subbaraj’s father, provides ammunition for the mission. In a shoot out scene Rajinikanth says to Anwar “Onnum illada kuzhandhe bayappudaadha”. I guess even we would react to violence the way Anwar does, if we weren’t already exposed to such violence in mainstream films.
Rajinikanth needs Jithu (Violence in movies) on his side if he is to get back on top. So he does that by Karthik Subbaraj’s oldest trick in the book – Soozhchi (A twist). It felt like KS is letting us know how he has to resort to violence and twists for the movie to compete with other mainstream films. Also we see Singaram becoming increasingly anxious towards the end. This is to show how other mainstream films fear a Rajinikanth film. And how easy it is for Rajinikanth to destroy other mainstream films if he resorts to violence in his films. Rajini even says to Jithu in the end “Nee udhavi panni irukka. Aana neeyum vesham dhaan. Unna vechikalaama? Mudichidalaama?”. Meaning violence has helped Rajinikanth a lot over the years. But does he need it anymore? Is Petta enough? That’s for the audience to decide.
I could go on describing every dialogue that adds to this narrative, but that would be overkill. I’ve just tried to lay down a different interpretation of the film which ties everything together. Having rewatched the film several times, I would say this is not the only other possible thread. It has a religious layer which explores christianity and judaism in the first half, islam in the flash back and hinduism in the final third. My favorite Hindu symbolism was when Rajinikanth and Jithu walk across a Lord Shiva statue with a tamed snake around his neck. I guess you get the idea. There is also an obvious political interpretation of the film. And to make all of this work simultaneously is brilliant. This movie needs multiple watching to understand the depth and subtleties in the performance of the actors. To understand how the director kept spoon feeding hints for you to figure out the twist. The twist is not the reveal but the explanation. People who say they figured out the twist probably missed it.
I had to get this out because I am fed up with people saying stuff like
“I am a Karthik Subbaraj fan. But I am disappointed.”
“It’s more of a Rajini film than a Karthik Subbaraj film”
“Karthik Subbaraj takes a back seat in this film”
I feel this film deserves to be discussed beyond the surface.
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Jetlagged
January 12, 2019
“I can’t think of many actors who can play a convincing antagonist to Rajinikanth. The only actor capable of taking Superstar on is… Superstar himself”
The biggest antagonist who can make us root for thalaivar is “vidhi” – something that is beyond everyone’s control, like muthu’s/surya’s(thalapathy) problem of identity in his birth itself, arunachalams fate of earning back his legacy (and identity) by entering a ridiculous wager, a childhood friend from a different economic background growing up to be a different person in annamalai…..These are life situations that we can relate to and know is beyond anyone’s control and we felt good watching how thalaivar could overcome all that. Basha was of course an exception of screen play genius and a strong antagonist. Loved petta. But still waiting for that film where situation itself is the villain, where he grapples with the challenge that fate has thrown to him. Looks like that’s happening to him in real life.
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Varsha
January 12, 2019
Warning: Spoilers ahead!
The big twist at the end – so typical in KS movies – did not work for me because I found the confrontation scene between Jithu and Singaaram so disappointingly unconvincing! A scheming rat like Singaaram, IMO, would have reacted a lot differently than what the character in the film does, given that Jithu is actually his own son! I would expect him to have sensed the impending danger and taken preventive measures. That would have made the revenge drama much more interesting. Instead, we get a watered-down reaction that spoils all the potential fun in the big reveal!
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Ramesh
January 13, 2019
@Selva Ganapathy….Thanks for providing a different perspective…I’m going for the 2nd time today ..and ur post will certainly help me in seeing things I missed the first time
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VIvek
January 13, 2019
Petta is a total blast! Karthik Subbaraj has delivered what is exactly needed, not just to us fans but perhaps to Rajini himself – and that might be the belief that Rajini still has it in him to elevate a simple movie to a blockbuster! In my opinion, Ranjith reduced Rajini to a tired old man and Shankar made him a prop in his grand set pieces. This is the single most wholesome Rajini entertainer since Padaiyappa and somehow everything felt..natural. Karthik’s wit is seem everywhere in not taking things too seriously and this is where Shankar I think failed Rajini. All of his Rajini films seem to take Rajini too seriously and humor seemed put on. Just try watching the funny parts of Sivaji and even Enthiran, the humor is not easy (Shankar has far more success with others, especially Kamal in this area). I think Shankar was pressuring himself that make the biggest and grandest Rajini films possible that he failed to connect (with me at least) on the very basic things that makes Rajini click. Karthik Subbaraj has pulled off an incredible feat considering he openly puts it out as a fanboy’s tribute. This could have so easily become a snoozefest of hero worship but it has turned to be the movie that fans have longed for! Heck, Rajini has enjoyed himself, it is clear!
As for someone stating about Lingaa that Rajini should do more age appropriate films, sorry you don’t quite get the pulse of what makes Rajini! He is not Amitabh, he doesn’t have to be, we adore Rajini for the way he lights up the screen, that’s it – pure, raw charisma! Please don’t squash that. There are plenty of others who do appropriate roles and we do celebrate those actors! This is Rajini, there isn’t going to be another one!
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Abc
January 13, 2019
@Selva Ganapathy V Terrific interpretations, I definitely agree that there are multiple layers to the movie.
Another meta detail I loved was the battle between VJS the actor (Nawaz’s son) and VJS the star (Rajini’s son)
And I bet if there is a analysis made Karthick Subaraj may have just referenced every Rajini movie. A frame, music, character, something. He even touched 2.0 with Simran’s aura reference.
I could watch this movie again and again. For the funeral scene, the frame with Rajini and VJS stepping out of a van and so many other brilliant moments.
It’s a fitting tribute to the one, the only one. When he says,” indhe aatam poduma kozhandai?”
(slightly teary eyed and with his trademark smile). I choked up a little bit, we just cannont have enough!
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e221
January 13, 2019
Honestly, the people who rave about the Rajnism in this movie honestly don’t get why Rajnism worked not just with fans but with a mainstream audience as well. The style, the dialogues, The comedy, The power all were there but it all complimented a powerful story that evokes a strong emotional response from the audience. Rajnism was never the core of any movie. A strong story with powerful supporting characters and Rajnism really lit up all the portion of the film which otherwise would have been an ordinary film. Take Siva. Even the flopped Pandian, Pannakaran, Dharma durai etc. Rajni movies were always about relationships. Take Annamalai, Muthu etc. The writing takes time to establish the relationship, make the audience connect to the character so when there is a problem to the relation, the audience can connect more. This is always the framework in any successful or memorable Rajni films including Murattu kaalai.
The irony here is KS is master of emotions. For instance, Mercury’s climax is so emotional and touching. But there is no such emotional connect here. This is such a disappointment. Can anyone name one memorable character in the film? One memorable scene? emotional scene? There was some occasional spark like the scene between Petta and Anwar before killing Singarams brother. You remove the first half and still u won’t miss anything with the story at all which means KS sacrificed an entire first half for the sake of fanboyism. That never happened any Rajni movie ever before.
What KS has done is he took just the style, ignored this substance/framework and made a film just for himself and the fans. But he gave the least focus on writing the supporting characters and establishing the relationship connect. Result? For the first time in 22 years, KS has done what even Linga did not do to Rajni..Petta was beaten at the domestic box office by a Non-Kamal film. Rajnikanth is always a king of Box office in all centers not just A center alone. Right now its not obvious but in the coming days it will be very obvious specifically @ b and C centers.
VJS told in an interview that he has blind faith in KS. After this movie, Its better for VJS career if he stopped acting KS films because KS still treats VJS like a short film actor who can act than a star who can perform. If he continues to act in KS movies, then he will become a short film actor again and others will start treating him the same.
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R. Ramalakshmi
January 13, 2019
There two kinds of great actors – the Rajini type and the Vijay Sethupathi/nawasuddin siddique type…ones larger than life magnetic presence where HE is the character he is playing… and the other is able to so well flesh out the screen persona that he becomes the character…Its been awhile a director got it right – to cull out the Rajininess and exaggerate it by juxtaposing against the character which portrays a kind of everydayness (in persona not typology) with so much conviction (of Vijay Sethupathi)…. what you get on screen Is Rajini (of the masses) vs Jithu…
There were many meta moments in the movie I really enjoyed – the tragic comedy-esque fate of the characters alluded to by the mickey mouse sketches… and the arch-villain looking on is Pette (punning on Pete the nemesis of Mickey Mouse?); Ofcourse the allusion to Ramayanam as pointed out; references to vaanara kootam and Singaram (siddique) seated like a monkey when Kaali enters his room;.juxtaposing Kaali and Singaram, perhaps an allusion to Kaali from Mullum Malarum who dotes on his sister (in Petta a sister-like poongodi); hates kumaran(singaram/Kumaran-both synonyms of murgan) also shot in the hills of Ooty?! …
the other interesting references are thalapathi like train scene where a child is born…where there is a frame of rajinikanth looking pensive (almost like he is looking back as kaali at surya)…many ‘self-referential’ moments in the details for a Rajini fan. These details themselves becomes a tribute to him.
Ofcourse there are many ifs and buts in the movie…we could stop reducing our female roles to parochial moments of a sisterly/motherly/wifey character in need of ‘protection’ and abandoning them without any closure… reduce excessive stunts. also I wish Rajini movie were less crowded… in terms of characters there is very little space – physical or otherwise, to flesh them all out with justice…
But the movie is mass and how! One of the last scenes actually captures the spirit of the movie – wherein a character remarks what a great actor he is after Kaali reveals to Jithu that he has been duped into killing his father (stage within a stage moment)… this was as much subburaj the director aswell as subburaj the fan boy’s tribute to his star (the opening titles proclaims the same)…a delightful comeback for Rajini.
R.Ramalakshmi ( 2 part Rajini and 1part Karthick Subburaj fan!)
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Rahini David
January 13, 2019
Filial Piety is the hugest Rajini Antagonist of all time. None of the Vidhi is inevitable. Mr. Barath, Arunachalam, Thalapathy, Mannan, Velaikaran, Annamalai to name a few.
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brangan
January 13, 2019
e221: Superb comment. Rajini was never just about the style. It was ALSO the strong, emotional story that was woven around this style.
In this regard, kids who grew up in the 90s typically talk about Baassha, Annamalai etc., but even in the 80s, there was Nallavanukku Nallavan, Netrikann, Pudhukavidhai, Engeyo Ketta Kural etc.
Curious about this line, though:
For the first time in 22 years, KS has done what even Linga did not do to Rajni..Petta was beaten at the domestic box office by a Non-Kamal film.
(1) Haven’t other Rajini films been beaten by non-Kamal films before?
(2) How is Kamal a yardstick, given that — the odd Thevar Magan aside — the box office of his films was always less than Rajini’s films? (eg. Manidhan was a bigger hit than Nayakan, and so forth.)
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Pato
January 13, 2019
e221 : Opening day collection of both the movies have nothing to do with content . Vijay and Ajith command huge fans following among youth who form majority of the opening day crowd. Rajni has lost some of his audience post pa Ranjith movies and his political entry.
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e221
January 13, 2019
@BR..On 1992 Oct 25 both Pandian and Devar Magan Released on the same day. Devar Magan was a super hit and Pandian was a flop. After that to my knowledge, none of the Rajni movies were beaten by any movies that released on the same day.
I cannot bear any more what these KNOW ALL Directors are doing to our favorite Rajni. I cannot Imagine what Could have Pa.Ranjith done to the movie Annamalai? He would have transformed the entire Building Demolition scene into the climax of Kaalam. What could have happened if KS directed Baadshah..He could have chopped off all the Emotional scenes between the stepbrothers/sister, Father and Son etc and Rajni would have torn the coat of Mark Anthony and all the fanboys would be saying “This is a meta-reference to Moondru Mugam where Rajni torn the dress of Sendhamarai”…Mudiyale… Style at the expense of substance..
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Selva Ganapathy V
January 13, 2019
@e221 I guess you haven’t watched any of Karthik Subbaraj’s other films. Watch Iraivi if you want to be emotionally moved. This movie is not supposed to be emotional on the surface level. The whole point of the movie is to show how mass films have become desensitised and how Rajinikanth has to resort to violence and twist to satisfy the audience. “Indha aattam podhuma kozhandhai?”. You guys are missing the whole point. The movie works emotionally below the surface. Its deals with frustrations of Karthik Subbaraj and Rajinikanth about the current state of mainstream films. If the film doesn’t work for you, please try and move on. Avoid slandering a filmmaker because it didn’t work for you. Karthik Subbaraj is among the few who actually love the artform. Mass actors like Rajinikanth and Vijay sethupathi are trying to protect him.
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Hyman Roth
January 13, 2019
Pettai will be sued by vaishnavite acharyas as it is a lift of hiranya kasipu hiranyaksha prahlada narasimha set of stories from baghwadam,with prahlada being the clueless jithu.
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Honest Raj
January 13, 2019
BR: How is Kamal a yardstick, given that — the odd Thevar Magan aside — the box office of his films was always less than Rajini’s films? (eg. Manidhan was a bigger hit than Nayakan, and so forth.)
SKV, TTT, AS and Indian made record collections at the BO for a Tamil film, no?
As for non-Kamal films, Captain’s Ramana was the top-grosser of 2002!
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Honest Raj
January 13, 2019
e221: I cannot Imagine what Could have Pa.Ranjith done to the movie Annamalai?
Annamalai was originally slated to be directed by Vasanth. Surely, KB was far more smarter as a producer than as a director!
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VIvek
January 13, 2019
@BR: At this time, could we request you for an interview with director Suresh Krissna? He made the best Rajini movies in the 90s – Annamalai, Baasha, even Veera. What I always felt was that this guy had the best Rajini moments that were not just mass but cane with oodles of class, dignity, style. P Vasu, K S Ravikumar, and Sundar C could not really match him in this blend.
Baba was his last one but unfortunately that probably turned out that way due to Rajini himself feeling the need to be the maker.
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Akash Balakrishnan
January 13, 2019
@Selva Ganapathy V
That was one big overanalysis. Kudos for the thinking. Feels straight outta of jigarthanda kind of meta narrative. However, ur points make more sense as concepts rather than masterstrokes, IMO. I remember this time when I interpreted Kaatru Veliyidai as a feminist film – Those Bharathiyar references, her dilemma, the details etc- and this seems similar. No offence to ur thinking. But ur point about this being one hell of a artistic expression seems like an exaggeration. There are ways to interpret the bad writing/acting of those small villains could be interpreted as the bad writing found in tamil cinema villains but then someone once said ” A good thing poorly expressed is a lie”. I thought that the excess masculinity in this film could be a commentary. I was unable to tolerate Petta/Kaali as he was continuously bossing around and stuff. I badly wanted to make something out of it. I came across this interview of KS in cinema express where he said “I enjoyed the emotional aspects of Kaala and Kabali but I really missed the Thalaivar bits in them”. He added “I was really disappointed after watching an old Rajini movie. My uncle asked me why. I told him that my idea of Rajini was hurt by making him vulnerable. By making him not save a child and another character. If he can’t save them, how can it be a movie for Thalaivar ?” And there went my theory. This is just a bad movie made by a good filmmaker. Say, like a CCV. To conclude, this was a film written for Rajni, by a Rajni fan for Rajni fans. But I highly doubt that this movie would even work for his fans. I really liked certain bits of his childishness(Not a fan. a 2k kid) but I would say e221 is right in this aspect. One can’t make a film purely out of admiration without a proper story. A lot of talent has been wasted here and it makes me sad. Even the screenplay was lazy. The flashback could’ve been made interesting by not giving away that Poongodi is alive. Many mistakes made out of excitement and enthusiasm. I really hope KS makes a film like Iraivi or Jigarthanda after two boring and mediocre outings like Mercury and Petta. But, I can say this: Ur oveanalysis is actually really interesting. U have a keen eye and a strong mind for films. And.. was I the only one pissed off by those unwanted political jokes(?) ? What is this new trend with everyone trolling someone being trolled just for the sake of it ?
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Akash Balakrishnan
January 13, 2019
PS : The point about the probability of Rajni’s fans not liking this film was with relation to e221’s comment.
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Madan
January 13, 2019
I wonder if this hasn’t been brought up already only because Tamil mass films are already politically loaded to begin with. But this read like Rajni’s 2019 election manifesto to me. Briefa sollanumna, Rajni BaJaPa odda seramaatar, thalaivara nambunga. The secularism, reclaiming inter religious marriage from the love jihad taint, the all out attack on cow belt militancy with ample emphasis on vadagu india. Yes, Rajni is not Ramar but rather the Anjaneyar who will save Tamil Nadu from the North Indian invaders again. Sorry if this was cynicism overload. To be frank, in the current climate, I didn’t wholly mind the message and also appreciated showing eunuchs in a positive light. But all social tokenism aside, I had one serious problem with the climax. SPOILER ALERT
For the whole Rajathanthiram conceit to work, Nawazuddin has to protest again to Vijay that Rajni is lying and not to believe him. His silent resignation to his fate jars when the big reveal comes later. I have not watched KS’ other films but do know he is an acclaimed director, so I frankly could not understand such a big miss from him. I know it is a mass film and all but don’t tell me even this level of plausible denial wasn’t built into earlier Rajni films. It has nothing to do with logic anyway, because it is already illogical that Rajni should so easily convince Vijay that he is not Nawaz’s child. It is about supporting the narrative with the right reactions from the characters and that was missing in the climax.
I also felt KS was not sure whether he had put enough mass in the film and therefore let the climax drag on and on with additional insurance mass dialogues. I kept thinking surely if it’s dragging on then Nawaz must have one last trick up his sleeve but there was nothing and Vijay’s surrender subsequently was also tame. To compare with the film that virtually created the template for Rajni’s 90s mass hysteria films, Badshah had all the mass but was also taut and never let up in intensity (like the metal show I attended yesterday :D). This one kinda lost the momentum towards the end. I think this problem first started with Padayappa where the climax was again bloated to give ample space for Rajni mass dialogue + stunts. A good political lesson from this for Rajni could be: don’t just think about the core base, try to convert the swing vote also.
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Arun Annamalai
January 14, 2019
@brangan’s review and @e221’s comments hit the nail on the head. It was not a perfect mix of rajinism and plot development in script. It is like a food item where the gravy and veggies are separate and we do not get the perfect blend due to half hearted villian characters and no solid consistent character graphs. Also the long screen time shows bloatedness and no discipline to cut out scenes to make it a tighter movie. When you get the feeling when the movie would end you know the director has messed up along the way.
Petta delivers on true star charisma and what we have been missing in star masala movies, can never fathom how Vijay and Ajith are called super stars, despite ones looks and dancing abilities, come on it is dialogue delivery, panache and conveying so much power and attitude with just a walk, look and gesture. This is way better than Mersal and Vivegam as a star movie. SPOILERS AHEAD: could not buy into VJS climax plot twist as i felt they could have just left him as his son the way it was delivered.
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Aadhy
January 14, 2019
I now believe no one can handle Rajini better than Karthik Subbaraj, at this point. It’s not about the dozens of easter eggs, homages, references to past Rajni movies and drowning the audience in the sea of nostalgia. I think he has cracked how to sell the superstar Rajini, at a time where he’s not just become bigger than any villain, but also any story. The audience are neither going to buy a vulnerable Rajini (ex. Kabali, Kaala) , nor is there any villain menacing enough to convince us about inflicting serious damage to the superstar. Endhiran is not a good example of Rajini being a good antagonist because we had to endure an absolutely life-less, colorless, boring Vaseegaran and an expression-less Chitti as protagonists, to finally enjoy Rajini cutting loose as 2.0.
Stories from his biggest hits in the 80s and 90s (even Basha) have either not really aged well or have been done to death. In today’s times, a strong story would consist of solid supporting characters and their arcs, which means having a considerable amount of scenes where Rajini isn’t present. But the most common criticism of Petta has been that the second half (where other characters did have screen time) is not as mass as the first half, or also referred as lag . We as audience are unwilling to let Rajini not be part of even a few scenes.
KS knows this and what does he do? He presents the superstar in a best-hits-mashup and also in a never-seen-before way, both at once. An age old plot of revenge, the familiar mannerisms, mumbled dialogue delivery and the cocky attitude to whip up nostalgia. A manipulative & murderous Rajini, with hitman-like qualities to satisfy the gangster-buff in KS, which is the part that worked incredibly well for me. Never have I seen such a cold , blood-baying Rajini on screen post his 90s superstardom. The phrase ‘Kola gaandu’ acquires a totally different meaning, even if not all that different from the individual words in it. KS hands over sub-machine guns, rifles and everything else that could fire, to Rajini and makes him go berserk, staging Anurag-Eastwood type shootouts. The VJS twist at the end is actually quite dark considering how holy blood-relationships are meant to be treated in the Rajiniverse. No one is going to take Nawaz seriously as a villain if he’s going to take on Rajini face-to-face. So he’s made a cowardly saddist, who avoids direct confrontations at all costs, which Nawaz can now play in his sleep. They should have cared a bit more on the lip sync though. I also loved how dance , an act Rajini is not particularly the best at, becomes a recurring motif right from the dance at hostel to the one in climax, providing for some exhilarating adrenaline rushes in certain scenes. All in all, at a time when I was at crossroads about what to expect from Rajini’s next, considering Kabali and Kaala (films I really liked) didn’t do that well, Petta rekindled all those inexplicable emotions I experienced as a kid watching this man light up the screen on fire every single time a movie of his played. Yes, I did indeed get #Rajinified.
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KayKay
January 14, 2019
Petta = The “Padayappa” of 2019 i.e a precision-engineered effort to trigger multiple nerdgasms from die-hard Thalaivar fans who’ve been champing at the bit and gnashing their teeth in frustration as film after film from The Style King post -Shivaji (the last “massy” effort from The Man) has been all foreplay, but little follow through in terms of delivering what they want. It can’t have been easy, sitting through one thoroughly botched effort (Kochadaiyaan), one coma-inducing misfire (Lingaa) and seeing the Rajini Icon either appropriated for one director’s political agenda(Kabali, Kaala) or another’s whiz-bang Special Effects Extravaganza (Endhiran, 2.0). I’d say the Robot movies were equally “massy” but I’d be in a select minority.
On that front, Petta is Rajini at his cock-walking, scenery chewing and punch dialogue spouting best.
For die hard Rajini Fans, it’s the Second Coming.
For the not so die hard…..
[SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS]
Well, we’d say, we found it entertaining overall but at the same time, we’d wonder why Petta suffers from the same problem as “Vishwaroopam 2”. where pre-and post interval sections seem to belong to different movies that were stitched together.
We’d ponder at a movie with an almost 3 hour run time which still can’t find the time for properly setting up conflicts (2 lines about the Terror Boys and 1 scene of ragging and they’re the Big Bad of the 1st half, ready to be taught a lesson by the Bad Ass Hostel Warden).
We’d marvel at one of the best supporting cast ever to be assembled for a Rajini film and then cringe in dismay as one by one, they’re tethered, led to and finally sacrificed at the Alter of Brand Rajini.
We’d be baffled at the need to parade Simran and Trisha before us for a few minutes before being unceremoniously shunted off screen by of all people, the man who gave us “Iraivi”
We’d hope the experience of working with Rajini more than compensated for how the film made use of Sasikumar (the Terminator of Asuravadham, being Rajini’s Silent Enforcer:we’d fantasize about THAT movie)
And lastly. we’d have such an outpouring of sympathy for Bobby Simha and Vijay Sethupathi, that we might actually hold a wake, grieving over how they start off as Galloping Knights but finish as Simpering Pawns, the former reduced to grateful servitude after a knife slash and the latter sitting downcast after having been used and conned in a needless last minute twist reveal. We hope there were enough zeroes at the end of your cheques, boys.
And then….we’d just rewatch Baasha.
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Ramesh
January 14, 2019
I think the film would have worked even without Simran, Bobby Simha and his goons.. that would have made it 25 minutes shorter.
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Mrinal Narayan
January 14, 2019
Thinking along the lines of @e221’s comment — Vettaiyadu Vilayadu probably comes off as one of the best Fan tribute movies??? Soora Samharamish and that Karka Karka song…
They could have written Simran’s and Trisha’s like how VV wrote Jyothika’s and Kamalini’s.. It would have given an emotional connect, I believe. Simran is also a divorcee here like Jyothika from VV and Trisha’s character ends up like Kamalini’s because of the villain taking a revenge.
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Selva Ganapathy V
January 14, 2019
@Akash Balakrishnan
In the same interview with cinema express, in the final question, he does talk about the meta narrative. He says @The story I wanted to tell is inside that. Naan sollanum nu nenacha story, narration laam win aana dhaan idhu vella varum” (“Idhu” here refers to being 90’s Rajini film). Meaning he believed the film wouldn’t work if the meta narrative is not understood. That is exactly my point.
I’m not saying this is how you should watch cinema. I am just making a suggestion. If the film doesn’t work for you, it’s fine. But it worked for the filmmaker. And I believe Karthik Subbaraj is not a filmmaker who just has scenes for the sake of jokes and mass. I believe all the elements in the film were purposefully crafted.
Also I did mention I can go on adding to the narrative. But I wanted you to do it yourself when re watching the film. I’m pretty sure I can convince you of the narrative if we discussed it in detail. But I don’t wanna spoon feed. Just like KS didn’t want to. It’s up to you. You can just move on saying it was an average film. Or you could appreciate it as much as I did after I got beyond the surface. And I’m telling you, it’s a whole different experience. I can only speak for myself. But It’s just a suggestion.
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Selva Ganapathy V
January 14, 2019
@Akash Balakrishnan
I’m sorry. I kind of misunderstood KS’s comment. He probably meant, if the film succeeds, the narrative has also succeeded. Because the narrative itself is about Rajinikanth coming to top.
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Thupparivaalan
January 14, 2019
Aadhy: A superlike for you comment. Karthik exactly knows what Rajni’s strengths are and plays to it. The sudden mood shifts in a scene are utilised to an superb extent. The scene that also worked brilliantly for me was the assassination at the funeral, brilliant acting all over and ice cold finishing from Rajni. It is refreshing to see Rajni as a blood baying gangster, who isn’t afraid to kill, wants to kill. He has always been glorious as the bad guy. He gets to let himself loose in villainous roles.
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Selva Ganapathy V
January 14, 2019
@Akash Balakrishnan
I could maybe give you another example which could convince you. “Pondatti pullanu sentiment kintiment irundha ippove odi poidu”. He is talking about people expecting a family pleaser. Which you won’t be getting. He has made it quite clear.
I also have a feeling that the release of Petta and Viswasam on the same day was planned and thought out. Petta for the mass audience and Viswasam for the family audience. This I am not very sure of. But it could be.
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Kid
January 14, 2019
V: You are pretty much on the money regarding Bachchan in Khakee vs him in Buddha. The thing is that Bachchan is a very different star than Rajini..you can’t reduce him simply to a set of gestures. With Rajini you can still get away by doing that (because in terms of pure gesturality Rajini is quite unique)..if Bachchan was to attempt some of the more over-the-top roles of Rajini (not talking about all but the ones which depend purely on his gesturality), it wouldn’t work because the audience always expects something more from him (the viewer demands the “actor” from him even when he is playing a “star”..and it becomes it even more tricky because he has hardly ever played a star in the last two decades so the contemporary isn’t as keyed into his masala screen-persona as it is with Rajini’s). This is why his performance in Buddha doesn’t work..Rajini would have knocked that one out of the park (even considering alll the others problems with the film).
On Petta, I really really enjoyed it (much more than Kaala and 2.0 though the latter’s strengths in terms of sfx & 3D can’t be denied..) and Rajini is in such top form here that his performance really papers over a lot of the film’s issues. I was initially sceptical as to how Rajini would fit into Subbaraj’s world. Subbaraj’s films are situated in the post-Rajini universe which is to say that say in something like Jigarthanda, Rajini is the presiding diety of that film’s world (the film’s homages are testament to that), his spirit hovers over it, he is worshipped in that world, but he can’t himself enter into that world because he would be so huge a persona that he would completely destabilise it (I mean imagine him in Bobby Simha’s part in Jigarthanda, the film would just not work especially in the 2nd half). But what Subbaraj has done is that he has moved into Rajini’s universe. This isn’t even close to being a truly important contemoporary Masala film let alone among the all time great ones of the genre (from the more recent Rajini films, I will take Endhiran easily over it) but I found it compulsively entertaining and is certainly better than two Ranjith films (Kaala had its moments and I was involved throughout its running time but I also thought Rajini wasn’t the right kind of star for a film like that).
I will also say this..for a star to depend so much on gesturality as Rajini does, it is very difficult to retain the kind of heft and aura he has managed to in his screen persona (even in his twilight years as a star)..most stars like this (Vijay etc) don’t last this long. And it is even more heartening that contemporary Tamil filmmakers want to explore his persona in serious (by serious i mean that they want to truly engage with his persona) ways (irrespective of what the final results of the films are).
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Kid
January 14, 2019
Gautaman Bhaskaran’s tweets (amd his piece) reveal a complete lack of education among Indian critics regarding what a cinematic-star means and what a star-performance is. What is even more problematic is that there is no willingness among contemporary Indian film reviewers to educate themselves in such matters. Btw the problem isn’t that he dislikes Rajinikanth (that would only be a matter of taste), but that he is making this very elementary error like most of Indian critics, especially the Bombay ones, that only kind of good performance in cinema should be the one which requires good “acting” (in traditional terms) which is far from the truth (and is such a myopic way of looking at cinema). And this is because in this country there is no film culture which discusses such stuff (Baradwaj Rangan is the greatest corrective to this school of thought..I will say this, and I really mean it but BR’s thoughts on both melodrama as well as star-signature should be studied not just in India but across the world..he is really one of the last who truly explores these subject).
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Akash Balakrishnan
January 14, 2019
@Selva Ganapathy V
Your interpretation is really good and no one is asking people to change their views. Just that the fact that KS hasn’t grown to a level where he can make a Utthama Villain kinda of meta narrative. Even Jigathanda had those annoying tonal inconsistencies. Take birdman or Barton fink(Not so meta as much as mindfuck and clever). For a meta narrative to work, there must be a cue to trigger that response. And for a meta narrative to be plausible it must work alongside a movie and not merely be the main movie. Your interpretations are really good and it is really valuable when someone figures out something for themselves. I even established that we were on the same page by saying that I badly wanted to find out if the excess masculinity meant something. But at the end this is just an excuse to show more vintage thalaivar. Lets say if KS really intended to make the film you interpreted. The ragging point makes no sense unless first year of college is atleast an metaphor for some art form(Education is not a even a minor character motivation here and the ragging was a hindrance to those students not anwar’s love. Not at that point). And with respect to Jigathanda, the concept of young filmmakers struggling was something which happened to the MAIN character, fuels his motivation, allows KS to explore many shades in Karthik’s character. And the point about Micheal being jealous and copying scripts ? There are better ways to weave ideas like that into the script especially when someone like KS is incharge of writing. His films are more about the things surrounding an event rather than the event itself. Seen from that angle, this would end up as a bad try at effective detailing and would else become a chance for Thalaivar to get caught in the hands of the main villain accidentally while dealing with small time rowdies. Still, there is a hundred percent chance that this could be something KS meant. But at the cost of a good story ? If so, then he might’ve made some impressive piece of art which only he can understand. And the point of art is to EXPRESS and act as a stimuli for emotions and worldview. I used to like KS(the writer – director) before mercury and I went into Kola-Gaandu mode after this movie. Really hope he make something worthwhile. After all, there are a few interesting filmmakers around.
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bart
January 14, 2019
Petta – Oru tharamana sambavam dot
P.S.: Enakku Sirappana sambavam kooda
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Selva Ganapathy V
January 14, 2019
@Akash Balakrishnan
I’m happy you are interested in getting beyond the surface. I appreciate you taking the time to relate with my interpretation. I’m flattered that you think I was able to come up with a narrative that Karthik Subbaraj could not have thought of. But I would suggest you give the movie another watch because you seem to be genuinely interested in the film even though you are in “Kola gaandu mode”. The unifying thread that I found might not be the same as what the filmmaker intended. But I was able to connect almost all of the elements and dialogues in the movie to a narrative. I just wanted to give a platform for this type of discussions. But I can’t connect all the dots for you. I don’t want to. You have to do it yourself. You might even find a similar thread. For example, the masculine and feminine thread you mentioned also exists. Why do you think the child is delivered by transgendered people? Could it not be a sign that the child has both masculine and feminine traits? Empathy and violence? There are many such threads. Karthik Subbaraj might not be good enough to tie every element in the film to a meta narrative and make it work also on the surface level. But it is almost undeniably clear to me that it is a meta movie.
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Thupparivaalan
January 14, 2019
I essentially saw it an as western, with an monolithic star in the center. KS has had no sectets about his admiration of the westerns that starred Clint Eastwood. And I see Petta as his take on the western genre with a dash of rajnism. Rajni, is in his effervescent best here, stylish, instinctive and he even hums the good bad and ugly theme at one point.
Kaali has the arc that is typical of an western. He enters a town (college) with a force, distorting the dynamic. His purpose is unknown, and soon we learn about his mission at the interval. The problems is most westerns, at least the famous ones, the flashback is meant not to shed a tear but give the purpose for the hero to do he’s doing. The same happens in petta, we aren’t allowed to dwell on the relationships because KS doesn’t want us to. This difference is more pronounced when the entire Rajni, instead of saving the malvika character wants to take on nawaz, before being consoled by the collector. Petta Velan, also falls within the grey area, he himself says ‘naan nallavan dhaan, anaa romba nallavan illa’. There is no scope for the emotions as in Rajni’s earlier films because that is not he is after. It is about putting up a show to the audience. I loved the film, and definitely feel 30 years onwards, when we look back we’ll realize how well made and packaged this film was.
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Isai
January 14, 2019
Watched both Petta and Viswasam. e221 has superbly articulated my thoughts on Petta.
There are too many things wrong in Petta, right from the first scenes to the very last.
Before the Maranam Mass song, Bobby Simha rags the juniors to sing a song praising the seniors. But, the lyrics of the song ‘Getha Nadandhu Varan…’ all keep referencing Rajini. This is what happens when you get the ‘introduction song’ composed first and then are unable to think of a suitable lead-in for the song. In the middle of the song, when Rajini starts dancing, the students cheer him and start background dancing to him even though they have never met him before. How is this logical? That is why Ullala song works much better in the movie even when Maranam mass song was more popular pre-release.
Let’s look at the final twist. (Considering the length of the movie, 15% of the audience had begun to walk out after the main villain’s death. This is where test screening would have helped.) VJS should be atleast 6-7 years old during the time period of the bomb blast. How would he have forgotten his parents? It is like VJS didn’t even ask a single question to Rajini about the blast. And how did Rajini know that VJS doesn’t remember his mother. He decides not to shoot him after seeing some burn marks in his body. At that time, he wouldn’t know when exactly had VJS’ mother died. Not to mention Nawazuddin Siddique playing along with Rajini’s tale when VJS comes to question him. Wouldn’t he be worried that VJS may attack/kill him if he believed in Rajini’s tale. Instead, he consoles VJS like how one would console a tantrum throwing child who has just lost a sports match. Everyone seems to play along like ‘Boss, neenga sonna seri’.
What surprised me is that now I think Kaala is better than Petta in terms of what the director has accomplished or even as a piece of cinema. At least Ranjith was successful in portraying the plight of Tamils in Dharavi and gave some memorable characters (Eswari, Lenin etc.) and scenes even though he let his message/political agenda get in the way of good storytelling. In this movie, KS accomplishes nothing much except running a ‘Spot the Rajini reference’ contest for the fans. A music video collage of Rajini mass scenes would have done this better.
Kaala and Jurassic World had released on the same day. After 4 weeks, Jurassic World, an IMDB 6.2 rated movie collected more than Kaala in the Chennai Box office. After seeing both Viswasam and Petta, I bet that after 2-3 weeks, Viswasam will do much better than Petta in Chennai & other A centres too (It is leading in B, C centres from day 1). At least Ajith’s ‘Viswasam’ seems to have paid off.
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RAJA SANGAMESHWAR
January 14, 2019
Exactly. First half could have explored a lot more into the “good antagonist” angle of Vijay Sethupathy. More like two different stories running in parallel and merging post interval. Could have satisfied the karthik subburaj fan boy in me. Also, I hated it when VS had to mouth “Maass” when he encounters kaali for the first time.
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Voldemort
January 14, 2019
KayKay : That was an absolutely brilliant comment! Do you write anywhere? (like a blog ) Would love to read.
Selva Ganapathy V : Terrific interpretation. You could do a Readers Write In to further elaborate your point.
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Sai Ashwin
January 14, 2019
@RAJA SANGAMESHWA
Same here, its fine if the filmmaker decides to worship Rajini but why does the characters in the film also worship him? Antagonists nonetheless, this is exactly the kind of stuff seen in telugu films.
And to everyone trying to find meta-meanings, those are just easter eggs, you cant hold viewers with just easter eggs in a film, even meta narrative films like Contempt,Sunset Blvd or Adaptation work as films first and foremost.
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Madan
January 14, 2019
Isai: Perfectly summed up about the climax. Yes, way too many holes. And as I said, I was willing to overlook the holes if the characters at least proceeded to act in a way consistent with the holed-script. But as you put it, Singa Singh just accepts the narrative too easily which would have been fine if it had been the truth anyway but when Petta comes up with the big reveal later, it is not convincing because had Petta been lying, we should have seen Singa protesting and warning Jitu that Petta is trying to deceive him. So it essentially felt like KS had put in this twist just for the sake of it without enough thought to make it work.
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vijay vasan
January 14, 2019
Two scenes which made me entertainingly curious were 1. where Rajini threatens Bobby Simha and his dad at his house with a lot of flamboyance, but immediately returns back to the house searching for his coolers and 2. the immediate following scene where he scans the crowd for henchmen and says “evvalo naal dhaan adhe rendu motta, rendu meesai nu sanda poda anuppuveenga”. How awesome it would be if Karthik Subbaraj directed Rajini in a Last Action Hero or even a Hot Shots kind of a movie?
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Billa
January 15, 2019
This is easily Rajni’s best of his three collaborations with the new-gen directors Ranjith and Karthik. Freed from the idealogical weight behind his image from ranjith’s films, Rajni throws a glorious party to his fans. He walks across the screen with an electricity, and delivers an out of park performance. Few sequences in recent years have given me the goosebumps like Petta did, be it the funeral execution or the mad idea behind the nunchak sequence. I loved the twist in the end, a nod to both the star’s personal love of Mahabharata and Ramayana, and the story of who’s the final king in the jungle. Despite the warmth of the cinematography Petta is a cold film. And it is mighty interesting to see Rajni operate in such a film, and it also gives the film it’s shares of problems. The audience are in a limbo, as Karthik can’t decide if he should go for the emotional beats in the flashback, or make Rajni a cold gangster. There are a few missteps like the casting of nawaz, genericity of the opening stretches, rajni’s dancing (he was an very entertaining dancer in his prime, but his legs have aged), Karthik can easily be forgiven when he has ventured where no other collaborators with Rajni have ventured in recent years. As a piece of cinema Petta is far better than kaala, kabali and 2.0.
BR: I felt the first half was not completely wasted. Rajni advices Simran to dance and does the dance himself in the second half. He helps Anwar in love the same way he helped his father. I see the Anwar arc as an extension of the plot from baasha. There it was his own brothers and sisters that he had to save, and thus retreats to Chennai. Here, it is Anwar baasha’s parallel character, marakkayan, who’s son needs the saving.
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Selva Ganapathy V
January 15, 2019
@Sai Ashwin
I agree that the film has to work even on the surface. I understand the criticisms of the film. I was kind of underwhelmed by the plot as well at first viewing. It was Rajinikanth that made the film work for me. But it doesn’t mean we shouldn’t appreciate the filmmaker’s attempt to tell a story with multiple narratives. I brought up the meta narrative because it was not discussed anywhere. When the film clearly has one. And also because every inconsistency of the plot seemed to make sense once we get the underlying narrative. I had an emotionally moving experience when I rewatched it. Anyways it is up to us. It’s a finished piece of film. We could either make the most out of it or just move on. I always like to see what the filmmaker is trying to convey rather than criticise him for not giving us what we wanted to see. I feel dismissing the film for it’s surface flaws is like dismissing Tamil padam saying the screenplay is not linear or that the character is inconsistent. That’s not the point of the film.
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Ramesh
January 15, 2019
The funeral execution in Petta and the police station scene in kaala where he gets beaten.. are two of my most favorite Rajini moments recently..two contrasting scenes.. but he rocked on both occasions ..such a joy to behold..Vijay and Ajith aren’t fit to lace his boots..it would be such a shame if they are seen as the next superstar.
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MANK
January 15, 2019
A lovingly constructed tribute to a beloved movie idol gone horribly wrong or a mischievous prank played at the Rajini obsessed or Rajinism obsessed audience or a mixture of both. These are the ways one could describe Karthik Subbaraj’s Petta. If this was designed as a straightforward Rajini film then,this is Neither a good Rajni film, nor a good Karthik film, not even a cohesive film, period. Just a random postmodern Rajini show. A truckload of referential subtext with absolutely no context. Karthik’s attempts at resurrecting the (almost fallen) idol is such an exercise in futility that one is forced to question whether he even understands what makes a Rajini film a Rajini film. Rajnisims cannot exist in isolation. It needs thematic framework. it needs the buildup from a well developed screenplay. Rajnisims alone does not a Rajini film make
Having Rajini strut his stuff in a totally pointless movie is as painful as watching Rajini being subjugated in Ranjith’s films or being used merely as a bankable commodity to fund Shankar’s extravaganzas. KS’s worst tendencies are in full display here. Fractured narrative, scattershot postmodernism, fourth wall breaking winking at the audience, characters lacking consistency , cold craftsmanship and the worst of all, the obsession with plot twists. Of all things, he reduced Rajini to a hostel warden solving canteen corruption.Pretty much explains the scope of the film. I just kept on wondering ,where are the epic settings,the scale, the scope, the epic set pieces,the man to god transformations, the masala scenes . It never hits a consistent tone,one moment a straight masala film and the next a send up off one
Now if its more of an elaborate joke made at the expense of Rajinitards, then it works much better, atleast conceptually. Thats a Jigarthanda like film with Rajini himself starring.The first dialogue gives an inkling of it. Its like KS saying through Rajini: you suckers have ben crying hoarse about not getting enough Rajinisms in his last few films. Guess what ,i am going to devote the entire first half of the film to only Rajinisms, no character, plot, supporting actors or my auteurial instincts are going to interfere in this. just soak in it and go crazy in the theaters. And the Rajinisms are in full flow here. the walk, the talk , spitting out words like bullets, the stylish gestures, the dance steps, The rapid change of expressions and body language its the Rajini that we havent seen for more than a decade. at the interval point he seems to be saying , look however much you and me like these Rajinisms , this is still a feature film and we need some semblance of story and character to go along with it. But dont worry. the story and character will be just a mishmash of past Rajini movies .Now we have a super double bill,. with both Rajinisms and Rajni filmisims running in parallel.
So he base the film majorly on 3 milestone films of Rajni. First is Mullum malarum, most probably Rajini’s greatest turn as actor. A film directed by Mahendran, who makes an appearance here .Second is Thalapathi, which marked the union of Rajini with Karthik’s favorite director Mani Rathnam. The third is Baasha , the greatest Rajni film ever made . But it is not much fun, i am afraid, worse in an act of subversion (intended or not) or modernizing , he reverses everything that was good about these films
Finally at the end of the film , he asks : isnt it enough for you guys, A load of Rajinisms to last a life time , dont complain about this anymore. Basically what KS has done here is what he and only perhaps he experienced while watching Lingaa. Create a running conversation between the idol and the worshipers.
Karthik’s best appears in just one scene , the funeral scene that appears post interval which is a brilliantly crafted and shot sequence that one wonders what the hell happened to him for the rest of the film. It mixes his love for Rajini as well as the love for westerns. We already heard the dollars film theme played before a couple of times in the film, here he gives the payoff. it brims with Tarantinosque dark humor mixed with his usual hit tip to Sergio Leone, as Rajni quotes the iconic – if you want to shoot shoot dont talk- line from Good bad and ugly as he dispatches Devaram. he shoots the rifle single handed like a cowboy would shoot a pistol. the camera moves are extraordinary, where it tracks, zooms and whip pans in the space of a single shot.But this scene just come out of nowhere and goes out to nowhere. Rest of the time he is doing flaccid replicas of scenes , like from thalapathi where Jaishanker asks Rajni to leave Mammooty telling him he is his wife’s son. here its Rajni in Jaishanker place and VJS in Rajni’s place. we soon learn that the scene itself is a hoax and whatever Rajni was saying was all lies. Very similar to what the film is doing to the audience
Well for me , another whiz kid bites the dust trying to make a new gen Rajini film and the grand wait of the next great Rajini film continues.
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letstalkcinema14
January 15, 2019
Would mean a lot to me if you guys checked out my review.
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Bee
January 16, 2019
I don’t think a proper Rajni film is possible now. Suresh Krishna, Ravi Kumar have lost their stock and Karthik seems to have misunderstood what a proper Rajni film is. He reduces him to a style merchant. His past three outings have had little room for masala echoes, they are plot driven, coldly calculated stuff. Rajni’s films need warmth, Petta has turned out exactly how I feared it would, stunted, underwritten and indecisive. Characters come and go without registering in the mind, half hearted and unfinished subplots galore, Karthik neither wants this to belong to the masala world nor his universe and ends up making a Hodge podge that is somewhat saved by a spirited superstar, who still at the age of 69 is giving his all for his directors. It’s a pity his enthusiasm is not met with good writing and direction. He has tried going with the old bigwigs (ravikumar), the new gen whiz kids (Ranjith, Shankar and Karthik), and all of them have let him down. Let’s hope ARM doesnt repeat the above mistakes and gives Rajni, the proper sendoff he deserves.
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Mohan
January 16, 2019
So what’s next for Rajini, I still feel ARM(minus the Sarkar hangover) is a safe bet. He can complete a film quickly with good amount of mass scenes.
Tidbit: In the initial titles when the name comes for Costumes it is given as Banu( Rajini Sir). Wish this involvement was shown for a better placement of ‘Raman aandalum’ song, it immediately reminded me of his pongal competitor’s previous movie( guess I am the only one with this feel)
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Ramesh
January 16, 2019
I dont understand why Baasha is considered one of Rajini’s best…i never liked the film even at that time.. the auto scenes/conversations with Nagma were such a bore..as Baasha his dialogue delivery ..hey..hey hey.. indha baasha were comical…to me it seemed liked a rushed , low budget film..I saw it the first day at Abhirami and felt the film would bomb at the box office…So its stilla mystery to me why Rajini fans go gaga over Baasha.. Are there neutrals who liked Baasha?
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Pato
January 16, 2019
BR: Will you review Seethakaathi? Looking forward to your take on that.
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Arjun
January 16, 2019
I haven’t got around to watching Petta, so can’t say much on the comments calling it underwhelming. But why does Kaala cause so much grief for Rajni fans? I thought it was a proper, well executed film. Rajni plays the classical underdog fighting for the downtrodden, there’s plenty of style and action to go with it too. I suspect the politics is what turns off some rather than the lack of the Rajni quotient itself.
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Ramesh
January 16, 2019
@Arjun..Coudnt agree more.. Kaala was one of Rajinis better outings recently..
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MANK
January 16, 2019
Yes i liked Kaala much more than this one.It was emotionally moving . Though it was not what we call a Rajini film. i had some issues with the film which i mentioned in that thread, But i loved Rajini there. I didnt like Kabali except for some parts here and there
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Madan
January 16, 2019
@Ramesh: As a neutral or rather somebody who likes those films of Rajni from back when he used to really act and in good roles, I think the flashback of Baasha gave it a strong core. The template has since been imitated in both Muthu and now Petta, where Rajni is kinda like Bruce Wayne in limbo with the beast resurfacing under extreme provocation. That duality gave it an enigma that wasn’t really there until then in Rajni films. It also created room for an effective antagonist in Raghuvaran. Today I find both Raghuvaran and Rajni’s acting too over the top in the film, specifically the Hey Hey style Rajni uses here. But at that time, it was something different and worked. It was kinda like Amitabh, come to think of it, a kind of hoarse, aggressive whisper /rasp. Very different from his Sivaji style high pitched oratory in Annamalai.
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Srinivas R
January 16, 2019
@Ramesh – Baasha was probably the first movie in the the meek hero with a violent past template. The movie really built up to the interval very nicely with hints dropped everywhere and Rajini playing it with a philosophical shrug added to the anticipation and the movie just jumps to life at interval point. A Rajini movie waiting well past an hour into the movie to unleash an action scene was unique for it’s time. I remember watching it in Albert within a week of it’s release and going wow when the action exploded. I also think that Baasha is a movie much liked by neutral fans.
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Bee
January 16, 2019
On a second viewing I can see the lack of substance under the style coming through. Despite all those buildup scenes for Rajni, and the funeral scene my favourite moment in the film doesn’t involve Rajni at all. It has devaram and that lawyer coming out of the jail, and he quips ‘yov vakkeelu, Mera poi moonu kola panna poren, ippave bail ready pannu’. I found that morbid and hilarious. Wish KS sustained more of that tone throughout the film.
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brangan
January 16, 2019
Bee: Damn, this has been a crazy-busy week. Haven’t found the time for a second watch. Should do it soon.
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Bee
January 16, 2019
BR: Well, the times have certainly changed when you could skip reviewing a Rajni film and get away with it (wink wink). You’ve become more of a star reviewer yourself doing three types: the mini review, text review and Ask BR, and somehow I still want more from you. You’re a gifted reviewer.
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petta paraak
January 16, 2019
Ok on second time viewing, I feel like VS performance was sumaar to bad. He spoke hindi believably but there’s a self aware, mocking swagger throughout – I doubt he was playing a character that didn’t really espouse the far right stuff he was portraying on screen – so it came across as him just being his sarcastic self (especially apparent when he says “vaangada kalaacharatha kaapathalam”). I didn’t buy it. Sure, we can say he was doing it to build his party etc. but seemed like he was written as someone who truly believed in all of it. In the climax, both villains just fold up and give up, which is fine but even in that scene, VS was just sitting around. I didn’t buy that his word was shook.
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Srini
January 17, 2019
When speaking of Rajini film references, I found the reference to Arunachalam to being the strongest. Rajini is left alone in a temple and a character played by Ravichandran picks him up and Rajini becomes a part of the family. Don’t see that getting mentioned much.
And speaking of political references when Rajini looks at the screen and says something on these lines – ‘namba already 20 varusham late, udane erangi adikkanum’, while talking to Anwar, I thought it was a reference to him not taking the plunge in the late 90s 🙂
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Shankar
January 17, 2019
Well, I did watch it a second time in the theater! 🙂 That said, I’m amused by the serious discussions about this film including the lack of emotional connect, the sky high praise for Baasha etc. Since the mid 80s, except for a few outliers, the rule of the thumb for Rajini movies was that you left all your thinking, outside the theater (read that as brains!). His films since then were meant to be a joy ride. Even Baasha has so many cringe-worthy elements but hey, it’s a great entertainer and was really fun. I love watching Annamalai over and over just for the meek becoming mighty angle. Sure, there are other elements but one would never confuse a Manidhan with a Mahanadhi! So, to me, this film qualifies in that same vein. It’s a fun ride…just get on it! 🙂
Quick question…in the brief jail scene, Rajini is in prison garb, with the number “165” on his shirt. Is this his 165th film?
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Madan
January 17, 2019
“Even Baasha has so many cringe-worthy elements but hey, it’s a great entertainer and was really fun.” – Well, maybe the problem is some of us have moved on from those days and the industry too has changed. You didn’t have a Pisaasu or even an Andavan Kattalai back then so you had to watch whatever was there on offer. I remember somebody here arguing with me in earnest that Eramana Rojave was not so bad because it didn’t have the usual Goundamani-Senthil track. And I can relate to that argument because those were the standards then.
With that being said, I do appreciate an entertainer as long as it regards brevity as a virtue. I didn’t feel with either a Baasha or a Singaravelan to mention a Kamal leave-the-brains-out entertainer that they dragged on. There was quite a bit of flab in Petta and as I mentioned, it is not new. It started with Padayappa. The hardcore Rajni fans can’t get enough of them so there have to be a few extra frames glorifying his feats even more after the rest of the film is done. Me, I like his style and mannerisms but I don’t need this breaking the fourth wall act. Ultimately I come to watch a film and not to indulge in idol worship. I do appreciate though that KS was able to introduce a mild shade of grey in this one.
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Recovering Macaulay Perapulla
January 17, 2019
Saw it yesterday for the second time, and the experience was far more subdued than I had imagined. I am surprised no one mentioned “Main Hoon Na” template in this thread. I suspect KS found his inspiration there. Masked Identity | Ramayana Reference | Violence in Campus | and so on.
VS is becoming repetitive in his mannerisms and I hope he works on his body to come in good shape. At the final dialogue, one can see VS eye balls moving sidewards to observe Rajini while he spouths climax dialogue with all fury. It was an unintentionally funny meta moment for me 🙂
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Srinivas R
January 17, 2019
Quick question…in the brief jail scene, Rajini is in prison garb, with the number “165” on his shirt. Is this his 165th film? – Yep, it is his 165th
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Ramesh
January 17, 2019
VS is one of the most overrated actors..For Tamil audience fed up with mindless mass cinemas of Vijay,Ajith, Vishal, and Simbu, VS suddenly looks and acts as a boy next door and so have started to glorify him as the next big thing..He is average at best with a very limited range. Our standards have become so low that anything better than Vijay/Ajith is looking great.Surya,Vikram and VS belong to this category(better than Vijay/Ajith).
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Aadhy
January 17, 2019
Thupparivaalan : “The scene that also worked brilliantly for me was the assassination at the funeral, brilliant acting all over and ice cold finishing from Rajni”
That was my favorite scene as well, especially because the trailer led me to believe the dance takes place in a Pongal-like festival setting. Never imagined the events would play out how it did. In fact, this dark twist worked more for me than the climax one, which I kind of predicted when setup is established for the big reveal later. The funeral scene would normally never belong in a Rajni movie. You can even say Rajini’s actions here inflicted more harm to his own people, which might not have happened had he been less trigger-happy.
I agree with you on viewing the film as a Western and that’s how I saw it too. KS does have a fascination with deaths, or let’s say killing people off. All his previous movies have had atleast 2 or 3 people killed, except maybe Pizza, which still deals with a post-death belief. Since he operates in this cold universe filled with not the most-likeable people and deaths being treated so casually, it’s hard for people to warm up to his movies, or to establish an emotional connect with his characters. I think he’s imagined Rajni as a killing machine in this universe and then realized this isn’t exactly what people would look for in a Rajini movie. So he gives us an entire first half that’s filled with Rajinisms and makes it bloody entertaining (atleast I found it so), before unleashing a killing beast in the second half.
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Aadhy
January 17, 2019
After the second watch, I realised it’s quite hard to compare Petta with Baasha. Apart from having Rajnisms and the revenge story as common factors, both movies are vastly different in terms of treatment.
In Petta, a lot of Pettavelan’s (second half) character comes out in the form of Kaali (first half) here and there. Kaali might solve problems and be a good man to good people, but the way he solves problems, even minor ones, is unusually aggressive like Pettavelan. He keeps giving death threats to even small time goons, smacks people before they could talk, gleefully agrees to help Anwar’s affair thinking it’s some “Adithadi prechana” . In Baasha, first-half Rajni is is mostly low-key, even beaten by local goons, before finally exploding in the pre-interval stretch.
A Nagma-like heroine in Simran develops a relationship with Rajini to become inconsequential in the second half. They totally did away with the Simran character rather than bringing her back in the climax as the damsel in distress just to be saved by Rajini like in Baasha. In other words, the stakes are kept very low in Petta, and further lowered by a meek villain and his dumb son.
Baasha operates more at an emotional level level because of the weight the flashback-within-a-flashback sequence carries, detailing the Anwar-Manickam bond and the mythical birth of Basha. In Petta, Malik’s death has 0 emotional impact just because of the way KS treats deaths. Baasha connects at an emotional level because of the lesser but impactful deaths while Petta functions as a fun western operating in a colder universe with more bloodshed.
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Madan
January 17, 2019
“In Petta, a lot of Pettavelan’s (second half) character comes out in the form of Kaali (first half) here and there. Kaali might solve problems and be a good man to good people, but the way he solves problems, even minor ones, is unusually aggressive like Pettavelan. ” – Agreed and mentioned something sort of on these lines in the other thread about ratings. The transformation is not as drastic as Baasha, really, because Kaali himself is pretty rough from the get go and by the time he talks about kola gaandu (while still Kaali and not yet revealed as Petta) he is all but in character with the flashback Rajni.
” In other words, the stakes are kept very low in Petta, and further lowered by a meek villain and his dumb son.” – Yes, and to some extent, this took the wind out of the sails for me as far as the climax was concerned. Again, I have never seen nor related to Westerns so maybe I would have related to KS’ treatment of the climax better if I had. Agreed though that Baasha basically carries more emotional weight. It was basically a more loaded film as films that weren’t outright comedies tended to be at the time. I doubt that out and out loaded treatment would work today.
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brangan
January 17, 2019
Madan: Again, I have never seen nor related to Westerns so maybe I would have related to KS’ treatment of the climax better if I had.
Actually, no. The Western is one of the most MORAL of film genres, and watching them is not going to help you understand KS’s aesthetic. There is nothing in his films that suggests an affinity with the classic Western. The spaghetti Western — maybe somewhat. KS’s aesthetic is more a pastiche aesthetic (in a good way), in the sense that he’s not a purist. He is like Tarantino, in that he sees things through a “filmic” lens, kind of in a postmodernist way.
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Thupparivaalan
January 17, 2019
BR: I might be talking nonsense here, but I’m doing it anyway for the fun. I compared the film with the good the bad and the ugly. Of course Petta is never as accomplished or explosive as the former is, but I could see some similarities.
The good = Rajni, a good heart but not afraid to kill.
The Ugly = Vijay Sethupathu, is definitely on the other side. Not afraid to kill and does devious things.
The Bad = Nawaz, completely bad and infact uglier than Vijay Sethupathi, even threatens to kill Vijay during the phone conversation.
The only mistake that I felt KS did was to not devote enough screen time to both Vijay and Nawaz, and of course setting up the climatic shoot down in the hinterlands of UP, when he could have done it in TN itself. Rajni’s character is anyways making an appearance after a vanavaasam, so having the climax take place in the college itself should have worked.
Imagine a final sequence involving, all the three actors in a Mexican standoff, and Rajni making Vijay Sethupathi kill nawaz, only to later reveal the real twist. I always felt it should have been Vijay Sethupathi killing his father than Rajni. Would have amped up the drama a lot better.
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Madan
January 17, 2019
“He is like Tarantino, in that he sees things through a “filmic” lens, kind of in a postmodernist way.” – Yeah, that makes sense too.
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Aadhy
January 17, 2019
When I wrote ‘fun western’ w.r.t Petta, I was talking about the Sphagettis. I haven’t watched a lot of classic westerns actually. The Sphagettis are more fun because of their grittier, dirtier nature and they featured anti-heroes. I don’t think the Dollars trilogy had a lot of morally ‘good guys’. Aren’t Sphagettis, and the Revisionist/Anti-westerns meant to be a satirical take on the more morally upright classic ones? I agree that the violence was very stylized in a Tarantino-esque way, who himself is a self-confessed fan of Sphagettis that inspired atleast 4 of his movies.
I might be totally off, but I could find a lot of this sensibility in Petta and Jigarthanda.
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Aadhy
January 17, 2019
Madan : I just read your post in the other thread and completely agree with whatever you’ve said about the movie there, especially the last statement.
” I get that rajathanthram didn’t belong earlier in Rajni’s universe but I don’t also regard the first half of Petta as being entirely drawn out of the 90s oeuvre either.”
First-half Kaali might bring the Rajni nostalgia back, but isn’t all that good-natured as a 90s Rajni character i.e. not a meesa vecha kozhandayappa . He gets a job through recommendation, snaps at the interviewer, bosses around the mess supervisor, and the worst of all, endangers the life of 100s of students at the hands of violent goons just to save one dude who is his close buddy’s son (though he does not let anything happen to them as is the norm). .
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Sadhana
January 18, 2019
For the hype that was created, I am completely disappointed with the way the movie was handled- especially the second half. Too long and too slow and many parts that we could have done without. The twist in the climax was predictable but yet again, the Rajini movie needed the Karthik Subbaraj twist.
I’m surprised as to how little screen space the women were offered in such a mass movie – so much talks and debates were happening when CCV came out and on the women in CCV. I think there is far far less screen space here. And the impact doesn’t stay.
I enjoyed every bit of Kaala and sadly only the first half of Petta.
Off topic – Sir, did you review Adanga Maru or did I miss it on your list.
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Mrinal Narayan
January 18, 2019
Also, did anyone else get reminded of Venkat Prabhu’s Mankatha? in the way Petta handled certain things. The usage of female leads, the small “In the end, I made you a fool” twist.. (whether it works or not for some people), A “Raaman Aandalum! Raavanan Aandalum!” song playing.
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vandana
January 18, 2019
BR you have a serious issue when reviewing a Rajini film. Seems like you become a serious reviewer, somebody who loves cinema. You have a problem if it is a Rajini movie, or if it is not a Rajini movie. you have a problem if the director makes his kinda movie, if the director doesn’t make his kind movie. What in the world do you want. Why don’t you review all the other movies in a similar fashion. For example your favorite director Mani Rathnam. Even if the movie is crap and unbearable, you try to parse thru each and every frame, shot and try to defend the director. Or a crappy unwatchable movie like vishwaroopam. It is evident that you have a problem with Rajini movies. So, I would start ignoring your review of Rajini movies in the future. And of course Mani Rathnam/ Kamal’s movies too. I can predict what exactly you would write irrespective of how the movie is. I still cannot believe that you gave more stars to an overrated, over the top movie like vishwasam.
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Isai
January 18, 2019
I don’t understand why some women get surprised/disappointed when “women” get less screen time/scope to act in maintsream movies. Shouldn’t a writer-director be allowed to develop and present his/her story without worrying about whether it is ‘gender balanced’? The only performances that I remember of the movie ‘Kolamaavu Kokila’ are of Nayanthara’s and Saranya’s. I liked Neethane En Ponvasantham a lot and later got to know that it was based on a story written by Reshma. If we are not getting enough movies having good scope for women, isn’t the problem due to lack of female writers? It would be nice if women take steps to acknowledge and address this instead of feeding their victim mentality.
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brangan
January 18, 2019
vandana: LOL. You sound like my mom from when I was a kid. She’d say, “You said it’s too spicy and I reduced the spice. And now you’re saying it’s too bland. What in the world do you want?” 🙂
Well, I want a well-cooked dish, is all 🙂
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brangan
January 18, 2019
PS: My favourite auteur-directors are scoring their biggest hits of late with films that are not working for me. First Mani Ratnam and CCV. Now, KS and Petta.
Selva should seriously hope I don’t fall for NGK 😀
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Madan
January 18, 2019
I am surprised – though I shouldn’t be – by the comments almost imploring positive views for the film. It’s not like this was some masterpiece of a flick anyway. And Rajni films haven’t been for a long time either. So…to use a very crude food analogy you want a McDees Happy Meal to be given the same rating as a fine dining place. Nobody is saying the Happy Meal isn’t doing the job it promises to for its customers. But nobody regards that as an ultra special feast to savour for a lifetime either. If Rajni fans were being honest, they would acknowledge that the purpose of his films have been constrained to merely providing ephemeral titillation at his style, stunts and dialogues. There is definitely a lack of a strong emotional core to support this style quotient. And I might add that unlike BR I haven’t even watched MR Or Kamal’s recent outings and cannot say I am particularly interested. So no trying to score brownie points for yenemy fan base from my side, not interested in those games.
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therag
January 19, 2019
I can’t see what all the fuss is about. There was exactly 1 sequence worth remembering in Petta – the funeral sequence. What is all this about bringing back the “old Rajni”. I have watched plenty of Rajni movies from all eras and I have no idea what anyone is talking about.
Oh, and I don’t watch Ajith films.
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V
January 19, 2019
@Vandana: Vikatan too has rated Petta the same way, vis a vis CCV and Vishwaroopam 2. (However they have given 1 mark less to Viswasam than Petta)
While Vikatan reviews are stereotypical, their rating system, I heard, is a consensus among – what is known as “Vikatan Vimarsana Kuzhu” – a group of reviewers. 42/43 is their std score. Anything above that is good and below, is simply below expectations! And this is how they rated:
Ccv: 43/100
Vishwaroopam: 42/100
Petta: 41/100
Viswasam: 40/100
So….
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tnsundar
January 19, 2019
Ramesh: VS is one of the most overrated actors..For Tamil audience fed up with mindless mass cinemas of Vijay,Ajith, Vishal, and Simbu, VS suddenly looks and acts as a boy next door and so have started to glorify him as the next big thing..He is average at best with a very limited range. Our standards have become so low that anything better than Vijay/Ajith is looking great.-Very true. His dialogue delivery-same as I notice from his first movie. Nothing great I see in this acting. It is the same with Nayantara. They outshine others by choosing movies with good scripts. That does not make them good actors.
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Ramesh
January 19, 2019
@Vandana, @ BR: I agree with you when say BR has a problem with reviewing Rajini’s films. Being a huge fan of both BR and Rajini, I think BR largely doesn’t let his personal likes/dislikes get into his reviewing..But how objective can somebody get while reviewing subjective stuff like art, cinema, music etc..Having said that, its obvious he is not a Rajini fan and his kinda of films is not his cup of tea…But sometimes I do find him saying a lot of good stuff for some crappy movies of Ajith, Vijay, Gautam Menon, Kamal etc….So even before both films getting released, I was telling my friends BR’s rating would be 2.5 for petta and 3 for Viswasam… But then it’s his view… I doubt if there will ever be a 3 star Rajini movie for BR…That’s why I was interested in knowing BR’s top 10 favourite Rajini movies in my earlier comment.
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vandana
January 19, 2019
@V Vikatan has some special love for Kamal and Mani Rathnam just like BR. Seriously… CCV better than Petta. They must be kidding me. Doesn’t matter how their movies are, they always think they are always reviewing Nayagan. They are simply frozen in time. I hope they move on.
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MANK
January 19, 2019
And being a die hard fan of both Brangan and Rajni, I say that Brangan has been much too lenient on petta 😀
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Madan
January 19, 2019
MANK: Yeah, if anything, BR is USUALLY soft on Tamil commercial potboilers (IMO of course). I remember feeling he was too soft on Vedhalam. As I said above, it is more that the fans want a comic sketch to be hailed as a Da Vinci masterpiece. Another way to put it is if that grand turkey of an innings that SRT played to score his 100th 100 hadn’t borne his name, nobody would have had compunctions about calling it out for the pedestrian affair it was. You and I look at the film first and foremost while for the ultra hard core fans, it is “after all Rajni film”.
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Govindam
January 19, 2019
I found Anwar’s birth very mythic. In a moving train, as the sunlight was warm and golden, amid tension and with the help of transgenders, this child takes a birth. Strangely, they too call him a very “special” child. The next scene where they board the boat and the editing cuts… there was a sense of myth in the writing.
And, somehow, I find Rajinikanth’s emoting very subtle and more composed now. Is it the Pa Ranjith effect?
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Bee
January 19, 2019
BR: any plans on reviewing Tarun Baskar’s Ee Nagaraaniki Emaindhi?. Liked the film a lot. Great first half, but the film loses its plot after that. But, you can see why Tarun is one of Telugu cinema’s most promising directors.
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Amit Joki
January 19, 2019
“Nawaz failing to convince VS that he is really his son”, I wonder why this is how most of the people here felt including BR.
Firstly, Nawaz didn’t really treat VS as his son throughout the film. He really does use VS as a henchmen. VS may not have been Rajini’s son alright, but he wasn’t Nawaz’s either. We don’t see Nawaz’s wife any where.
And the burns on VS seems more likely due to a bomb blast than the phony “crackers” theory Nawaz uses as an excuse.
VJS is more likely to be “the boy who lived”. May be, Nawaz did take someone who was still alive. His reason isn’t flawed. This is the same plot that Andrea uses to save Dhanush in Vada Chennai, “Save him now and you will have earned a fiercely loyal follower”.
Brainwashing a child (who is an orphan anyway) to think Nawaz is his father will be more powerful anyway.
Also, Rajini doesn’t kill VJS. I refuse to believe KS is someone who could leave such glaring plot holes. He might have had plans for a sequel and that’s why things stand as it is.
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Eswar
January 19, 2019
Success of a movie is like success of a political party in an election. Most times, they are multifaceted and target simultaneously different groups. The more groups they can connect to, the more chances for them to succeed.
Two people voting for the same party do not vote for the same reason. Similarly two people who likes a movie do not enjoy it for the same reason. A movie, even if you are watching in a theatre among hundreds of people, still manages to have a private conversation with you. Some of them succeed by touching on your most personal moments. Some of them succeed by making you forget those moments. If someone enjoys a high emotional drama that others can’t stand it’s because of this. If someone raves about a mindless, emotional movie its because that movie made him forget the necessities of life.
The kind of conversation a movie has with a viewer also depends upon the viewers’s taste. Taste stems from one’s personal experiences and exposure. Taste is a very sensitive topic. As Chetan Bhagat puts it: (via a old post from Jai Arjun Singh)
“A lot of people don’t realise that taste can be used to run other people down. But all of our tastes are a product of our environment, the families we were born into, our upbringing. If I’m from a sophisticated background I might have exposure to the finer points of Japanese cuisine. But a traditional Jain family won’t know anything about it – does that mean these people are dumb?”
It’s easier to forget this sensitivity when we talks about movies. Even people who are generally sensitive about other things don’t think twice when they diss a movie especially around the viewership. It is one thing to say “I do not like this food” and another thing to say “who will eat this food”. The latter is being insensitive to the person who is enjoying it. We don’t do this at the table while eating, but we don’t think it’s not okay to do it when we discuss about movies. To wonder how movies like Petta or Viswasam can be enjoyed is questioning the tastes of the people who are savouring it. Since taste is a personal thing, discussing about movies can become personal very quickly. Once it becomes personal the discussion becomes pointless as it revolves around trying to prove whose sensibilities are superior forgetting that for each his own is better.
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Honest Raj
January 20, 2019
petta paraak: I doubt he was playing a character that didn’t really espouse the far right stuff he was portraying on screen – so it came across as him just being his sarcastic self (especially apparent when he says “vaangada kalaacharatha kaapathalam”).
Absolutely spot on! For the most part, it felt like he was playing Ka Ka Po’s Kathir.
And, totally agree with him being overrated. His female counterpart in that regard would be Aishwarya Rajesh.
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Madan
January 20, 2019
“To wonder how movies like Petta or Viswasam can be enjoyed is questioning the tastes of the people who are savouring it.” – This happens because there is not the difference in culture that’s there between Japanese and Jain cuisine. Your example would work with a Westerner finding Indian music weird or vice versa. Both sides lack each other’s cultural reference to make sense of the music. This is not the case with Petta though one very annoying thing I have seen in these discussions is a section of fans of mass films attempt to imply that those who don’t like it are Peters who are not true Tamilians in essence and have pretensions of finer taste.
I think it’s worth examining why this debate happens more and more with mass films. A mass film like Petta is ostensibly meant to appeal to the largest section of the audience. It’s supposed to be the Rolling In The Deep of cinema. And it used to be that way. If I remember correctly, even Hollywood mass market films had a broader appeal in the 90s.
I think the issue these days is enormous amounts of money are spent in making and marketing these films. Therefore, the production houses are even more risk averse and want to have an absolute lock on the minimum returns so that it’s worth the endeavour. This is why we see what is supposed to be a mass film requiring instead a hardcore commitment to the star/universe (as in Marvel). Without this prior awareness, one is left cold by the meta narrative playing out as the star breaks the fourth wall and converses directly with the fans. I felt this way about Vedhalam also so it’s not a one off. It is how mass movies are increasingly being made.
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Siva
January 20, 2019
Eswar: Superb comment! Especially, I liked that last paragraph very much. Mostly because, I too, am guilty of being insensitive to people enjoying dumb movies (or what I perceive as dumb; they may well be not dumb, after all). And I don’t think I am going to be able to change that behavior. At least not completely. It is very hard, no? — changing an ingrained mindset.
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Aravind
January 21, 2019
Kalyanam song from pettai sounds like it’s inspired from s.balachander ‘s song “kalyanam aah kalyanam “from penn movie released in 1954.
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V
January 22, 2019
Intrigued by the review, comments & post-review pieces here, I watched the film today. Felt like a pure vegetarian at a Muniyandi Vilas Military Hotel! As someone who was never swayed by the “style” factor of Rajnikanth, but still could enjoy his largely entertaining capers like Manithan, Annamalai & Baasha – this one was underwhelming.
I watched it with about 15 others in the theater with absolutely no hungama. So the evocative dialogues and whistle-baits did not receive any response from the crowd. In a way, this ensured that it was the film that was the focal point and not infectious fandom
The initial portions were superb. It was great to see the star in super form, but I think it got repetitive after a point. Ive known for 30+ years that this star can set the screen on fire – someone who hasnt deviated much from his template, even in Kaala Kabali type of movies. So why have meaningless characters just to prop up the already gigantic Rajni? Karthik Subburaj from what I have seen, doesnt get verbose to explain the twists in his films (eg Pizza) – but here I guess he had to keep dialogues to explain obvious things. For eg: The Vaali Rama story in the end – Rajni had beautifully changed his facial expression from that of a concerned dad, to a triumphant badass boss once his job was done. The dialogues just created flab. Similarly the political intonations & commentary on food, urimai, mannu, right-wing etc were just so out-of-place. I get that it is impossible to show Rajni in a negative light – but why this positive glow? The personal enmity itself could have served the purpose quite well, but no – podhu nalam has to be somewhere there, even in a Karthik Subburaj film, known otherwise for his unapologetic characters (eg. Sidharth in Jigarthanda!).
I could suspend my belief for some of the gaping holes in the plot, but certainly not for the one where Rajni makes a fake claim, a claim so crucial to the story which however pivots on something improbable like Nawaz’ lack of any reaction to it! I mean, atleast show him get a severe asthmatic attack that muffles his voice. This one is more amusing than Manorama believing that Rajni – Prabhu are CBI officers in Guru Sishyan 🙂
Vjs: while many found his performance problematic, I thought he was being true to his character – that of Singaram’s son – i.e not a bright bulb. Would have loved to see him as the main antagonist, not a pawn in the game.
Just wondering if this film would have got this sort of a reception had it not been marketed strategically by Sun pictures (gradually creeping into our minds through audio launch, Karthik Subburaj’s image of a Superstar veriyan & this film being a tribute being cultivated through Twitter, Suryan FM plug-ins, Sun TV spots etc) or had it released like 2.0, during a non-festival weekend or if it did not carry KS’ name (i.e idhey padam, but say, the Director’s name was, maybe, Soundarya Rajnikanth!). Ofcourse Rajni fans would have made it a hit even then, but this outpouring of acclaim may not have happened.
BR’s review is spot-on.
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Eswar
January 22, 2019
Your example would work with a Westerner finding Indian music weird or vice versa. Both sides lack each other’s cultural reference to make sense of the music.
Even within the Tamil culture, there are so many layers. Not every Tamil can pick another sub culture within the Tamil speaking society easily. The Beef eating protagonist in Attakathi is a reference to a certain sub-culture. Sivaji as Periya Thevar is not just about the character for everyone. For some Mukkulathor, Sivaji of the Thevar caste playing himself would have be more prominent than Sivaji the actor. It may be a coincidence but Sivaji played a Thevar again in Pasumpon. Danush’s dialogue “Konnaa Paavam, Thinnaa Pochu” in the village scene in Power Pandi, touches upon the culture of animal sacrifices in parts of Tamil Nadu. While this dialogue would mean nothing to people not exposed to these traditions, it would strike a chord with groups practising these rituals. Especially at a time when these rituals can be seen barbaric. A mainstream hero uttering such a dialogue would be viewed as an affirmation to their practice.
To identity with even the non-cultural themes one has to have gained certain exposure. Capitalism vs Communism theme played out in Anbe Sivam is one example. In the same movie Aravindhan Neelakantan sees another layer — portrayal of a corrupt Siva Bhakthar and an all loving Christian nun. Criticising Hindu theism and sympathising with other religions is a very Periyariyan theme.
Ambedkarian references in Pa.Ranjit movies like Rajini’s suit in Kabali, Karthi’s book in Madras can be identified only if one has been exposed to these ideas. A friend grown up listening to the impact of Dravidian politics on Brahmins could only see Iruvar as glorifying Dravidian leaders. A non-Brahmin won’t feel the same way. Brahmin dialect speaking corrupt/manipulative Secretary and the poster of Qutubuddin Ansari, the face of Gujarat riots, in Raju Murugan’s Joker is a way of layering a specific political ideology within a generic ‘against the system’ movie. There are so many references in movies, subtle and explicit, that people with certain experience and background can pick immediately which in turn influences their likes and dislikes.
The point I am trying to make here is the references, both cultural and non-cultural, are not always readily identifiable. The background of the hero, the dialogues they speak all resonate with some group. Make others cringe. And both have their own reasons.
Movie watching is not an academic exercise for everyone. Not everyone has the time and energy to care about which universe the hero belongs or if the movie is meta. When someone measures and dismisses their favourite movie with the terms that they don’t care, with the terms that they are not exposed to, then they are likely to feel these criticism as alien to them. This highlights the gap in exposure, taste and appreciation.
What is seen cannot be unseen. Once someone is attuned to appreciating the finer aspects of cinema, even if it is perceived, it becomes difficult to see it any other way. To this group appreciation of movies like Vedhalam, Viswasam is a puzzle. On the other side are the people who are not exposed to these aspects. Not exposed because they don’t have an opportunity or because they don’t care about these aspects. To them the likes of Viswasam is as good as any movie that the former group would acknowledge as a Masterpiece. Their taste may be perceived as less finer, but they are probably as satisfied with these movies as the other side’s experience of a Masterpiece.
—
Thanks Siva. I have also done that. Ridiculing Vijay fans. Yes, I agree it’s difficult to change an ingrained mindset. But I think there is hope if we can acknowledge it. I believe that movie appreciations are a matter of taste. Tastes, to me, are more about the environment of the individual. Following BR and the conversation I am having here, has a lot to do with my environment. In a different environment may be I wouldn’t have had the luxury to discuss about movies or I would have been going frenzy over a Vijay or Ajit film, and abusing BR and his followers. I am hoping that being aware of this would help me to be less snobbish towards these fans.
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Madan
January 23, 2019
“Even within the Tamil culture, there are so many layers. Not every Tamil can pick another sub culture within the Tamil speaking society easily” – True. However, to me, how much a film (or any work of art per se) expects the viewer to know this sub culture in order for it to work also says something about the film’s scope. I don’t mean this qualitatively but rather in terms of broad v/s narrow. I have never gone by maatuvandi but I love Raja’s maatuvandi songs. What I am saying is the more ambitious of art creations find a more intrinsic quality of the human condition that the audience can relate to while the more specific discuss, well, specific aspects of a sub culture. One needs both kind of art, obviously. My point though is even the need for a viewer/listener to understand culture is not uniform across different works, different artists. Unlike BB King, I was not born on a plantation in the South and have not walked in his shoes but I can relate to his art. Which brings me to:
“Once someone is attuned to appreciating the finer aspects of cinema, even if it is perceived, it becomes difficult to see it any other way. To this group appreciation of movies like Vedhalam, Viswasam is a puzzle. On the other side are the people who are not exposed to these aspects. Not exposed because they don’t have an opportunity or because they don’t care about these aspects. To them the likes of Viswasam is as good as any movie that the former group would acknowledge as a Masterpiece. ” – Yes. That is exceedingly well summed up and to my mind, this aspect dictates more what a viewer gets out of a movie. What at all one cares about or looks for in a film ends up dictating what films one tends to like and these films in turn may fall into particular slots as well (artsy v/s commercial). Though…I don’t begrudge anyone their fondness for a Vedhalam. It’s fine and as I covered above, I kind of understand what they get out of it. It’s just not the same thing as what I want to get out of a movie and that’s also fine because it would be boring if all films had, you know, slow scenes and soft, unobtrusive BGMs and all the other hallmarks of refinement. I am reminded of the climax of Mr Bean’s Holiday where a typical, hilarious Bean accident rescues the audience out of stupor and the director out of certain rejection.
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Honest Raj
January 24, 2019
Eswar: In the same movie Aravindhan Neelakantan sees another layer — portrayal of a corrupt Siva Bhakthar and an all loving Christian nun. Criticising Hindu theism and sympathising with other religions is a very Periyariyan theme.
Kamal has been criticised for glorifying Vaishnavism (either directly or indirectly) and vilifying the followers of Shaivite traditions in his movies.
Mathimaran, much like AN in the statement above, sounds like an idiot here:
Furthermore, in the Periyarian universe the corrupt Siva Bhakthar would be a Brahmin and not a Vanniyar. 🙂
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Ramesh
January 24, 2019
@Honest Raj : Mathimaran or for that matter any Periyarite is an idiot.Periyarites and Hindutvaites are two sides of the same coin.For the former , the brahmin is an eternal villain and for the latter , the minorities.
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Ramesh
January 24, 2019
As matter of fact, the general degradation in tamil society, its art, culture and cinema is a direct result of Periyar worshipping dravidian movement..The anti-intellectual tendency of tamil society, personality cult, hero worship, casteism etc is the legacy of dravidian movement..the impact of all these reflect in tamil cinema..thats why today we have superstars in Vijay and Ajith…thats why we have fan clubs, milk abhishegam and trash being passed as commerical and mass cinemas..film stars being glorified as intellectuals… actors entering politics.
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Ashwin Kumar
January 24, 2019
I was relocating between cities and able to watch the movie only today. Regret not being able to experience watching with a boisterous audience early on. Nevertheless, loved the movie. Boy, Rajini was in stupendous form. Kudos to KS for taking us back when Rajini movies were loaded with fun and excitement.
Like many who have commented above, I find it hard to believe that BR expected to see more of KS when the director himself had set expectations about this being a fanboy tribute movie. “Interesting” review for there was so much more nicer things to write about .Review indeed felt rushed and unfair.
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Ashwin Kumar
January 24, 2019
And I gotta disagree with BR from #AskBR here about the character sketch of Rajini. I thought it was pretty consistent throughout. There was always an element of mystery about the warden inspite of all the morally good things he does. The character certainly had hints of shades. And one can’t disregard that after 30 years, a man can become more righteous from regret and experience. So it was not a case of two differently toned halves pre and post interval. And about BR not being able to accept Rajini as a cunning and scheming person in the second half, I find that amusing😂
Give some credit to the 69 year old superstar for moving out of his beaten to death plots and embracing new plots and storylines. It shows that he has moved on but still people expect old fashioned rajinism. One has gotta accept this new age rajinism😊
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Eswar
January 25, 2019
@Madan “the more ambitious of art creations find a more intrinsic quality of the human condition that the audience can relate to“ yes. That’s well put.
@Honest Raj “Furthermore, in the Periyarian universe the corrupt Siva Bhakthar would be a Brahmin and not a Vanniyar. ”
That’s a very keen observation 😀
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anon
January 31, 2019
I’d really like to understand why Rajni did Kaala. Knowing now that he had Petta script with him during Kabali, what made him to another film with Ranjith before doing Petta? I was watching Rajni’s Kaala audio launch speech and he said he was wondering what to do post Kabali and he decided to call Ranjith once again. He sounded genuinely fond of Ranjith and was quite aware of the messaging of his films. Kaala seems like a hashed together script after this meeting, so he wanted to work with Ranjith again rather than any script compulsions. Anyway, watching the last few Rajni films with no misogyny and bullshit duets has made me a Rajni fan again. I hope he does NOT work with ARM – is that really his next film?
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vinjk
April 11, 2019
watched Petta on Netflix. It’s a very mediocre film. Contrived story, under-utilised actors (vijay sethupathy, sasikumar, nawazuddin, trisha, Simran…), and most of all Rajini’s over acting!
Can’t understand why he has to act like he is in a 60s black and white film!?!! Rajini’s performance reminded me of how malayali mimicry artiste impersonate yesteryear malayalam actor Prem Nazir. Cringeworthy!
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Vikram s
April 26, 2019
Watched it on Netflix, it just goes on and on.. , must say, it’s a distant cousin of Main Hoon Naa.. .i liked kaala better (though it was message heavy) also, Nana Patekar made for a great villian.. what was Trisha doing here (maybe ticking off an item on her bucket list).. VJS and Nawaz were thoroughly underutilized…I do agree with some of the other comments about VJS’ body language here (unless it was a deliberate choice)
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hari prasad
June 8, 2023
Petta indeed had a scene where the Simran character gets a proper closure.
This is the problem that Karthik Subbaraj and his movies suffer post Iraivi
He has become more ambitious with every movie , so he writes down a lot , shoot a lot of scenes and he edits them thinking that people aren’t interested in watching a 3 hours movie which makes the movie look and feel incomplete and half baked.
In Mahaan , there was a nice deleted scene on how a meek and weak Vikram learns to fight that ended with a homage to his famous barbell lifting scene from Dhill , of course it got deleted and that shot in a single take scene where he fights the goons and Simha calls him Devathoodhan felt illogical because of the scene’s deletion.
Jagame Thandhiram felt like an unfinished movie because of these awkward cuts.
Hope he doesn’t repeat this mistake in Jigarthanda Double X.
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