There’s a lot of rock-solid writing by writer-director RDM. After what seems like ages, I watched a film that’s genuinely unpredictable, and not in a gimmicky way.
Spoilers ahead…
At first, I thought Kavalthurai Ungal Nanban — presented by Vetri Maaran — was a psycho-thriller: as in, a thriller with a “psycho” killer on the loose. Look at the signs. There’s a captive, moaning in unimaginable pain. There’s the position this captive is found in, something that feels almost fetishistic. There’s the pair of handcuffs. There’s the sickly yellow glare that surrounds this captive. There are the signs of dust and disuse all around, which suggest we are somewhere far from civilisation. Slowly, we see that this evaluation of the film may not be too off the mark. We are still in a psycho-thriller: as in, a psychological thriller. And the foundation of the drama that plays out is one of the pillars of civilisation as we know it today: the police force that’s meant to keep society in good health, failing which there’s only anarchy.
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gnanaozhi
November 26, 2020
Wanted to watch this after your review but sadly I think it is only running in theatres.
I was and still am like this character (based on your review) and would be interesting to watch how this plays out.
Always give back to cops (with respect ofc), never paid a bribe etc. Still remember when I got under a cops skin and he openly said I can even put you away for a Ganja case. That was the only time a cop overreached.
This was when my friends and I were walking back home from Sathyam (lived in Gopalapuram then, so a 5 min walk), we got into our flat and were walking to my block. Cops hail us from outside the gate, ask us to come out. Which we did and then rudely start asking us questions. Pissed me off and I told him point blank that we were in my own home and there is nothing that gives a police the power to randomly ask where I was. It escalated from there.
99% of the time though, and this definitely might be a language / clearly upper income class boy thing but cops backed down. Always wondered if this was not to be the case, and I had called them out in Tamil & visibily was poor, would they tolerate insolence.
Just one time though I had to back down, a friend of mine was caught drunken driving (I was in the backseat, college days so forgive the bad behaviour), cops stop us, I take the moral high ground and the cop decided to make an example of us, marches to Neelankarai police station, threatened to file suit unless we paid up 2k (in 1998 money this was big). I wanted to still fight it but the moment we reached the station my friends caved and they paid up 2.5k + the cops took away the whiskey bottle they had, it was a Glen so the loss hurt even more. To this day they make fun of me for bargaining us up from a 500-1000 bribe to 2.5k + half a bottle of Single malt.
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brangan
November 27, 2020
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M.L.Prabhakaran
November 27, 2020
Hi Baradwaj Ji,
Good day!
I have a query.,
In Anupama Mam’s review, Subtitles are there.
But, In Your review (or) Mr.Hriday’s review, don’t have subtitles.
Is there any reason for it?
Thanks,
Prabhakaran.
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abishekspeare
December 11, 2020
” That may not be the director’s intention, but that is likely to be the takeaway for most of us middle-class folks”
ENNADHU BR middle class ah!
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