Read the full article on Film Companion, here: https://www.filmcompanion.in/sethu-20-years-vikram-bala-baradwaj-rangan
Bala, as a filmmaker, is very much like Sethu, a very unique kind of brute force. His generation of filmmakers would go on to shape the Tamil hero we see on screen today.
Spoilers ahead…
I was not in India when Sethu was released, on December 10, 1999. Those days, Tamil movies did not get a huge release outside the state — unless they had really big stars. And Vikram, of course, was hardly a big star, then. His highest-profile films — Meera, Puthiya Mannargal, Ullasam (can you imagine Ajith and Vikram together today?) — were more famous for their songs. But suddenly, there was news about this amazing new film that had become a sleeper hit, and then this film went on to win the National Award for Best Feature Film in Tamil, and Vikram became the poster child for perseverance. Every starry-eyed struggler now had a new idol to worship, a new mantra to chant. How many sad little films he struggled through! How many other stars he dubbed for! How much he believed in himself! Keep at it, and you could be the next Vikram!
Twenty years on, there still hasn’t been another Vikram. I would argue that even Vikram isn’t the same Vikram. His blazing talent is not up for debate. He’s the best masala hero of his generation. He’s also the best actor of his generation. But oh, his films! Something keeps going wrong… but let’s not go there. Let’s stick with Sethu. I watched it again for this piece. I hadn’t seen it in a while and yet, I remembered every little bit. Maybe that’s how you know a movie is stuck in your head. And maybe it’s also because it’s a very simple story, really: it’s a tragedy about star-crossed lovers. It’s more about the performances and the treatment.
Continued at the link above.
Copyright ©2019 Film Companion.
Baradwaj Rangan 
Honest Raj
December 9, 2019
The scene where Vikram beats up his opponent ends with a “poetic” touch – the only such moment in Bala’s filmography. In terms of cinematography and music (when blended together), Sethu is Bala’s finest work! Yes, Sriman was brilliant in the film.
And, I absolutely love that “mayilaragu” scene. 🙂 It would’ve been a total disaster had it been played by Vijay, Ajith, or even Prashanth.
P. S. I think it was Vignesh (not Murali) who was offered the lead role.
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brangan
December 9, 2019
https://twitter.com/hawkeyeview/status/1203970556552310784?s=19
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shaviswa
December 9, 2019
I cannot watch a Bala movie completely. It kind of gets on my nerves after a certain point. And that is true with Sethu as well. Never liked the film – in fact I felt it was horrible.
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Anuja Chandramouli
December 9, 2019
Oh! This piece brings back fond memories…Loved, loved, loved the film and it made me a huge Bala and Vikram fan. Unfortunately, both haven’t done anything remotely close to the dazzling brilliance of Sethu in too long. Pithamagan was amazing too but it feels like that was light years ago.
‘What he lacked in elegance, he made up for with raw power.’ Couldn’t agree more. The film was packed with a certain intensity of feeling that felt almost feral and landed like a blow to the guts. Bala was something special before he started buying into his own myth and becoming tarred with the ruinous brush of self importance, sickening over indulgence and an untrammeled ego.
The characters in Sethu were so full of life and verve, they still remain tucked away in a corner of my head and heart. I loved the Anna and Anni characters, with their adorable quirks. The former was stern but a lot nicer than he let on and as for the Anni, it was sweet how understanding and protective she was of her brother-in-law even as she unselfishly devoted a chunk of her life towards soothing ruffled feathers and pouring oil on the troubled waters of the relationship between the brothers who could not have had more diametrically differing personalities.
The friends and the mentally challenged lady were well etched too. An excellent Sriman, the funny, scrawny sidekick (whatever happened to that dude?) and the quiet TamBrahm chap who sweetly refrained from judging or joining his buddies when they smoked like chimneys and drank like fish. And I can’t remember any other director who lavished so much care and attention on minor characters like the heroine’s folks, the long suffering professor played by Manobala and even the tea kadai bloke. I remember loving and savouring the way every single scene played out right up to the scene where Sethu’s head is bashed in by those detestable hoodlums. BR, why do you upset me by dwelling affectionately and at length on the affecting music in the film but casually leaving out the maestro’s 30 second masterpiece that soared with Sedhu’s heart capturing those precious moments of perfect happiness just before everything went straight to a fiery hell thereby amplifying the anguish of the audience to unbearable levels? That is the point where I started weeping so hard I could barely see or register the lamentable happenings that followed. (Went through the exact same thing in Pithamagan. Damn you Bala!)
And can I please take a few moments to dwell on Vikram’s absolutely glorious performance? Hell, I felt cheated when he lost out on the national award for it. How enormously good was he? And why aren’t our idiotic filmmakers offering him roles worthy of his sublime talent? Not even Vijay Deverokonda or VJS could have pulled off this role, though the former did remind me of Vikram with that magnificent performance in AR.
May I also say that this film is a legitimate classic before the political correctness loving and enforcering mob descend en masse on this thread? Sure he abducted his love interest and issued death threats to coerce her into loving him back, had spectacular rage issues and had such a predilection for violent, abusive behavior he makes Arjun Reddy look like a kitty cat but I am not ashamed to say that I still adore Sethu and understand why the heroine chose to reciprocate his feelings despite the sociopath levels of bad behavior. The epic tragedy that eventually overtook this flawed but decent even heroic (yes, I said it) man still makes me wanna burst into tears and bawl into a pillow.
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Kay
December 9, 2019
I was watching Malai En Vethanai song today and had similar thoughts. That Sethu has got to be the softest of Bala’s movies. Maybe he didn’t want to shock the audience in his first movie.
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MANK
December 9, 2019
Today, a story about a brutish college stud deciding that a docile fresher is the love of his life may seem familiar. You may have heard about a recent film that did this? Yes?
Reaaaally, which one 🙂
A bit of banter follows between his friends, for about a minute-and-a-half, and we segue right into another song: the magnificent ‘Kaana karunguyile’. It’s a deliberately “crass” song. The old-time cabaret dancer Jyothilakshmi — described by one of Sethu’s friends as “kulukkal sundari” — is brought in to dance. The stylish sway of her hips as she walks into the scene is something to behold.
I love the scene where Sethu attempts suicide and falls on a poor watchman — Sethu survives, the poor watchman battles for life. Your brain needs to be wired a certain way for you to be able to write such a scene, which wobbles between genuine sadness and tar-black comedy.
Sex, violence, comedy , tragedy…. Yup!, vintage Brangan all around
You should write more about old films. I feel like i want to watch the film again, like right now
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MANK
December 9, 2019
Vikram became the poster child for perseverance. Every starry-eyed struggler now had a new idol to worship, a new mantra to chant. How many sad little films he struggled through! How many other stars he dubbed for! How much he believed in himself! Keep at it, and you could be the next Vikram!
Yes all true, but i had hoped that he would use it as a spring board and become the next Rajnikanth or Kamal Haasan. Alas, trying to be both at the same time did him in. And what poor choice of films. Even the worst actor in the world would be sensible enough to stay away from films like Kandasaamy, Rajapaatai ,Irumugan,. i think even Vijay’s films during the time were far better.
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bart
December 9, 2019
Wonderfully written. A movie that was needed desperately in those times.. It was the season of various forms of love – paathu love, paakama love, thottu love, thodama love etc etc. This movie came as a turn-around on those series – Kadhal Kottai, Poo Magal oorvalam, Hello, Kalamellam Kadhal Vazhga, Kannethirey thondrinal, Kadhalar dinam and countless many.
Vikram was the person to look up to. He followed this with Dhill, Dhool, Kasi, Gemini, Saamy etc. There wasn’t anyone else who could do a Kasi and Pithamagan while cranking those commercial blockbusters. I watched Dhool twice in theaters, while “Anbe Sivam” (which released alongwith) had to wait. Those days.. 🙂
But then both the director and the actor went downhill to rock bottom that even the movie “Varma”, made (a remake!!) for his son with the same Bala had to be shelved.
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Madan
December 9, 2019
Beautifully written though I cannot fully relate to it as I have only watched parts of the second half, coming up to the end. I do remember the poignant BGM theme Raja composed for the moment when Abitha visits Sethu in the asylum. It stayed with me because he chooses a haunting violin motif overlaying a keyboard progression rather than something dramatic da da dainnn like the typical Tamil films of that period. @ 1:57 in here:
Oh, and I guess Kadhalenna Kadhalenna was another of his ‘bad luck’ songs – not included in the film but has outstanding orchestration and sung very well by Swarnalatha.
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Madan
December 9, 2019
1:57:34 to be exact.
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TambiDude
December 10, 2019
“I cannot watch a Bala movie completely. It kind of gets on my nerves after a certain point. And that is true with Sethu as well. Never liked the film – in fact I felt it was horrible.”
I felt the same watching Naan Kadavul, specially the misery of the character played by Pooja.
Same with Angadi Theru which was designed to make us feel guilty of leading a good life.
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ini
December 10, 2019
Pieces like this always reminds me how lucky Tamil cinema is to have such a fine chronicler in you.
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krishna prasad
December 10, 2019
Liked Sethu. But Bala ‘s other movies get to my nerves. Mean the intention of the movie mayb to make one feel nauseated which he does achieve but one ‘s brain needs to be wired a certain way to see only the negatives and the disgusting without being able to c the positives and the beautiful. Guess I would go as far as saying he is one of the most over hyped directors along with a r murugadoss.
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Heisenberg
December 10, 2019
//I do remember the poignant BGM theme Raja composed for the moment when Abitha visits Sethu in the asylum. It stayed with me because he chooses a haunting violin motif overlaying a keyboard progression//
@Madan – That’s a wonderful and haunting bgm, but it recurs in the movie at least 3 times in different moods. First is when Vikram wakes up middle of night in search of that peacock feather and plays with it, the bgm plays in a very breezy mood. When Vikram tries to convince her in that deserted building, after vikram has poured his heart out, the theme is played as a soulful vocal. Later as a tragedy in the asylum.
To this day, whenever I remember Sethu, this bgm plays in my head.
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Madan
December 10, 2019
Heisenberg: Thanks, thought it might a recurring motif, too good not to be. I don’t recollect the first instance you mentioned but yes I do remember that short Unnikrishnan solo that plays as an ecstatic Sethu celebrates.
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Heisenberg
December 10, 2019
@Madan. Here it is from around 1:45
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Isai
December 10, 2019
I remember telling a friend 12 years ago that my 3 favourite Tamil directors were Bala, Selvaraghavan and Hari. Even today, I think it still remains the same, even though the quality and impact of the movies of these directors have only lessened in these years. Looking back, I think the reason why I liked these directors were that despite the repetitiveness and other flaws/indulgences that they had, they were quite good in character building. Not just the main leads, even the supporting characters, especially women, were well fleshed out. Also, they were able to perfectly capture the milieu or more appropriately the ‘vaazhviyal’ of these characters. To top it off, they were also good at writing dialogues that were memorable and at the same time non-‘filmy’. Sadly, I don’t remember any of the other directors being consistently good in the above 3 aspects in the last 12 years.
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Isai
December 10, 2019
Sethu was the most ‘palatable’ Bala movie. He first built characters that were quite endearing AND THEN transported them to the dreary world that he envisioned. When he stopped doing this in his later movies, many people found it difficult to stomach. I wish BR had included the fact that while Sethu was remade in multiple languages, including in Hindi as Tere Naam, it couldn’t replicate its ‘ecosystem changing’ success. It was a movie that was perfect for its time and wouldn’t have had the same impact if Vikram had done it after becoming a huge star through Dhool and Saamy.
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lapogadnan
December 10, 2019
Vetrimaaran?
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Isai
December 10, 2019
Did Sethu have “blatant misogyny, caste hatred and normalized harrasment of women”? For misogyny, let us consider the scene where Vikram’s friend Sriman is shouting at the brother Sivakumar for deciding to admit Vikram in an asylum. The brother’s wife steps in and slaps Sriman. And now since Bala was misogynistic, he showed both Sriman and Sivakumar then hitting the wife, for how dare a woman slap a man? Is this what happened? No, it was that rare Tamil movie where a woman slaps an unrelated man and faces no consequences. So much for misogyny.
As for caste hatred, which I suppose is about brahmins, again it was that rare Tamil movie which accurately captured the milieu and interpersonal dynamics inside a tamil brahmin home. I feel only someone like Bala who had brahmin friends could portray this. Other directors just show the brahmin home only from outside with just 1 mandatory scene where the hero boldly marches in and asks to marry the brahmin girl. While this remains a wish fulfillment, it is nowhere an authentic capture of the milieu.
In this movie, Bala shows a brahmin as a friend to the hero.. an ‘agraharam’ brahmin who is a friend.. but doesn’t join them while drinking.. a friend who is neither perturbed nor helpful when an ‘other caste’ friend is in love with a girl of his caste.
Yes, there were a couple of dialogues mocking the girl’s father and fiancee. But the first ‘Ara Mandaiyan’ dialogue only realistically shows how a non-brahmin youth saw the priestly profession as something that is not very aspirational. That is why, even today, there is no WIDESPREAD demand for reservation in priestly jobs and brahmins continue to enjoy that privilege. The second ‘Thoppanaar’ dialogue comes only because of the men’s antagonism towards the heroine’s fiancee. Again, this guy is shown to be magnanimous in the sense that despite their antagonism, he is able to see that his fiancee, whom HE encouraged to go to college, would have a better quality of life with the hero. He even takes her to the asylum! The dad, meanwhile realistically asks the heroine if the hero’s help towards her sister is SO WORTHY that she decides to marry him? He later requests the brother Sivakumar to convince his daughter and finally abuses the hero in the climax. Nobody got offended with that because they saw it as a genuine expression of pain. Heck, this tamil movie by a debut director even had a sanskrit song! So much for caste hatred.
Finally, the one thing that does bother me is if this movie normalized the harassment of women. Now, despite the fact that there was neither an easy acceptance (ie just keep badgering and she will accept) nor a happy ending, I still feel a bit uncomfortable. But, then I was surprised to recall that among the multiple women with whom I THEN discussed this movie, none of them had mentioned this harassment. Now, I realize that the girl got a guy who was financially much better off and better looking than her expected ‘would be’. He is madly in love with her and goes out of his way to solve his sister’s seemingly insolvable problem. He kidnaps her to a secluded place and then says ‘I don’t want to rape you.. I just want to express my feelings to you’.. I want to hear from that seemingly rare woman who would say that I know he SEEMS a much better match for her but if I was in her shoes, I would have rejected him, because IN-PRINCIPLE, I am opposed to someone pursuing me like that..for this seems to be the stuff of #WhatWomenWantButWon’tAdmit.
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Isai
December 10, 2019
“lapogadnan: Vetrimaaran?”
I first ended the comment as.. “though Vetrimaaran comes close” but then modified the sentence to include the word consistently.
I think Vetri is better than these 3 when it comes to capturing the “vaazhviyal”. Vetri is again better when it comes to staging a scene or in terms of visual brilliance. But, in his last 2 films, he overstuffed the narrative, so quite a few characters were not well fleshed out since many of their scenes were chopped in editing. An example would be the dalit henchman who chases Dhanush in the forest in Asuran. Why is he loyal to the villain’s family and why does he have a sudden change of heart in the end? Another thing is he often sacrifices logical coherence/character consistency for getting a scene ‘high’. I have detailed this in Asuran’s review. Also, a personal bias against him is that his heroes either have no father or have a bitter relationship with their fathers. While the above may impress a critic like BR, I am not happy with his last 2 movies.
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Apu
December 11, 2019
Isai:
“Finally, the one thing that does bother me is if this movie normalized the harassment of women. …. But, then I was surprised to recall that among the multiple women with whom I THEN discussed this movie, none of them had mentioned this harassment. … I want to hear from that seemingly rare woman who would say that I know he SEEMS a much better match for her but if I was in her shoes, I would have rejected him, because IN-PRINCIPLE, I am opposed to someone pursuing me like that..for this seems to be the stuff of #WhatWomenWantButWon’tAdmit.”
Not having seen this movie and even the Hindi remake (Tere Naam) your comment is soooo very reminiscent of what anyone might say about Arjun Reddy.
No, that is not what women want but not admit. It might have worked for this woman, but yes, it also seems like normalizing the “say yes else I will kill you” behavior.
Also to BR and everyone: are you soft on this movie because you were much younger and less judgmental and it makes you nostalgic?
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Nivaz
December 11, 2019
@Rangan //I love the scene where Sethu attempts suicide and falls on a poor watchman — Sethu survives, the poor watchman battles for life. Your brain needs to be wired a certain way for you to be able to write such a scene// When this comes in the film :O
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Isai
December 11, 2019
Apu, I am only happy if a majority of women who watched this movie feel that they wouldn’t have accepted that much better guy ONLY because he was obsessively pursuing her. As I said, it does make me feel uncomfortable and has left me puzzled on why none of the 25, 40 and 65 year old women that I saw and discussed this movie with, took offence to that relentless pursuit.
This is not even close to Arjun Reddy, where most of the men and women I know, thought that the guy was an ass and felt that the heroine, at least in the initial scenes, looked retarded.
This seems closer to 7/G Rainbow Colony where an extraordinary set of circumstances seem to simultaneously pull and push a woman towards and away from a man obsessed with her.
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vijay
December 13, 2019
there is no end to this 20 yrs of this or 30 yrs of that series I guess. Not such a big fan. It is one thing to recall with fondness once in a while a movie like say Moondram Pirai or Kaadhal. But when it is overdone everywhere on the net it ends up becoming parodiable. How about 30 yrs of aboorva sagodharargal or 40 yrs of udhiri pookkal or 15 years of kaadhal? There is always some anniversary running. I guess this is a nice filler when you run out of topics to write on or have a lull between releases.
Coming to Sethu the first half was pretty ordinary. Bala emerged in the second half, and gave us a preview of what was about to routinely come. Pithamagan was the movie where he struck a balance between masala-gore and misery-porn. Vikram took 10 yrs to get there and then pissed it all away after 5 years.
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Ramesh
December 17, 2019
Why is Vikram considered a great actor?.. yes he can hide behind make up and come up with some weird expressions.. but has tough time emoting simple/closer to life expressions.. he has no comedy sense….his dialogue deliveries have been ordinary… and its not without reason he has struggled with success. Ofcourse he is far superior to Ajith and Vijay.
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Deepika
September 12, 2021
I am curious about the significance of Rajashree character. I am extending this from the phrase:
“This is another terrific character. On a screenplay level, she exists solely so that Sethu can “save” her and become a hero in Abitha’s eyes — but even so, there is so much naked desperation in this woman, whose husband demands more dowry and has kept her from meeting their son…..”
Yes, there’s detailing to Abitha’s sister role. But where was Bala going with this mentally challenged girl.. She was seen more often (comparatively) in the mental asylum phase of Chiyaan.
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Deepika
September 12, 2021
The first time when Sethu meets Abitha, she wears an abstract design saree with ‘cyan’ shades, the design of which looks like the damaging brain scenes of Sethu shown in abstract red shades.
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