Trigger 1: I write movie reviews on my blog. Like many other movie reviewers, I end every review with number of stars that I am willing to give the movie. My nephew and his friends look at my blog regularly. Sometimes they skip the article to find the number of stars I have given for the movie just to determine whether they can see the movie or not. They have their own scale based on my ratings.

Trigger 2: I am pursuing my Digital marketing masters at the University of Southampton. Web analytics is part of the subjects that we are learning. I was contemplating how numbers of have taken over how we should design our webpages. I still remember how I had to give way to an ugly orange button on the home page of our product page (when I was working in an IT product company) because it was giving more clicks. It did increase our clicks and downloads, but the aesthetics of the page were long gone.

I think the obsession towards quantification started when we were babies – the number of baby steps, height, weight, eating frequency, marks in school, college, life expectancy and what not. Take a step back and give it a thought, we always play the number game. Goals, awards, film’s revenue, GDP, calories earned and lost, size of physical parts, time spent in sex, marks earned in a subject, number of countries traveled, amount of money earned, steps walked, time spent on social networks, number of likes earned, number of followers, number of inventions, sleeping time, exercise time, alcohol levels and even how much we pee. Even marriages and relationships are measured based on the number of years a couple stay together. We have become so obsessed with quantification that even quality is measured in numbers (parts per million defects)

Quantification has crept in to our lives slowly that we don’t realize the impact. Is there anything that we do that’s not attached to numbers. We measure everything in our life and through this quantification we have lost focus on aesthetics, quality and deeper meanings in life. How can you quantify the beauty of reading Shakespeare? How can you quantify the experience of making love to your girlfriend? And slowly, that’s where we are heading. There are researches that have looked at how the obsession with numbers has affected the system itself.

This obsession has gone to a level that quantified self is a movement by itself. Started by Gary Wolf in 2007, the idea has stemmed in to conferences and communities across the world. To quote Wikipedia,

“Quantified Self is a movement to incorporate technology into data acquisition on aspects of a person’s daily life in terms of inputs (e.g. food consumed, quality of surrounding air), states (e.g. mood, arousal, blood oxygen levels), and performance (mental and physical)”.

People have started quantifying every aspect of life. Mobile phones, smart fitness tracker bands and smart watches are programmed to keep track of every bit of movement we make. For some people, it helps a lot. People lose weight, track their health problems and keep fit. But is it true for the majority is a bigger question?

So what’s the problem in quantifying things? It has become the norm in this world, then why not quantify your life. The problem occurs when you start obsessing about it and start ignoring things that are supposed to be. For example, pumping yourself with extra workouts in the gym just because you enjoyed one more piece of bacon. The problem happens when a child is denied an extra ice cream just because he /she has achieved the calorie intake for the day. The problem happens when we start hurting ourselves to satisfy an app. The anxiety that stems out of not achieving your daily targets – number of steps that you need to walk in a day to achieve 100% on your Fitibit tracker.

Doctors report that the consistent tracking might lead to psychological issues. Only few lifestyle diseases like diabetes need consistent monitoring but more and more patients are provided with data when they meet their physicians. The self-diagnosis has become more rampant that they try to control the treatment process (Keller, 2014)

Dr.Kimberly Dennis (CEO of Timberline Knolls – a rehabilitation center for anorexia patients) says that 75% of her patients are obsessed with tracking their daily food routines through their smart phones (Gregory,2013). Although, during the pre-digital era, we had the same kind of obsession on quantification, smart phones and apps have made it quite easier to self-track and grow this obsession.

Slowly and steadily, we are involuntarily allowing ourselves to be digitized and systemized. In few years, we will allow companies to decide what to eat, when to eat, when to walk, when to play, when to have sex and when to poop. John Bogle, Former CEO of the Vanguard Group rightly puts it

“Numbers are not reality. At best, they are a pale reflection of reality. By worshipping at the altar of numbers and by discounting the immeasurable, we have in effect created a numeric economy that can easily undermine the real one” (Linster, 2011)

Can we live without quantification of our life? But what life would we live with just numbers?

“Not everything that counts can be counted, and not everything that can be counted counts” – Einstein

P.S:

1. I have explored only the self-quantification aspect of this obsession. And there are obsessions of numbers and data in every walk of life. I am intending to write more about them.

2. I have not yet explored the psychological and sociological aspects of this issue.

Image credit:
1. Charis Tevis – Sourced from Flickr.com through Creative Commons 

References:

1. Invivomagazine.com, (2014). Self-tracking, to the point of obsession – Tendances – Corpore Sano – InVivo. [online] Available at: http://www.invivomagazine.com/en/corpore_sano/tendances/article/66/self-tracking-to-the-point-of-obsession [Accessed 25 Feb. 2015].

2. Linster, G. (2011). » Is the Quantified Life Worth Living? Coffee Theory. [online] Coffeetheory.com. Available at: http://coffeetheory.com/2011/07/11/is-the-quantified-life-worth-living/ [Accessed 25 Feb. 2015].

3. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantified_Self

The post The Quantified Life (or the unrelenting obsession with numbers) appeared first on Sylvianism.

Not so long ago, it was said that if you want to make a successful Tamil movie, you have to win the hearts of masses from the village. One of the reasons why MGR was so successful with his movies was because he knew the perfect masala that will impress the masses. Although currently the movies have become more multiplex oriented, one person who mastered this art was Bhagyaraj and his masterpiece in this genre is Mundhanai Mudichu

Mundhanai Mudichu (The knot in the saree) (1983)

Mundhanai Mudichu is a story of Parimala (Oorvasi), daughter of the village head, lives her life by making pranks in the village along with a bunch of small boys. Bhagayaraj comes to the village as a schoolteacher with his child. Initially, Parimala continues her pranks with the teacher but later finds sympathetic as she finds that he is a widower.

Attracted by his good behavior, she falls in love with him and tries to woo him. After finding that he wouldn’t accept a second mother for his child, she accuses him of molesting her. During the interrogation, she pledges by stepping over teacher’s child to confirm that he molested her. And he is forced to marry her.

After the wedding, he openly tells her that she will remain celibate and he wouldn’t touch her as she cheated him. Parimala tries everything but he stays the same because he strongly believes that she would mistreat his son if she has a child of her own. The remaining part of the story deals how Parimala gains the confidence of her husband.

Mundhanai Mudichu had Bhagyaraj and Oorvasi in the lead supported by Deepa, Kovai Sarala, Peeli Sivam and Thavakalai Chittibabu. The movie was produced by AVM Productions with Ilaiyaraaja scoring the music and Ashok Kumar wielding the camera. And of course, Bhagyaraj directed the movie.

What’s so special about the movie?

1. Mundhanai Mudichu was special because the story related to the deep-rooted cultural identity of the Tamil Nadu villages. It was as if Bhagyaraj took a camera inside a village and that’s what made the movie so close to reality.

2. The movie’s screenplay is one of the best ever made in Tamil cinema. Tightly strung screenplay with strong doses of humour and sentiments struck a chord with the audience.

3. It gave Oorvasi to the world of movies. The story revolves around her and she carried a very strong character on her shoulders with finesse. In fact, it was indeed a surprise because she was just 15 when she was roped in for the role and her second acting assignment.

4. The natural acting of supporting characters. In fact, most of the actors were new faces and perfectly fitted to the roles

5. The perfect combination of screenplay, direction, acting and musical score.

Why it is in the list?

1. Arguably, one of the masterpieces in this genre. One of the movies that is still referred whenever people talk about rural oriented movies.

2. The movie became a trendsetter with respect to rural milieu movies and ran for 200 days in theatres. In fact, AVM used letters from the audience to promote the movie.

3. The crowning jewel of K.Bhagyaraj and he was not able to surpass the success he achieved in this movie.

Trivia

1. Oorvasi started her career with Thodarum Uravu but Mundhanai Mudichu was the first movie to release. Originally, her sister Kalpana was chosen for the movie. Bhagyaraj spotted Oorvasi who accompanied Kalpana and chose her to be the heroine of the movie.

2. Although Kovai Sarala made her debut as a child artist, her first adult role was for this movie. She acted as a 32-year-old pregnant lady.

3. The movie was remade in Telugu as Moodu Mullu. Interestingly, another producer dubbed the original as Vaddante Pelli. The movie was remade in Hindi as Masterji, with Rajesh Khanna and Sridevi in lead and Halli Meshtru in Kannada.

4. It was quite usual for K.Bhagyaraj movies being remade in Hindi because of his taut screenplays.

5. Drumstick was referred as an aphrodisiac in the movie. The scene became so famous that it has numerous references in various other movies. Bhagyaraj admitted that he got the idea from his grandmother. It serves as an example of how a pop culture reference moved in to mainstream parlance.

6. During the filming of the movie, Pandiarajan, Livingstone and GM Kumar (assistants of Bhagyaraj) escaped from the shooting to narrate a story for a producer. There is a sequence in the movie after the main interrogation scene where Bhagayaraj scolds his three students for being false witnesses and calls them “guru dhrogigal” (betrayers of teacher). And his assistants responded with an apology in Pandiarajan’s first movie (Kanni Rasi) by making a character like Bhagyaraj to bless them indirectly.

7. The movie was certified ‘A’ due to thematic elements but still became a huge hit with the masses.

8. The title song “Vilakku Vacha Nerathulla” was not originally part of the movie. As Bhagyaraj liked the tune, he made a title song and MN Nambiar and his wife inspired the sequence. Nambiar’s wife always cooked for him even in the sets and Nambiar fed her the first spoon every time. Bhagyaraj saw this during the shoot of “Thooral Ninnu Pochu” and used it as an inspiration for this song.

9. The reason why I have referred Bhagyaraj’s character as “The Teacher” is because his character doesn’t have any name.

References:

1. Koffee with DD show (Vijay TV) dated 8th February 2015 with K.Bhagyaraj and Pandiarajan

2. The Best of Tamil Cinema – Volume 2 by G. Dhananjayan

YouTube Link:

The post 50 Tamil movies to watch before you die – 28 – Mundhanai Mudichu appeared first on Sylvianism.

Photo credit: Thomas – licensed through Creative Commons 2.0  from Flickr

English Translation

To the thought born in my mind

die today

Don’t become a refugee

like the waves of the sea

die now..

If I have make you in to words

you will become a twand

on the minds of others

If I have to personify you

you will be untrue

Are you an orphan?

couldn’t be..

because I gave birth to you

even though I know you are not for me

Who will own you?

just die now…

The post தமிழ் கவிதை : எண்ணமே…இற appeared first on Sylvianism.

Photo credit: Chiara, licensed from Flickr through Creative Commons 2.0

English Translation

Separated by a semicolon
like two verses of a poem
we are apart yet together…

The post தமிழ் கவிதை : அரைப்புள்ளி appeared first on Sylvianism.

Few days back, when I was listening to the Telugu version of this song, I made a post on Facebook stating that if I need to take one song with me to my grave (like the Egyptian kings), it would be this one. Why this song? It’s not only me but innumerous Ilaiyaraaja fans have this as their most favourite song created by the Maestro. I am sure that this will be in the top 10 list of every Ilaiyaraaja fan. 20 years back on this same day, Avatharam was released and this post celebrates the brilliance of Raaja the musician, Nasser the creator and Vaali, the poet.

What makes this song special?

Avatharam is the directorial debut of Nasser. The movie is about folk dance artists and their life. Kuppusamy is a talented folk artist who dreams to become an actor in his guru’s troupe. He has a soft side and infatuated dedication to his guru’s daughter Ponnamma. She is blind and one day Kuppusamy tries to do his daily work blindfold just to understand her plight. He fails miserably and explains this to her . Touched by his innocence, she asks him to be her eyes and experience the world for her. This is the moment in the movie when Ponnamma really falls in love with Kuppusamy and being that rustic conservative woman, she expresses her love through that statement. In fact, in the whole movie, you will not see Kuppusamy and Ponnamma openly expressing their love (verbal or physical).

Originally, Nasser didn’t have any song situations. He shot the movie, approached Ilaiyaraaja to compose the music and impressed by Naaser’s brilliance, Raaja scored music for the movie. Listen to Nasser explaining, how this song was composed – hilarious and there can’t be a better tribute to Ilaiyaraaja.

The Song

The girl is visually impaired from birth. She hasn’t seen colours. She hasn’t seen shapes. She hasn’t admired the birds, trees, people, rainbow or anything. But she can’t arrest her mind from imagining. How would she imagine things? Is it even possible/ Have you ever thought about visually impaired people? He wants to help her feel the colours. Feel the colours can be the tagline for this song. The song was written by Vaali and it goes like this. I have grabbed the translation from one of the blogs that was too perfect to be ignored – Thanks to ReNuka for the translation – it is available here

http://iamnotinukraine.blogspot.co.uk/2012/05/translation-of-thendral-vandhu-from.html

தென்றல் வந்து தீண்டும் போது என்ன வண்ணமோ மனசுலே
திங்கள் வந்து காயும் போது என்ன வண்ணமோ நெனப்புலே

வந்து வந்து போகுதம்மா எண்ணமெல்லாம் வண்ணமம்மா
என்னங்களுக்கேத்தபடி வண்ணமெல்லாம் மாறுமம்மா
உண்மையம்மா உள்ளதே நானும் சொன்னேன் பொன்னம்மா சின்ன கண்ணே

What’s the colour in your heart,
when the breeze brushes your skin?
What’s the colour in your thoughts,
when you feel the shine of sky’s akin?

As I see the resurgence of colours’ splendor
In my mind, it occurs…
Indeed each thought has a different color.
Isn’t it the truth, my sweet love?
(In truth, what is it that exists,
and what about its colour?)

Think about it, each of our thoughts indeed have individual colours and the colour of those thoughts change based on the impact it gives.

Stanza 1

எவரும் சொல்லாமலே பூக்களும் வாசம் வீசுது
உறவும் இல்லாமலே இரு மனம் எதோ பேசுது
எவரும் சொல்லாமலே குயிலெல்லாம் தேனா பாடுது
எதுவும் இல்லாமலே மனசெல்லாம் இனிப்பா இனிக்குது

ஓடே நீர் ஓட இந்த உலகம் அது போல
ஓடம் அது ஓடும் இந்த காலம் அது போல
நிலைய இல்லாது நினைவில் வரும் நிறங்களே

Flowers spread fragrance, but without revelation.
Hearts speak consensus, devoid of a lawful union.
Cuckoos sing the melody, not for one man’s whimsy.
My heart feels a mystic bliss, but nothing do I fancy.This world is alike a stream
and time runs afloat
like the planks that afloat.

Inconstantly crosses my mind,
a thousand colours!

The song becomes a duet of both hearts that reflects the freedom that their hearts have found to pursue their love towards each other. And at the end, he completes the stanza to emphasise the bliss of unique beautiful colours that they feel inside their heart that stems out of love.

The Interludes

The post 20 years of Thendral Vandhu Theendum Pothu appeared first on Sylvianism.

I wrote this essay as an assignment for a module in my MSc Digital Marketing course. Don’t ask me how much marks I made but I really liked writing it. I hope you like it too.

TS Eliot once wrote

“You now have learned enough to see

That Cats are much like you and me”

(Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats, 1939). That pretty much sums up the theme of this discourse that tries to explain why the Internet loves cats more than any other thing or not? This essay will explore the virality of cat pictures on the Internet and in turn explain the virality of memes in general as cat pictures were part of the first set of memes created on the Internet. This discourse proposes a theory that cat pictures and videos are manifestations of paidia play of humans. It also talks about implications on marketing and how practitioners can create content akin to cat pictures to make campaigns work.

The ‘myth’ of cats and the Internet

Let’s be honest, people do believe that the Internet is run by cats and human beings are just part of it. But the truth is cats don’t have the statistics behind them. People do search for dogs more than cats on Google, Instagram has more pictures of dogs than cats, Facebook has more posts about dogs than cats and not so surprisingly, dogs have more videos on YouTube than cats (Figures 1,2 &3). In fact, 2013 is deemed to be the year of sloth (Rothman, 2013). Different animals have taken control of the Internet in different years. But the reason for the perception to swing towards to cats side is because of the virality it garners. Since 2011, cat pictures are 4 times viral than their dog counterparts and Ben Huh of Cheezburger network confirmed that people submit 10 photos of LOLCats for every Hot Dog photo (Thornton, 2013).

Figure 1: Google search trends for Dogs and Cats

Figure 2: Hashtags comparison of Dogs and Cats on Instagram

Figure 3: Youtube search comparison of Dogs and Cats

To put in to perspective, how important this cat sensation is, it is imperative to understand the different businesses that have stemmed from this phenomenon. The Cheezburger blog network that started through the famous “I can haz cheezurger” meme is valued at $35 Million as of 2013 (Verduyn, 2013). UK shares 3.8 million cat photos and videos compared to 1.4 million selfies (Metro, 2014). Pluto TV, an Internet TV network started an exclusive channel for cat programming (Sumologic, 2014). There is an Amazon best selling book on how to make your cat an Internet celebrity (Amazon, 2014). Above all, the web sensation Grumpy cat got its own Christmas movie in 2014 and made $64 Million in the same year. So it becomes inevitable to figure out what makes people to share cat pictures.

Figure 4: The phenomenon of cats

There are quite number of articles from marketing practitioners explaining the reasons behind the virality of cat pictures. From Mashable to the Guardian everyone has written a piece on it. From scientific explanations to psychological reasons, people have tried to identify motivations behind this phenomenon.

The reasons that were proposed include cats are cute, cats are evil and cat owners are introverted, hence they use the Internet has become their own dog park. But, all these reasons are superficial and far from convincing. For example, dogs are adorable and in fact dogs are more attached to humans than cats. As mentioned earlier, dog pictures are shared more on the web but cat pictures have more virality. In order to cognise this phenomenon, it is critical to go back in history and also understand the basic human nature of play.

The role of mythology and science

Cats have formed part of human civilisation since the start. There were ample proofs published on Science magazine that all domestic cats came from on species in the Far East and the process would have started 12000 years ago (Zax, 2007). This is clear from the fact that Egyptian mythology had Gods with faces of big cats and Bast, a feminine God had domestic cat’s head. Bast was reckoned to be beautiful and independent. She was the Goddess of pleasure and personified playfulness, grace, affection and also cunningness (Ikram, 2005). In Norse mythology, cats were linked to Freyja, the mistress of Magic. Cats were doomed as part of witchcraft and devil worship by Christianity in Middle ages like any other mythological gods. Marie Louise von Franz in her seminal book, “The Cat: A tale of feminine redemption, talks about the independence of cats and openly flaunt their autonomy. She notes further that cats expect human companionship but they don’t need it.

Not only mythology, but science also talks about the playfulness of cats. In recent research by Atsuko Saito and Kazutaka Shinozuka (University of Tokyo), it was found that cats recognize the voices of their owners but don’t care about it. They don’t explicitly show their affection like dogs (2012). The researchers also say that cats domesticated themselves and humans might have had a very minor part in it. There are thousands of research papers on cognitive abilities of other animals but cats couldn’t be researched because they are too independent to study (Grimm, 2014). For scientists, cats have been a black box because they are extremely smart to manipulate them in to a study. Independence and playfulness of cats have been the reason why people want them as pets.

Cats – manifestation of paidia

Roger Caillois in his groundbreaking work Man, Play and Games defines play as an activity that is not obligatory, has its own space and time, is uncertain in its outcomes, creates no material wealth and has elements of make-believe and unreality (1961). He categorises all playful acts between two extreme points – Ludus and Paidia. Paidia is the spontaneous expression of playfulness while Ludus is governed by rules. All sports in the world have started as paidia and moved to become a ludus.

Caillois says that all play (be it ludus or paidia) starts from an urge and these urges can be classified in to four categories; Agon (competition) – all sports can be categorized in to this, Alea (chance) – betting and gambling, Mimicry (simulation) – roleplaying, games of illusion and Ilinx (vertigo) – swinging, dancing.

Cats are the perfect manifestation of paidia whereas dogs are the perfect manifestation of ludus. The play by pet animals can be classified in to mimicry and ilinx. A cat abides by its own rules and it doesn’t care about what humans perceive them. A cat owner can’t control what it does although they are domesticated. On the other hand, dogs conform to the rules of the owner. A dog can be trained to do things that the owner wants it to do.

To explain this, let’s take the examples of two famous pets from the Internet world. Maru (the cat) and Jesse the Jack Russell (the dog) are among the top ten animals on the Internet. The most famous video of Maru has 20+ Million views while Jesse’s has 12+million views. Maru’s videos (Figure 5) are all about the impulsive reactions on normal things it owner does. For example, it tries to play with vacuum cleaner or it tries to play with a carton box. The only thing the owner does is, he places certain things and captures the unstructured reactions of his cat.

Figure 5: Maru’s playfulness

On the other hand, Jesse’s videos (Figure 6) are about how the owner has trained it to fold the laundry, ride a shopping trolley in the supermarket or cleaning the house. These tricks are cute and they are part of the play but all of these trained by the owner. Everything happens under some rules made by humans when it comes to dogs. The spontaneous reactions of dogs (in fact any animal) are rare.

Figure 6: Jesse’s ludus play

The same goes with other famous cats on the Internet. They mimic or role-play for the humans. They are manifestations of what humans want to play in real life. As children, humans find paidia in every aspect of life. They discover creativity in chaos, and everything starts with an exploration. Children explore, learn and find the means to play with anything. Children also express their emotions impulsively and without any inhibition. And adults can’t do the same thing. So in order to manifest their paidia, humans use cats to express the different emotions and notions of play. Be it the grumpiness through grumpy cat or the cuteness through snoopy or authority through Colonel Meow or the extreme playfulness through Nala, humans are using cats to manifest their carefreeness online.

The other way to prove this theory is that the place where the virality starts. Almost every cat viral picture and 90% of the memes start from the anonymous online communities of 4chan, Reddit or other similar communities. Through research on 150 different memes, Christian Bauckhage found that the majority of memes start and spread because of homogeneous communities and not Internet at large (2011). All these homogeneous communities have something in common – they are serious and playful at the same time. The playfulness comes to the fore when they start creating memes and makes the most unassuming characters as Internet celebrities.

The virality of cat pictures also provides a platform to understand virality of memes in general. Although, the memes spread like a viral epidemic between communities but understanding what content will make a meme or a picture viral is still an enigma. In a research by Jonah Berger and Katherine Milkman, it was found that social transmission of content depends on the internal state of a person rather than motivation to share. Any content that has a manifestation of the play will trigger the urge to share. Take for example, the viral meme content that took over the Internet in 2014 – the ALS Ice Bucket challenge is the perfect example of paidia becoming ludus for a good cause.

Implications on marketing

As cat pictures started becoming viral, marketers chose to use them in diverse campaigns. And not so surprisingly, most of them were epic failures. For instance, Cheerios tried to use the Grumpycat in its commercial and failed because it didn’t understand the idea behind why grumpy cat became famous. Buzz (Cheerios’ Honey Bee) tries to make the Grumpycat smile.

Greenpeace undertook one of the successful campaigns using cat memes. Cats Save Tigers was a campaign to spread awareness of dwindling Tiger population in the world. The commercial had the most famous cats of Internet like Lil Bub, Princess Monster Truck, Hamilton the hipster cat and many more doing their own things for their Tiger counterparts. The campaign became extremely popular because it allowed users to create their own memes through a website and share them on different social networks. Within a month of launch, there were 35.4 million mentions on Twitter of #catssavetigers and one picture of Captain Pancake (Internet cat) received more than 3.42K comments on Instagram (Mcleod, 2014).

The difference between these two campaigns was that the successful one didn’t try to change the nature of the original content. The originality was preserved and at the same time it allowed people to create their own memes to support a larger cause. It was indeed paidia being used and the users responded to the same. Jonah Berger lists the following things as the aspect of viral meme based on the cat pictures

1. Focus on ordinary people (manifestation of play)

2. Flawed masculinity

3. Humor

4. Simplicity

5. Repetitiveness

6. “Whimsical” Content (Kissmetrics, 2013)

Memes and viral content are different. Memes can be mimicked while content is shared. That’s why memes are perfect manifestations of paidia. However, any content that taps in to the inner playfulness of humans can become viral. It is crucial for marketers to create content that can be mimicked and shared by ordinary people that talk to their inner paidia self.

Cats are an enigma for scientists because of their intelligence, independence and playfulness likewise cat pictures are an enigma on the Internet. There are a number of theories on why they are viral and this essay is an attempt to propose a theory based on paidia. Cat pictures on the Internet are the collective expression of playfulness and independence of humans like many other things.

Bibliography

1. Agomuoh, F. (2014). Grumpy Cat’s $100 Million Scowl: How Being Unimpressed Made A Feline And Her Owner Rich. [online] International Business Times. Available at: http://www.ibtimes.com/grumpy-cats-100-million-scowl-how-being-unimpressed-made-feline-her-owner-rich-1742409 [Accessed 15 May 2015].
2. Amazon.co.uk, (2015). How to Make Your Cat an Internet Celebrity: A Guide to Financial Freedom: Amazon.co.uk: Patricia Carlin, Dustin Fenstermacher: 9781594746796: Books. [online] Available at: http://www.amazon.co.uk/How-Make-Your-Internet-Celebrity/dp/1594746796 [Accessed 15 May 2015].
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5. Caillois, R. (1961). Man, play, and games. [New York]: Free Press of Glencoe.
6. Grimm, D. (2014). Why It’s So Hard to Study Cat Intelligence. [online] Slate Magazine. Available at: http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/science/2014/04/cat_intelligence_and_cognition_are_cats_smarter_than_dogs.html [Accessed 15 May 2015].
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8. Ikram, S. (2005). Divine creatures. Cairo: American University in Cairo Press.
9. Just Jesse, (2012). Useful dog tricks 3 performed by Jesse. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PztO-OvzRyg [Accessed 15 May 2015].
10. Kissmetrics.com, (2013). The Science of Virality – Marketing Lessons from Internet Cats. [online] Available at: https://blog.kissmetrics.com/science-of-virality/ [Accessed 15 May 2015].
11. Mcleod, I. (2015). The best #CatsSaveTigers memes: Captain Pancake beats Lil Bub and Hamilton the Hipster Cat. [online] The Drum. Available at: http://www.thedrum.com/news/2014/08/02/best-catssavetigers-memes-captain-pancake-beats-lil-bub-and-hamilton-hipster-cat [Accessed 15 May 2015].
12. Metro.co.uk, R. (2014). Pictures of cats are more popular than selfies: Here’s why. [online] Metro. Available at: http://metro.co.uk/2014/02/19/pictures-of-cats-are-more-popular-in-britain-than-selfies-heres-why-4308297/ [Accessed 15 May 2015].
13. Mugumogo, (n.d.). Maru’s videos. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/user/mugumogu [Accessed 15 May 2015].
14. Rothman, L. (2013). How Cute Sloths Took Over Pop Culture, The World. [online] TIME.com. Available at: http://entertainment.time.com/2013/03/22/how-sloths-took-over-pop-culture-the-world/ [Accessed 15 May 2015].
15. Saito, A. and Shinozuka, K. (2013). Vocal recognition of owners by domestic cats (Felis catus). Anim Cogn, 16(4), pp.685-690.
16. Schultz, C. (2014). History, Travel, Arts, Science, People, Places | Smithsonian. [online] Smithsonianmag.com. Available at: http://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/scientists-confirm-cats-are-pretty-smart-b-dont-really-care-what-you-want-180951194/ [Accessed 15 May 2015].
17. Sumo Logic, (2014). The Internet of Things…and by “Things” we mean Cats! [Infographic] – Sumo Logic. [online] Available at: https://www.sumologic.com/2014/06/20/the-internet-of-cats/ [Accessed 18 May 2015].
18. Thornton, T. (2013). Why Do Cats Dominate the Internet? | Mediashift | PBS. [online] Pbs.org. Available at: http://www.pbs.org/mediashift/2013/05/why-do-cats-dominate-the-internet/ [Accessed 15 May 2015].
19. Time Inc, (1981). Time cover – January 1981. [image] Available at: http://img.timeinc.net/time/magazine/archive/covers/1981/1101811207_400.jpg [Accessed 15 May 2015].
20. Verduyn, M. (2014). The Guy Who’s Made Millions on LOL Online Cat Pics. [online] Entrepreneur. Available at: http://www.entrepreneurmag.co.za/popular/the-guy-whos-made-millions-on-lol-online-cat-pics/ [Accessed 15 May 2015].
21. Zax, D. (2007). A Brief History of House Cats. [online] Smithsonian. Available at: http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/a-brief-history-of-house-cats-158390681/?no-ist [Accessed 15 May 2015].

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One of the greatest music composers has left us today. It’s a sad day but the music he composed will not leave us forever. Unlike the recent temporal music that kills us, his music will stay evergreen in our minds. But in order to give him a tribute, people might repeat his most famous compositions on TV Channels, blogs, news and social media sites.

And that’s why, I am bringing you some rare gems that I listen to from this great composer. Some songs you might have heard before, some you might not have but all these songs are just beautiful. Again, I can’t talk about the technical details of the song, these are songs that I listen when I am alone in my room and sing to myself.

Mannikka Maataya (Janani, 1985)

This song has a special place in my heart. I used to sing it someone when that person is angry on me. There are two versions with KJ Yesudas and P Susheela.  The lyrics is credited to Nethaji.

Manila Vandha Nilave (Nilave Malare, 1986)

A song sung to a little girl as she is angry and it’s an ode to every child. Mellifluous voice of P Susheela just soothes you but the beauty of this song is the changing patterns between the charanam and pallavi. Just check it out and if you are a fan of Baby Shalini, the song is even more sweeter (I am).

Paatu Esa Paatu (Senthamizh Selvan, 1994)

Ilaiyaraaja and MSV collaborated for quite a number of movies. The most obvious ones are Mella Thiranthathu Kadhavu, Viswa Thulasi and Senthamizh Paatu. But there are some rare ones like this one. The movie didn’t do well and hence we ignore the awesomeness. Ilaiyaraaja’s respect to MSV is like a child to his father.

Rettai Kuruvi Rettai Vaalu Kuruvi (Irumbu Pookal, 1991)

Another MSV and Ilaiyaraaja combo that is lost in the mix. It’s an interesting movie too, a musician living in the jail takes revenge on people while doing his concerts. Oh, if it interests you, Prabhu is the father of Karthik (in the flashback of course). And the song it’s completely unexpected one from Raaja and MSV combo.

Ellam Therigiruthu (Poikkaal Kuthirai, 1983)

Balachander and MSV are like brothers. Until 1984, almost all KB movies had music from MSV. This is one of my favourite movies ever. Surprised!!!? I watch it at least once in 6 months (I am not kidding). This movie marked the entry of Crazy Mohan in to the film world. The movie is based on Crazy Mohan’s famous stage play – Marriage Made in Saloon. It also marked the debut of Vaali as an actor.

The hero who poses as a blind man sings about the girl while she is taking a shower..(now, you get the context!!) and the cheekiness bubbles throughout the song especially in the tune and also the way SPB sings it…

Naalai Naam Oru Raajangam (Punnagai, 1971)

One of my favourite movies of Balachander. This song marks the start of the movie where the newly graduated protagonists singing about their future and how they want to change the world. An exuberant song that could have been easily a MGR song.

Look, love me dear (Simla Special, 1982)

When someone talks about Simla Special, the song that immediately strikes your mind will be Unakenna male nindrai. I am not saying it’s wrong but sometimes rare gems like this miss out. Look at the difference between saranam and pallavi. It starts as a western and goes on to become something like a Ghazal… The variations will blow your mind.

Oh Little Flower (Neela Vanam, 1965)

What should I say about this. Scintillating piece of composition topped with some Sivaji’s acting.

Naan Nandri Solven (Kuzhandaiyum Deivamum, 1964)

One of my favourite songs but usually not talked about in the mix of other famous songs in the movie. Listen to it, it will just waltz in to your heart.

Vaan Meethile (Chandi Raani, 1953)

There is a sweet story behind this. The song was originally credited to CR Subbaraman with whom MSV and Ramamoorthy worked as assistants. Ilaiyaraaja adores CR Subbaraman and when MSV was composing along with him for Mella Thirandhadhu Kadhavu, Raaja wanted MSV to compose a song similar to this. MSV gleefully said that it was his composition and that’s how Vaa Vanilla was born. Listen to both tracks and see how the inspiration is as brilliant as the original.

There are lots of rare gems that can be explored in MSV’s music. It’s just an understatement to say that he was a genius. This is just a small tribute

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The 80s was a golden period in Tamil cinema because it allowed to break the cinematic rules laid by yesteryear. Can you imagine a lean hero who just about 5’2 with a peculiar eyesight to become a hero? It did happen. It did take place in the 80s.

Pandiarajan, one of the prominent assistants of K Bhagyaraj debuted as a director through Kanni Raasi. It had Prabhu and Revathy in lead and to be honest it was a bold debut by Pandiarajan as he took the “Chevvai Dosham” (Mangalik Dosha in Hindi) concept head-on. When the debut was brilliant, what he followed became a cult classic comedy in Tamil cinema.

Aan Paavam (The sin of a man) (1986)

Ramasamy (VK Ramasamy), the village head has two sons Periya Pandi (Pandian) and Chinna Pandi (Pandirarajan) who always fight with each other but affectionate to each other. Ramasamy sends Periya Pandi to meet a prospective bride (Revathi) in a nearby village but he accidentally ends up in another house to meet Seetha (Seetha). He falls in love with her and the feelings are mutual.

Ramasamy is hell bent on making the original bride as his daughter in law but Periya Pandi tries to stop the marriage by directly talking to Revathy’s father. On hearing it, she attempts to commit suicide. Chinna Pandi saves her but she loses her ability to speak in the process. After the incident, Ramasamy decides to go ahead with the wedding but Chinna Pandi enacts a drama as if Periya Pandi and Seetha are dead. The parents lament that they would have got them married if they had stayed alive and the drama is disclosed. The whole village chases Chinna Pandi for cheating them and he is rescued by Revathy. They both come together in the process. All’s well that ends well.

The movie was produced by Alamu Movies, written and directed by R. Pandiarajan. Ashok Kumar wielded the camera while Ilaiyaraaja scored the music.

Why it is so special?

1. The movie broke the mould of light hearted comedies that came before. Aan Pavam is unpretentious, overt and clean comedy that never tries to be smart. No twists, No turns but the screenplay is so enjoyable that you wouldn’t mind it.

2. The sequences are genuinely funny and writing is impeccable. There are some scenes that are still discussed in popular culture – for example “Muttiducha” scene or the one when Pandiarajan asks his father, “Nee en ammava kalyanam pannikalam, naan un ammava kalyanam pannika kudatha” (You can marry my mother, why can’t I marry yours?) or the sequences with Janakaraj and his son Thavakkalai. All of them are simple but sharp witty dialogues make them pleasurable.

3. The lead actors shine but the brilliance of Pandiarajan and Revathy steal the show while supporting cast (VK Ramasamy, Poornam Viswanathan, Janakaraj and Thavakkalai ) makes it even more special. Pandirajan introduced Kollangudi Karuppayi, a folk singer as his grandmother and her witty exchanges with him are hilarious.

4. The music – the title song “Indiran Vandhadum” is a tribute to Tamil cinema while “Kadhal Kasakkudhayya” became the original “love” failure song for men. But the background score is one of the most memorable scores in Tamil cinema ever. The score that defines the love story between Pandian and Seetha is still a favourite of many Ilaiyaraaja fans.

Why it is in the list?

1. For being the precursor to all light hearted comedies that came after this movie. Light hearted Comedies that you have seen in the recent past will have some aspect of Aan Paavam in it and it showed Tamil cinema that treatment of a story is more important than the story itself.

2. For showing that Tamil cinema will accept a 5’2, lean figured man with surprisingly weird expressions as a hero. Pandiarajan went on to make many successful movies as a director and an actor. Content was really the king in the 80s and we have lost in transition.

3. A timeless comedy. I can bet that your children will laugh like the way you did if you show the movie to them. It’s almost 30 years since the release of this movie and it’s still part of the Tamil popular culture.

Trivia

1. R. Pandiarajan was a long time assistant of K.Bhagyaraj. He debuted with Kanni Rasi (I have explained the story how he began working as a director in Mundhanai Mudichu post). He went on to direct and act in various movies. The most memorable ones are Nethiyadi, Manaivi Ready, Kathanayagan and Oorai Therinjikitten. He even composed music for Nethiyadi and now makes short movies. His short movie Help was featured in International Film Festivals like the Art Deco Film Festival (Sao Paulo)

2. Seetha also debuted in the movie. She went on to become a successful actress with movies like Unnal Mudiyum Thambi. Puthiya Paadhai was her career defining movie in which she also met her future husband R.Parthiban (another assistant of K.Bhagyaraj)

3. Kollangudi Karuppaiye was a folk singer in All India Radio. She was brought to movies by Pandiarajan. She was a regular in his movies and acted in many more but tragedy struck in her family as she lost her husband and daughter to road accidents. There is not any definitive news about her whereabouts as of now. It is sad because she is the pioneer of folk singing in Tamil cinema and the current folk singers acknowledge her contribution.

4. R.Pandiarajan did make a sequel of Aan Paavam with his son Prithvi in the lead. The story deals with the daughter of Pandian and Seetha (the lead pair of Aan Paavam). It didn’t do well at the box office.

5. The movie ran for more than 200 days and was a box office hit.

List of references

1. The Best of Tamil Cinema – Volume 2 by G. Dhananjayan

2. http://www.thehidu.com/todays-paper/tp-features/tp-fridayreview/a-fairly-enjoyable-sequel-kai-vandha-kalai/article3218418.ece

3. http://www.thehindu.com/2003/03/30/stories/2003033002740500.htm

4. http://www.newindianexpress.com/entertainment/tamil/article472116.ece

5. Image credit: http://ungalrpandiarajan.blogspot.co.uk

YouTube link of the movie

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T. Rajendar is a crazy genius. He is like that mad creative crazy scientist you see in funny science fiction movies who just wants to play with everything. There was a time when people were crazy for his movies. He was the darling of college students from early 80s and his love stories were huge hits among his target audience. In fact, most of the movies even followed a pattern and eventually, they ended in tragedy.

In the modern world of social media, he has become an icon of funny memes that mock him to unimaginable levels and his off screen antics doesn’t help. If the current generation watches his movies, I can’t even imagine the mocking that might ensue. But, in a way, the current generation is prejudiced about his movies and music. This post is to bring back the golden music from his movies that created a place for him when Ilaiyaraaja was ruling the movie world.

1. Vaasam Illa Malarithu (Oru Thalai Raagam)

Oru Thalai Ragam was the debut of T Rajendar and the movie is still in dispute on who directed it. But to be honest, one man who made it big from the list of debuts in the movie had been TR. This song became an anthem in the early 80s for young men who want to subtly express their love towards a lady. And of course, like most other songs of TR, himself wrote this one. The whole album was a runaway hit with En Kadhai Mudiyum, Ithu Kuzhandhai Paadum and Kadavul Vaazhum taking the honours along with this song

If you want to read more about the movie, you can read it on my 50 Tamil movies to watch before you die list – this movie was one of them

2. Nenjam Paadum Puthiya Raagam (Nenjil Oru Raagam)

How about a crazy techno fusion? Listen to the interludes of this song, he is bound to make you go mad and of course, SPB is just wow in this song.

3. Vasantham Paadi Vara (Rayil Payangalil)

This one is should be in your staple unrequited love songs list. It’s lilting melody that will make your heart swing. The whole album should make it to the unrequited love songs list as the movie is all about that – Amaidhikku Peyarthan Shanthi, Vasantha Kalangal and Noolumillai are the other hits from the movie.

S Janaki version

4. Cut adippom Cut adippom Collegekku (Uyirullavarai Usha)

The precursor of college based teasing kuthu songs..

I can’t go without mentioning “Vaigai Karai Kaatre Nillu” from this movie. An amazing folksy composition that oozes sadness. And oh yeah, the title for the movie was intentional to show his love towards his wife Usha.

5. Sollamathane En Manasu Thudikkuthu (Oru Thayin Sabatham)

T Rajender has this knack of missing folksy tunes with techno percussions. It doesn’t follow any rules and that’s why I call him the mad scientist. This is one interesting experiment and please don’t watch the over the top picturisation.

6. I am a little star (Samsara Sangeetham)

Simbu indeed had a lot of little kids as fans and there were movies made by his father just to portray him in pivotal roles. A complete hero based song for his son could be the heights of audacity but it did happen. The song is filled with predictions of how Simbu would become in the future and advice for kids/adults (I am not kidding). Nevertheless, the tune is extremely catchy and S Janaki rendered the song.

7. Endhan Paadalgalil Nee Neelambari (Uravai Kaatha Kili)

This song usually ends up in Ilaiyaraaja’s playlist and that itself makes it imperative in TR’s list.

8. Moongilile Paatisaikkum (Raagam Thedum Pallavi)

An excellent melody will sink your heart and is peppered with some amazing lyrics.

9. Oru ponmanai (Mythili Ennai Kadhali)

This semi-classical brilliance is not a song that you can expect from T Rajender but he delivers with aplomb. And of course, SPB makes it sound so easy but this composition is beyond comprehension when it comes to nitty-gritties.

10. En aasai mythiliye (Mythili Ennai Kadhali)

And the final one for yours truly. Mythili Ennai Kadhali was the first movie that I saw and remember. And it seems, I used to sing this song all the time and there are audio cassette recordings of me singing this song. So, one for me ☺

His musical prowess cannot be explained in 10 songs but this is a sample of a crazy genius. He needs to be seen without the prejudice you have in mind. And, he wrote all these songs and some of the lyrics will literally blow your mind.

As a Bond movie lover, I didn’t accept the change that the character went through during the Daniel Craig era. I was a skeptic but accepted it as a creative decision as I make the same arguments for some other movies. But to be honest, Skyfall reinstated the confidence in the character and Daniel Craig (it really did).

The stage was set with Skyfall’s brilliant ending and Spectre was supposed to be a spectacular finale that started in Casino Royale (2006). It was the completion of the origin story to show us why James Bond is what he is – suave, misogynistic, fearless and enigmatic. Alas, Spectre flattered to deceive, it’s a colossally boring movie that’s pointless and makes you think “all that puff for this?”

Spectre does have an explosive start. The long drawn chase, destruction and spectacular fight on the helicopter sets the tone for the movie but from there it sinks to the bottom. Bond kills Sciarra as M (Judi Dench in a brief video appearance asks him to) and tracks down his wife Lucia (Monica Bellucci – seriously, why was she in the movie?) to know the whereabouts of a secret organization – later revealed as Spectre. While he is rogue and tracking down Spectre among the architectures of Rome and snow clad mountains of Austria, back in London, there is a political turmoil happening to scrap “00” program and a surveillance program is replacing them through the efforts of new joint defence secretary, C (played by Andrew Scott of Moriarty fame). Bond tracks down Mr.White, one of the Spectre members, who kills himself after revealing that his daughter, Madeleine (Lea Seydoux) has the key to tracking down Franz Oberhauser or Blofeld or Number 1 of Spectre (played by Christoph Waltz).

I can’t complain of predictability in a Bond movie because it is supposed to be predictable, but it has to be deceptive. When Sam Smith was singing “the writing’s on the wall”, I should have been careful because the movie was as predictable that even a small child would say what’s happening around Bond and M while they are clueless about it. On the other hand, Spectre and Blofeld have a long history in the Bond movies. Although different actors from played it since Thunderball, it’s one of those characters that was charismatically ruthless in various instalments. Here, this is first time we are seeing him (as it’s the origin) and he has been the reason for all that’s happening in Bond’s life so far, and the way he falls to Bond is utterly stupid and laughable. Christoph Waltz’s charisma doesn’t save the character and his long monologues don’t help either. A “good vs bad” movie is as good as its villain. Le Chiffre (Mads Mikkelsen) and Silva (Javier Bardem) were so powerful that the characterization of Oberahuser (Blofeld) was wimpy in comparison to theirs. After all, he is supposedly the mastermind behind their actions.

Spectre has its moments – the car chase in Rome was brilliantly choreographed, the romance between Madeleine and Bond is sensuous but apart from that, there is nothing much to celebrate. In fact, the fight sequence with Blofeld is boringly choreographed and some characters leave without an impact. There are so many loose ends in the movie that don’t add up. For instance, what happens to Monica Bellucci or what about Hinx? It is just so surprising that this is the same team that delivered Skyfall.

When you watch Spectre, there is one question that looms around as a fan. Does James Bond need an origin story? Do we need to unravel the enigma of this classic character? The mystery is what makes him what he is. He is not some comic book character and we don’t need to get in to his brain and thoughts to understand why he is insensitive, misogynistic or ruthless. We don’t need to do a psychological analysis of Bond like we do for Batman and Superman. But when the makers have decided to go for an origin story, it needs a perfect ending. Spectre seems to be an unplanned ending for a planned origin story (or was it?). Spectre seems to be an afterthought and the ending is even more despicable than the movie. At the end of the movie, we are left wondering, what would they do in the next instalment.

Spectre will be one of the most boring and pointless Bond movies ever made. It will end up in the bottom with “A View to a Kill” and “Live and Let Die”.

There are only few movies that become a cultural icon for generations. When a movie is slated in that list, the people anticipate it to have a path breaking story or a social message (Mother India is a perfect example). But how a simple love story that talked about post-marriage relationship between a girl who doesn’t want to get in to wedlock due to an unrequited love and a husband who falls in love with her, can become a movie celebrated even after 38 years after its release. It happened and the movie was Mouna Raagam.

Mouna Raagam (1986) – (The Silent Symphony)

The story starts with Divya (Revathy), a happy go lucky girl and the parents inform her that a potential groom, Chandrakumar (Mohan) would be waiting to see her in the evening. In order to avoid the whole process, she arrives late after enjoying the entire evening with her friends. Surprisingly, Chandrakumar waits for her and meets her in private. Despite of her requests, Chandrakumar says he likes her and Divya is emotionally forced by her family to accept the wedding proposal after her father has a heart attack.

Chandrakumar, a loner, takes her to New Delhi after the wedding. From day one, Divya shows her repulsion towards Chandrakumar despite his repeated attempts to impress her. When he asks her what first gift she would like, Divya asks for a divorce and because of Chandrakumar’s insistence, at an emotional moment, she opens up about her unrequited love of the past.

The story gets back in time when Divya met Manohar (Karthik). Divya implicated him in a street brawl and robbery case. After realising his good intentions, Divya bailed him out. Manohar expressed his love towards her at the first instance and although she couldn’t approve of his revolutionary activism, she fell in love with him as he was irresistible. At one point, Divya stopped him from an attack he was planning. Manohar proposed her that he would stop his activism if she accepted to marry him the next day. Police arrested him the next day for the attack he was not part of and to keep his word to Divya, he tried to escape and was shot dead by the police in front of her eyes. Divya could not overcome the loss and that’s the reason she had been putting off her marriage for so long.

Chandrakumar understands her and they meet a lawyer who informs that they have to be together for a year to file for divorce. They start living apart in the same house and one day Chandrakumar gets attacked by his factory workers. Divya saves him and nurses him during the recovery. While nursing, she understands him and gradually falls in love with him. Chandrakumar becomes indifferent and hurts her at every moment. He arranges for her travel back to Chennai and at the railway station, he hands over the divorce papers. Divya tears them apart, breaks down and expresses her love towards Chandrakumar. He chases the train and they both unite to restart their life.

Mouna Raagam had Mohan, Revathy and Karthik in the lead supported by VK Ramasamy, Ra Sankaran, Vani and Kanchana. The movie had a brilliant musical score from Ilaiyaraaja with PC Sriram wielding the camera. It was produced by G.Venkateswaran (in short GV, brother of Mani Ratnam) under Sujatha movies banner and directed by Mani Ratnam.

Why is it so special?

1. Honestly, the theme of the movie was nothing new when Mani Ratnam worked on it. Multiple interpretations of love that blossoms after wedlock had been made in Tamil cinema but Mani Ratnam showed his finesse in the way he maturely handled the subject.
2. The two love stories in the movie are completely opposite in nature. If the love between Divya and Manohar can be termed as a storm that every girl would expect to sweep off their feet, then the love between Chandrakumar and Divya is a breeze that is mellow and matured.
3. The other notable divergence that Mani Ratnam made was that movie was made from the women’s perspective and not the two men. And Revathy carried the role with aplomb. There are two scenes that stand testimony to the brilliance of Revathy – one when she breaks down to express her anguish that she had been keeping in her heart for so long for Manohar. It’s even a surprise for the audience because until then her character is shown as a girl who is happy go lucky, prankish and some might even hate her for not liking Chandrakumar. The other one during the climax when she expresses her love to Chandrakumar.
4. Probably, most of the audience, when you utter the movie’s name, they would immediately scream in unison, ‘Karthik!!!’. Karthik as Manohar stole the heart of people with his effervescence and irresistibility. I can bet that women would have wanted a lover like him (if your mom was in 20s or teens when the movie was released, don’t forget to ask this question). Mani Ratnam arguably wrote the best cameo ever in Tamil movie history with Manohar’s character. The total time on the screen for Karthik is around 25 min but the impact he creates is humungous. Mohan’s character had to be played with subtlety and he cake walked it with deftness.
5. The dialogues of Mani Ratnam. According to him^[1], short, one line dialogues came in to his repertoire with this movie. One of the best scenes in the movie is the one when Divya asks her mom before her first night after marriage, “Thaali kattina mattum ellam sariya aayiduma, rendu nalaiki munnadi enna avarkita ippadi anuppichiruppiya” (Is it enough that he tied a wedding thread? Would you have sent me to him two days before)? Mani Ratnam’s screenplay started with this one thought.
6. If you ask any music lover who knows Tamil music, this movie’s songs and score by Ilaiyaraaja will rank in the top 5 of anyone’s list. It’s not an exaggeration and  if I start writing about the score, I have to dedicate my entire blog post to that. It’s just awesome.

Mouna Raagam Audio Jukebox

Mouna Raagam Original Score

Why it should be on the list?

1. Mouna Raagam announced the arrival of one of the most prolific auteurs that Tamil cinema ever saw (check the trivia why I say so).
2. For showing the story of unrequited love and the problems of arranged marriage through the eyes of a woman.
3. For producing one of the most loveable characters of Tamil Cinema that is unbeaten till date.
4. For Ilaiyaraaja’s music.

Trivia

1. Mouna Raagam was Mani Ratnam’s fifth movie and third TamiIl movie after Pagal Nilavu and Idhaya Kovil. In Baradwaj Rangan’s book “Conversations with Mani Ratnam, he candidly admits that Mouna Raagam was his first hit movie. In fact, he didn’t want to make Idhaya Kovil and he admits that the only thing that was great about that movie was Ilaiyaraaja’s music^[1].
2. Mouna Raagam was the second script of Mani Ratnam and was originally titled “Divya”. The original idea was to make a movie about how a timid young girl coping with an arranged marriage. Karthik’s character was an afterthought (yes it is true) and his character was inspired by Anil Kapoor’s character from Pallavi Anu Pallavi (Mani Ratnam’s debut in Kannada). In fact, Mouna Raagam would have been a Kannada movie but it didn’t work out. This is the first script that he wrote in Tamil and was originally written as a short story^[1].
3. Mouna Raagam won the Best Regional Film National Award for 1986 and was the official entry for foreign film oscar from India^[2].
4. Mouna Raagam has inspired many movies after its release. The recent one I would say is Raja Rani.
5. Mani Ratnam comes from a family of movie producers. He completed MBA from Jamnalal Bajaj Institute of Management Sciences (JBIMS) and started his film career with Pallavi Anu Pallavi in Kannada which won a state award. It also served as the debut movie of Anil Kapoor^[2].
6. Mouna Raagam was dubbed in Telugu with the same title and was remade in Hindi as Kasak with Rishi Kapoor (playing Mohan’s role), Neelam Kothari and Chunky Pandey (playing Karthik’s role). Needless to say, the movie didn’t do well at the box office^[3].
7. The song from Idhaya Kovil “Naan Paadum Mouna Raagam” gave the title for the movie^[1].
8. Kanchana did a small one scene role of a lawyer in the movie. Mani Ratnam has used actors in small roles but change the shape of the story. Kanchana’s role makes Divya stay back in Delhi. He has utilized Aruna in Idhayathai Thirudathey (Geethanjali) in the same way^[1].
9. It seems one of the ladies in the censor board, argued that Mouna Raagam should be given a “A” certificate as she couldn’t accept a housewife asking for divorce^[1].
10. Anjali was originally planned with Revathy and Mohan with the idea of what would happen after 10 years in their marriage (Main Ratnam calls it just a theoretical exercise). Nonetheless, it seems Mohan’s dates couldn’t be worked out^[1].

List of References

1. Conversations with Mani Ratnam by Baradwaj Rangan, Penguin, 2013
2. The Best of Tamil Cinema – Volume 2 by G. Dhananjayan
3. Kasak (1992) – Wikipedia
4. Image sourced from archives of Outlook Magazine

YouTube link of the movie

There is perhaps one movie that every Tamil actor wants to remake. Baasha is the holy grail of mass masala entertainers in Tamil cinema. To be honest, it has one of the most illogical stories you can think of (seriously, what’s the age of Rajini in the movie and who is Nagma?) but Baasha defines the masala heroism of Tamil cinema. Every actor tries his hand to mash up the story in order to emulate the movie. And every time it has failed miserably. Ajith’s Jana, Vijay’s Pokkiri and Sarathkumar’s Hey are the bad examples. Baasha was a high point in Rajinikanth’s career and it came after a string of decent commercial successes like Uzhaippali and Veera (but both of them weren’t blockbusters like Annamalai). Baasha elevated him to the hysterical fan following that you relate with Rajini, the superstar. Vedalam on the other hand comes after a string of box office successes for Ajith and his fanbase has expanded extensively in the past few years. And Siva has made Vedalam to tap the same hysterical fan base of Ajith.

The reason behind comparing Baasha and Vedalam is that there is not much of a difference in the template of the b story. So I don’t need to delve in to that part. In a way, Vedalam personifies the good and bad of Tamil mass masala entertainers. Over the top heroism, comedy scenes (Soori, Kovai Sarala, Thapa) that doesn’t work even a bit, loud background score (Anirudh) that tests your eardrums, glaring logical mistakes and cliched scenes (when they will stop showing blood donation and helping blind people to establish the goodness of lead characters). Nevertheless, there are few things that work in Vedalam.

Vedalam has been constructed by Siva with one thing in mind – Ajith’s on-screen and off-screen image. He just knows the pulse of Ajith’s fans and has assembled a screenplay that swifts through without any pause. Vedalam is like a fan who loves mass masala movies making a movie (or worshipping) his idol. Siva does have a knack for dialogues that he places at the right moments to cater the fans. For example, “Sir unga mudhugula kuthirukkanga” (They have stabbed you in the back) and he replies after a pause, “Yenna neraya per mudhugala kuthirukkanga” (A lot of people have stabbed me in the back). And every time, the fans go bombastic (I was watching the movie in a high end multiplex in Dubai). Probably, the whole directorial team has worked overtime to accentuate the heroic image of Ajith in every scene to the minutest of detail (for example, the knife in the first scene has AK56 inscribed on it – Vedalam is Ajith’s 56th movie). The same detailing is missing in constructing the characters of Shruti Hassan, Soori and other comedy actors. A little more focus on these characters would have made Vedalam even more enjoyable. Lakshmi Menon acts as a perfect foil for this brother – sister story. And her admiration for Ajith (which she openly purported in a TV Interview) is seen on-screen too. There are a few interesting deviations from a normal masala movie. The hero doesn’t advise women on their dress codes and doesn’t give lectures how a woman should live. In fact, the advice is delivered to men. There are not any romantic scenes or duets for the hero. There are not any sexy item numbers. Not even an iota of vulgarity (which is quite abnormal for such movies).

Vedalam is going to have a long run in theatres. It’s already making record collections and expected to break in to 100 Cr club soon. But there are lot of things that’re wrong with the movie. The movie totally resides on star power of Ajith and I am not criticising it. Siva has tried to tap the fan base and that’s what directors of MGR and Rajini did in their prime. Imagine this, if Shruthi’s character wasn’t there, if it had a better comedy, if the logical mistakes were ironed out, the success could have become even mightier. Vedalam might reinforce the idea of a mass masala in Tamil movie world. Mind you, reason why Vedalam is making cash registers go bonkers is totally because of Ajith and his fans. Will it work for another hero especially with such a faulty screenplay? It’s next to  impossibility.

Personally, I am happier to see Ajith as Sathyadev in Yennai Arindhaal rather than as Vedalam. Let Siva fight with Hari to become Rohit Shetty of Tamil cinema. But as a fan, do you really want Ajith to become Akshay Kumar?

PS: I love Aaluma Doluma – for the lyrics, the catchy tune and the celebration.

One of the criticisms that is levied against Tamil cinema in general is that they don’t reflect the reality of the society. Although Tamil cinema in the 60 and 70s dealt with family issues, those movies were masculine and melodramatic (of course, there were rare blips). The realism in issues was missing and Visu bridged the gap between realism and melodrama with his feminine based scripts and savvy direction. Samsaram Adhu Minsaram is the pinnacle of Visu’s creations.

Samsaram Adhu Minsaram (Family is like electricity) (1986)

The story starts with the customary bride seeing (Ponnu Parkum) function of Sarojini (Ilavarasi), the only daughter of Ammaiyappa Mudaliar (Visu). In fact, the scene serves as the introduction of characters too. Ammaiyappa Mudaliar is a clerk in a central government office lives with his wife, Godavari (Kamala Kamesh) in a joint family. His first son, Chidambaram (Raghuvaran) works as a cashier in Indian Oil and major financial support to the family. His second son, Siva (Vaagai Chandrasekhar) works as a fitter in a private company and a son who don’t even talk back against the words of his father. His last son, Bharathi (Haja Sharif) is on the pursuit of passing his SSLC (high school exam). Chidambaram is married to Uma (Lakshmi), who binds the family together and everyone in the family loves and respects her. Kannamma (Manorama) is not just the maid of the family but also part of it.

Sarojini rejects the groom after the bride seeing function and also insults the groom’s family. Ammaiyappan feels bad and visits the groom’s house. Jagannathan (Delhi Ganesh) impressed by Ammaiyappan and his family offers his daughter Vasantha’s (Jeevitha) hand to Siva. Ammaiyappan accepts it but says that they have to wait until Sarojini’s wedding. Sarojini reveals that she is in love with Peter Fernandes (Dilip). Although, they are against the marriage, they accept it for various reasons (Chidambaram is happy that he need not spend for his sister anymore). Both weddings take place on the same day and they start their marital life.

Siva and Vasantha’s privacy is adversely affected by Bharathi, who is always in Siva’s room to study while Sarojini is enjoying her new found independence and disrespects her father-in-law, Albert Fernandes (Kishmoo). Uma leaves to her brother’s house in Bombay (now Mumbai) for child birth. While she is away, on the same day, Vasantha leaves to her father’s house after discord with Siva while Sarojini comes back to her house after a fight with Peter. Although Vasantha comes back after strong advice from her father, Sarojini stays back claiming that her husband will come back like Siva went to fetch Vasantha.

Chidambaram, who is usually money conscious reduces his financial part for the family as his wife’s away. This gives rise to argument with his father and Ammaiyappan loses his cool and asks Chidambaram to leave the house. Chidambaram on the other hand asks Ammaiyappan to give back the Rs.18,000 that he paid for Sarojini’s wedding. Ammaiyappan divides the house in to two and asks Chidambaram to live separately until he pays back the money. He restricts the family from crossing the line on any account. Uma arrives to see the family in disarray and feels bad that her husband has created the rift. The rest of the movie about is how she reunites the family with help of Kannamma and Godavari. The film concludes in an unexpected climax through the decision of Uma.

What is so special about the movie?

1. The movie takes everyday issues that happen in a family and Visu spins a web around the characters that are real, relatable and forces you to question roles in the family. Visu’s movies have always been like that. Although he did write screenplays before (more on it in the trivia section), since Kudumbam Oru Kadambam, his play that also became a movie, he handled family and societal issues in majority of his movies.

2. The brilliant writing of Visu. The screenplay is crisp and the dialogues are punchy even when they are lengthy exchanges. While Uma’s (Lakshmi) dialogues are short and punchy, Ammaiyappan (Visu) and Chidambaram (Raghuvaran) have longer rants. This dichotomy is to show the callowness of men and the prudence of Uma’s character.

3. The amazing composition of scenes especially the fight between Chidambaram and Ammayappan, Kannamma’s scene with Albert Fernandes and the climax sequence.

4. The negativity of the Chidambaram’s personality comes from the situations that he is in. Visu’s movies have this knack of showing the point of view rather than allowing you to judge them.

5. The wonderful acting of each character (sometimes you might feel that it’s like a play but the origins of most of Visu’s movies are from his plays – can’t be blamed for that). Lakshmi, Raguvaran and Visu act as the three pillars of the movie and the supporting cast make the movie perfect. However, without Manorama, this movie would have been incomplete. Regardless of the fact that, everyone like that one scene in which she taunts Kishmoo (Kannama, Gammunu Kada), my favourite is the climax where she tears apart Ammaiyappan’s stubbornness and hypocrisy.

6. Last but not the least, Shankar Ganesh’s music. They always provided adequate music for the movies they scored. Janaki Devi Ramanai Thedi is an amazing melody while the pathos of Samsaram Adhu Minsaram is still fresh and Katti Karumbe Kanna is an emotional lullaby. The background score during the pivotal scenes is worth a mention.

Why it should be on the list?

1. For giving Tamil cinema much needed realism with respect to middle class families and their issues. The physical privacy issue between Siva and Vasantha was dealt sensibly without a hint of vulgarity.

2. A trend-setter with respect to family based movies and it created a separate slew of directors who made movies in this genre (most of them were Visu’s assistant directors)

3. For Visu.

Trivia

1. Samsaram Adhu Minsaram was a remake. Surprised? In 1975, KS Gopalakrishnan produced Uravukku Kai Koduppom based on Visu’s play directed by YG Mahendran with Gemini Ganesan, Sowcar Janaki, Muthuraman and Sujatha in lead. The film bombed at the box office. Visu was an official screenplay writer for AVM. He used to correct the screenplays for AVM’s movies and he was asking AVM Saravanan to produce a movie for him. AVM Saravanan was impressed by the original stage play. Visu suggested that it had already been made as a movie. AVM bought the rights for the original and asked Visu to rewrite the screenplay. Saravanan felt that there was a lack of comedy and Visu rewrote the script with Kannamma’s character. And that’s how Manorama came in to the picture.¹

2. Visu (originally MR Viswanathan)³ started his life as a stage actor during his school days and started his own theatre group, Vishwashanthi that created family based plays. He assisted K.Balachander and wrote dialogues for some of his movies (Thillu Mullu). Kudumbam Oru Kadambam was a breakthrough in his career but it was directed by SP Muthuraman although Visu wrote the screenplay. Manal Kayiru was his first hit movie that had a wonderful run at the box office although some of the reviewers panned it for lengthy dialogues and sequences.

3. Visu did try his hand at different genres. Chidambara Ragasiyam was a comic thriller, Puthiya Sagaptham and Rajathanthiram were revenge dramas but nothing worked like his emotional family dramas. Notable ones are, Dowri Kalyanam (1983), Thirumathi Oru Vegumathi (1987), Penmani Aval Kanmani (1988), Sakalakala Sammanthi (1989) and Varavu Nalla Uravu (1990). My personal favourite is Urimai Oonjaladigrathu (1992) that dealt with inter-religious love story.

4. His movies didn’t do well in the 1990s and he moved towards television with his Arattai Arangam (Sun TV) and Makkal Arangam (Jaya TV)³. His assistants made movies in the same genre and the most notable one was TP Gajendran, who made Budget Padmanabhan and Middle Class Madhavan.

5. The movie won the National Award for Best Popular Film Providing Wholesome Entertainment (1987) becoming the first Tamil movie to do so and also the first movie to receive a National award even though it was remade in the same language.

6. The movie had a remix (or retune or rehashed – I don’t know how to call it), of Oorai Therinjikitten (Padikathavan) with different lyrics as Visu laments about his family life.

7. The movie was remade in Hindi as Sansar with Anupam Kher, Raj Babbar and Rekha in the lead. The Telugu version, Samsaram Oda Chadarangam had Gollapudi Maruthi Rao, Sarath Babu and Suhasini in the lead with Sowcar Janaki playing Manoram’s role. The Malayalam version, Kudumbapuranam, was directed by Sathiyan Anthikad with Thilakan, Balachandra Menon and Ambika in the lead. The Kannada version, Onde Goodina Hakkigalu had Tiger Prabhakar and Lakshmi in the lead.

8. Viswashanthi is back to theatre as they staged ‘Konjam Yosinga Boss’ in 2014.

9. Kamala Kamesh acted in more than 400 films in Tamil, Kannada, Malayalam and Telugu. I couldn’t plot her debut movie but she became famous for her mother roles after the success of Kudumbam Oru Kadambam (1981) and Alaigal Oivathillai (1981). She never graduated to other roles and she was repeatedly cast in similar roles. Her daughter Uma acted in few movies but never shined in the silver screen and she is married to Riyas Khan. Interestingly, Kamala Kamesh suffers from a rare blurred vision problem and she still acted in movies with the disability.⁶

Credits

Producer: AVM Saravanan for AVM Productions; Story, screenplay, dialogues and direction: Visu; Music: Shankar Ganesh; Cinematography:N.Balakrishnan; Editing: A.Paul Durai Singam; Art direction: B.Nagarajan; Lyrics for songs: Vairamuthu.²

References

1. AVM 60 by M.Saravanan
2. The Best of Tamil Cinema – Volume 2 by G. Dhananjayan
3. A passionate Journey by Rani Devalla for The Hindu
4. ‘I never left the stage” Interview of Visu with V.Balasubramaniam for The Hindu
5. Wikipedia article on Visu 
6. Grill Mill with Kamala Kamesh by SR Ashok Kumar for The Hindu
7. Image credit: Rediff.com

YouTube link for the movie 

Disclaimers

1. I haven’t watched all the movies in the list. Some of them are in the list solely based on reviews and you might end up not liking them. Although, the torrents are out, the subtitles aren’t. I wish there were official releases online by Korean studios with English subtitles.
2. All these movies were released in 2015 in South Korea. I have left movies from December as I don’t have any source to check them out. So it will be added to next year’s list.
3. The movies are not ranked. The movies are most probably in the order of release.

1. Chronicles of Blood Merchant (Heosamgwan)

Backed by the performance from two of the biggest stars from Korean cinema, Ha Jung-Woo and Ha Ji-Won (I will not deny or agree that this movie is in the list because of her), Chronicles of Blood Merchant is genre bending emotional comedy-drama about an undying love of a guy. The movie is based on a Chinese novel of the same name written by Yu Hua.

Heo Sam-Gwan played by Ha-Jung Woo (he is the director too) sets out to win the heart of the most beautiful girl in the village, Heo Ok-Ran (Ha Ji-Won). He sells his own blood to make money and win her. Years later, the family is torn as the eldest son doesn’t resemble the father but a rich man in the village. The movie tends to be more melodramatic at the end but the mise-en-scene and the wonderful acting makes this movie a must watch this year.

2. Love Forecast (Oneului Yeonae – literally Today’s Love)

After watching this movie, I was gushing on Facebook about how I rooted for the lead pair to come together. I was waiting for a movie that can match the charm of Harry met Sally and this is the movie that fulfilled my desire. Kim Hyun-woo (Moon Chae-won) is an elegant weather reporter who is a totally different person off-screen where she drinks, bad mouths and fights with random people. The only person who knows and understands her is her childhood friend, Kang Joon-soo (Lee Seung-gi). He is a soft-natured elementary school teacher who secretly loves her but tries to date other women and in the process fails miserably.

Kim has a secret affair with a married senior colleague but she knows that she can’t marry him anyway. Love Forecast is a rom-com with an emotional ending but sweeps your heart through some excellent performances from the lead actors. Weather is used to show the different aspects of their life and plays a supporting role throughout the movie. Directed by Park Jin-Hyo, I bet you will root for the leads and that marks the success of this feel good movie.

3. Gangnam Blues (Gangnam 1970)

Gangnam Blues is supposedly the most popular movie of this year from South Korea and rightly so. We all know Gangnam Style from PSY. Gangnam is actually a district, part of Seoul that was developed during the late 70s and early 80s. Now the most expensive and affluent district in Seoul, it has a troubled past with respect to its development. Originally, Gangnam was full of farming land and people were forced to leave due to development around them.

Gangnam Blues is the tale of how real estate sharks took over the lands of farmer told through the life of two friends (Jong-dae and Yong-ki played by Lee Min-ho and Kim Rae-won) who are torn between two different gangs backed by politicians. The movie sparkles in the way director Yoo ha (Dirty Carnival) creates the backdrop and his subtle symbolisms make it even more brilliant. Some of them might find the movie stylish but the authenticity of the period has not been compromised. Gangnam Blues is one of the best neo-noir movies that you will watch just because of the amazing artistry of Yoo Ha.

4. Revivre (Hwajang)

Directed by Im Kwon-taek, Revivre premiered in the out of competition section of 71st Venice International Film Festival but released only in 2015. The film is based on a short story by Kim Hoon that won the Yi Sang Literary Award (one of the prestigious awards in Korea) titled Cremation.

The complexity of the movie can be understood by the way Im titled it – Hwajang has two meanings – cremation and make-up. The movie questions the idea of love and commitment in marriage. Oh is a top executive of a marketing firm who shuttles between work and hospital to help his dying wife. On the other hand, he is attracted to a young executive from his company. The movie shows his mental dilemma between his two sides that will question morality structures. Possibly, this is one of the best performances of veteran actor Ahn Sung-Ki.

5. Twenty (Seumul)

Most directors don’t get coming of age stories right although lot of them want to make one. Lee Byeong-heon backed up by his success of his indie venture Cheer Up, Mr.Lee., has presented a wonderful coming of age tale that’s funny, quirky and realistically portray the lives of South Korean youth. The three protagonists have different aims in life and are controlled by situations around them. Kim Woo Bin (the current heart throb of Korea), Lee Jun-Ho and Kang Ha-Neul make the movie perfect with their portrayals. Twenty is a must watch just for the truthful depiction of young men and women in Korea. Don’t miss the hilarious fight sequence

6. The Shameless (Muroehan)

The Shameless made its debut in the Un Certain Regard category at the 2015 Cannes Film Festival. Directed by Oh Seung-Uk (after 15 years since his Kilimanjaro) is a romantic noir thriller with Kim Nam-Gil and Jeon Do-Yeon (Secret Sunshine, The Housemaid) in the lead. The Shameless is a movie of a detective who takes a straight forward murder case with a suspect but it gets complicated when he gets involved with a bar maid. Although movie poses as a thriller, it’s more about human emotions, their fears, loneliness and insecurities. It has the usual elements Korean film noir but Yeon’s performance makes the difference. Watch out for her.

7. Northern Limit Line (Yeonpyeonghaejeon)

We have seen many movies about the DMZ and the land borders between the two Koreas but there are omly less number of movies (Yellow Sea was one) depicting the Northern Limit Line  – the sea demarcation between North and South Korea.

The movie deals with the not so much talked about 2002 battle of Yeonpeong. It was not in the news because North Korea attacked the South Korean patrol ship 357 while South Korea was playing their third place 2002 FIFA World Cup match against Turkey. Although the movie has lot of jingoism that you see in typical war movies, Northern Limit Line directed by Kim Hak-Soon (his first feature film as director) has its heart in the right place when it mixes the archival footage of soldiers along with the depiction. The production values are not compromised although the movie was crowdfunded and it has become the most watched Korean movie in 2015.

8. Minority Opinion or The Unfair (Sosuuigyeon)

Based on a novel of the same name written by Son A-Ram, Minority Opinion is the real life story of 40 tenants who were protesting against the government when they were relocated for urban development. It was widely known as the “Yongsan Tragedy” of 2009 when 5 protesters were killed along with a police officer during the riot that ensued due to the protest.

The movie traces the jury trial of Park Jae-Ho (Lee Geung-Young) who is accused of killing the police officer during the riot. He claims that he killed him for self-defence while saving his 16 yr old son. Young public defender Yoon Jin-won (played by Yoon Kye-Sang) teams up with a reporter Gong Soo-kyung (Kim Ok-Bin) to defend the accused while the whole establishment is against them. The movie depicts how in the name development the lives of common people are ruined. Gripping, heart-breaking and poignant, this courtroom drama should be on your list.

9. Assassination (Amsal)

Not to be confused with The Assassin from China, although this movie depicts a historical assassination attempt and is as lavish as its counterpart from China. Assassination is the eye-catchy blockbuster material that you will see from Korea this year. Lavish sets, brilliant cinematography and high production values makes this movie a winner.

It has a pretty similar storyline to such movies where a motley crew – Ahn Ok-yun (played by Gianna Jun), a sharp shooter, Song-ok (Cho Jin-woong) and Duk-sam (Choi Duk-moon) is recruited to kill an evil Japanese commander Mamoru Kawaguchi (Shim Cheol-jong). Romance, sacrifice and revenge makes Assassination watchable although the movie doesn’t touch the important political issues of Japanese invasion. Directed by Choi Dong-hoon (The Thieves), the movie is a must watch for the performance of Gianna Jun and the production.

10. Throne (Sado)

Throne was awarded the Best Film in the Annual Korean Critics Awards and also the official selection for the Best Foreign Film Oscar from South Korea. That itself qualifies the movie to this list but Throne is certainly one of the best movies of this year. It is based on the real life story of Prince Sado (played by Yoo Ah-Hin) who was condemned to death by his own father King Yeongjo (played Song Kang-Ho – no introduction needed). Prince Sado was put inside a rice chest and died after suffering for 8 days inside without water, food and air.

It has been said that the story has been visited in different versions but what makes Throne perfect is the characters are not black and white – the ambivalent depiction and the unraveling of relationship between Father and Son during Sado’s last eight days makes the movie perfect. Of course Song Kang-Ho and Yoo Ah-Hin are brilliant with their performances. They depict the ideological divide so very well and the movie actually makes you sympathetic towards the lives of Kings and Princes much like the lives of politicians these days. If you want to watch one movie from Korea this year, Throne should be your choice for the performances, screenplay and direction of Lee Joon-Ik.

11. Right now wrong then (Jigeumeun-matgo-geuttaeneun-tteullida)

This movie won the Golden Leopard at the 68 Locarno Film Festival for Best Film and also Jung Jae-Young won the Best Actor for his stellar performance (he won most of the major awards in Korea too). Directed by Hong Sang-Soo, known for his complex stories like In Another Country, Right Now Wrong Then is the depiction of two different scenarios of a chance meeting between an auteur and a soft spoken painter on the same day.

To understand it better, its like Groundhog Day but the way the lead pair see the two meetings is totally different. Backed up by the wonderful performances of Jung Jae-Young and Kim Min-Hee (No Tears for Dead and Helpless), Hong paints a self satirical piece on relationships. The movie ends in a heartbreaking anticlimax like most of Hong’s movies. Stark naturalism, complex storyline and Hong’s dark humour at the most unexpected places makes this movie an endearing watch.

12. Socialphobia (Sosyeolpobia)

Socialphobia is a dark, modern thriller that Korean movies are known for. It shows the worse side of Internet knows as Social Networking Witch Hunts (yup, it’s slowly creeping in to India) that are quite disturbing in Korea. When a young military officer commits suicide, the social networking sites in Korea get in to the act by voicing opinions and there are comments against the military from a certain user Rae-Na. In order to punish, a group of 8 young students track her down to find her dead in her apartment. After that, they become target of netizen ire and they set out to find the original killer.

The movie shows how dangerous SNS witch hunts can become and how easy is to pass judgements over social media. Directed by Hong Seok-Jae, it shows the future of Internet crimes in many countries and that makes this movie important.

13. Clown of a salesman (Yakjangsoo, literal – Drug Peddler)

Every year, there will be a movie from Korea that will make you cry. This year it’s going to be Clown of a salesman. Il Beom (played by Kim In-Kwon) has a lot of loans to pay back and also needs to take care of his daughter’s medical bills. He joins a PR company where he has to entertain older woman and entice them to buy products. He gets into illegal dealings to save his daughter and the movie ends in a depressing note.

Clown of a salesman is a socio-cultural commentary on the current South Korean capitalist society. Il Beom wants to be honest and righteous but situations force him to do what he does. His realisation that he can’t get out of what he started his heart breaking. The movie is directed by debutant Jo Chi-Eon.

14. The Priests

Korean movies have something for everyone (there are lot of sleazy X rated movies this year that you can definitely check out) but this movie is for the horror fans. If I say The Priests is terrifying, it would be an understatement. The movie follows a similar plot to lot of exorcism movies where a little girl enters in to a comatose after an accident. Two priests, Father Kim (played by Kim Yoon – Sook know for The Yellow Sea and Chaser) and young Deacon Choi (played by Kang Dang-Won known for Secret Reunion) believe that the girl is possessed by evil spirit and they start an exorcism process. Most of the movie is the exorcism and the events that unfold due to that.

Directed by Jang Jae-Hyun based on his award winning short film, 12th Assistant Deacon, The Priests is fast paced, scary and has all the elements of classic horror thriller. To entice you, it beat “Spectre” in South Korean box office to open at number 1 which is no mean feat.

15. The Inside Men (Naebujadeul)

Koreans love their web toons and every year there are some wonderful adaptations. The Inside Men is one such brilliant movie directed by Woo Min-Ho (known for Man of Vendetta) based on Yoon Tae-Ho’s webtoon series “The Insiders”. The movie stars three prominent actors of Korean cinema – Lee Byung-Hun (known for Bittersweet Life, JSA and I saw the Devil), Jo Seung-Woo (known for Marathon) and the veteran Baek Yoon-sik

The movie deals with the media – politician nexus (yup, I can hear what you are thinking). One of the influential newspaper editors helps a politician to become a presidential candidate. They cheat the henchman who helped during the process and he joins with a young prosecutor to bring the politician and the media honcho down. The movie deals with power politics and the influence of media on the formation of governments. An edge of the seat thriller with some brilliant acting from the leads.

As I said earlier, you might not good prints and subtitles for certain movies. But bookmark these movies for later. As in many other industries, there are lot of crap doled out every year in Korean movie industry too. These are the better ones this year and I think I covered every genre to make a perfect list.

Kollywood as usual had a roller coaster ride in 2015. Backed by the success of small budget movies in 2014, this year saw directors making some interesting experiments. Finally, I am happy that we saw a good sci-fi movie in Tamil. We had a star trying to change his ways through a classy movie but straying away to a masala at the end of the year. In fact, success of Vedalam made me question whether I should continue reviewing movies. I am still contemplating.

We saw the rise of another bankable actress – Nayanthara. We also saw the decline of big stars. The Tamil movie audience are showing that they have to reinvent. We saw the demise of some stalwarts – Manorama Aaachi and MSV while talented editor Kishore’s sudden demise was shocking.

We also saw the much publicised Tamil actors association elections and mudslinging. Personally, it was a difficult task to watch Tamil movies this year as I was in the UK. I watched 83 movies but I wrote only 3 reviews because I saw them late on Herotalkies. It helped me to understand why Tamil cinema distribution is a tough task and the clout of international distributors like Ayngaran. In fact Aascar Ravichandran chose to distribute ‘I’ by himself and had a wider release while other producers are restricted by the international distributors.

Disclaimers

1. The movies are in alphabetical order and not ranked. These are the best movies of 2015 according to me and not based on box office returns.
2. The list of songs are from movies that were released in 2015. So don’t expect Tharai Thappattai or Maalai Nerathu Mayakkam to feature in the list.
3. I haven’t added dubbed movies to the list.
4. The songs/albums are listed in chronological order and not ranked.

The 10 best movies of 2015

1. Baahubali

The magnum opus that the whole country should be proud of. Although the movie had an age old story that mostly looked like a mashup of multiple ancient fables, the vision of SS Rajamouli made the movie special. The focus and dedication in creating the mise-en-scene, the amazing workmanship to bring out the best from his actors and meticulous post production makes this movie one of the best this year. I am definitely waiting for the second part of the movie.

2. Indru Netru Naalai

A time travel comedy in Tamil is unimaginable. But it happened in 2015 and I am glad it happened. Sujatha would have finally smiled after watching a Tamil movie. A true blue sci-fi and I was going crazy at the climax and the way debutant Ravikumar.R handled the subject deserves a pat in the back. And thanks to CV Kumar for backing up such projects.

3. Kaaka Muttai

I watched Kaaka Muttai only recently. I stayed away from the movie just to wade off the hype (I do it for a lot of movies). But I should say I liked it. I think both Kaaka Muttai and Kutram Kadithal (next movie in the list) handles the same theme in two different ways. Manikandan has extracted the best out of the two kids and it makes you reflect on the society that we live in.

4. Kutram Kadithal

It will remain the best movie of the year for me. It reminded me of Thomas Vinterberg’s Jagten (The Hunt, 2012) the Danish movie about a teacher being accused of sexual harassment by a small girl. Kutram Kadithal was that good for me. It reflected how everyone wants something out of an issue that’s blown out of proportion. There is one scene where a black garbage bag sticks on to Merlin’s leg just to symbolise that she is becoming bad (the use of black for evil and white for good has been used by Alfred Hitchcock extensively) shows how talented Bramma G is. Radhika Prasidha is an actress to look out for.
Kutram Kadithal had a good run in film festivals across the world and won the National Award for Best Film in Tamil. They also made a simultaneous (almost) digital release which could be a wonderful revenue option for smaller movies.

5. Moone Moonu Varthai

I still remember going gung-ho on Facebook after watching this wonderful little gem of a comedy. The last few years we are bombarded with comedy movies but most of them are repetitive while this one wasn’t. Directed by Madhumita (her last two outings weren’t that impressive). The wonderfully crafted screenplay coupled with some amazing dialogues and the excellent acting from the leads, Arjun Chidambaram and Venkatesh Harinathan makes this movie as the best comic movie for me this year. If you haven’t watched it, give it a try.

6. Purampokku Engindra Podhuvudamai

Most of the lists will not have this movie but I thought it was one of the better movies of the year. In the 1980s, we had a lot of anti-establishment movies that were revered but the thought that we are living in a better world makes these movies unwelcomed. Purampokku Engindra Podhuvudamai makes a strong case against death penalty and  its criticism on capitalistic society at large made the movie unpalatable for most people. Jananathan’s honest film making with some strong performances from Vijay Sethupathy, Arya and Shaam makes this movie one of my favourites this year.

7. Rajathanthiram

Heist movies are fun. If you see it in one way, it’s sadistic to be enjoy when someone gets robbed. But it’s a movie and when it’s made well, you really enjoy it. Rajathanthiram is a taut thriller that keeps you at the edge of the seat until the end. Directed by debutant AG Amid with Veera and Regina in the lead, this little gem was a good surprise of the year. I am willing to forgive them for getting inspired by Rififi in the heist part.

8. Thani Oruvan

I should admit that I was biased against M.Raja. I used to call him Xerox Raja for his meticulous remaking of movies. I was never confident that he could make a wonderfully crafted screenplay. I am ecstatic that he proved me wrong and other critics in the best way possible – writing a brilliant screenplay and creating one of the most adorable villains of all time – Siddarth Abhimanyu. It was a treat to watch Arvind Swamy on screen and even the romance portions of Nayanthara and Jayam Ravi was wonderfully crafted.
I just had one grouse though, Siddarth lost quiet easily. I wish there is a spin off with Vinayak Mahadev and Siddarth Abhimanyu – how about that?

9. Uttama Villain

I don’t think there is any actor in India who could do a satire on himself. Kamal had the guts and depth to do so. And it was indeed one of the best movies of the year for me. But I had lots of emotions running when I saw the movie and I think fellow Kamal fans felt the same. I shall not discuss those. Uttama Villain needs to be seen in a different plateau and Ghibran’s music was just brilliant to be ignored.

10. Yennai Arindhaal

Ajith has become a quintessential star who can make any movie and his fans are going to lap it up. Yennai Arindhaal is a movie in which he wanted to be an actor rather a mass star. Gautam could bring Ajith’s different shades on screen and the movie gave a much needed break for the talented Arun Vijay. For me, the romance portions between Ajith and Trisha is the best of the year. Ajith went on to do Vedalam that became the biggest hit of the year but I wish he makes more Yennai Arindhaal(s) than Vedalam(s).

Notable omissions

1. Papanasam – I can’t forgive Jeethu Joseph for copying The Devotion of Suspect X and being so unapologetic about it
2. I – Shankar’s “I” was plasticky and lacked soul but I loved the soundtrack
3. O Kadhal Kanmani – In one sentence, Mani Rathnam is yet to make a come back for me.

5 movies that you wouldn’t have watched but you should give a try

1. Tamizhukku En Ondrai Azhuthavum

Directed by debutant Ramprakash Rayappa, Tamilukku.. is a chaos theory based thriller that is based on the solar flare of 2012 which affected the communication systems in many countries. I still don’t know why this movie didn’t make it big like it should have.

2. Charles Shafiq Karthiga

A well written thriller by Sathyamoorthy, CSK (they used that short form) is a good watch. It had some strong performances from Jai Quaheneni, Narayan and Sanjay but strayed off to predictability in the second half. You will not be bored watching it.

3. Naalu Policeum Nalla Irundha Oorum

The critics panned it, audience didn’t receive it well but I think this movie deserves a watch just for the interesting premise. Give it a try when it runs on TV.

4. Kirumi

Directed by debutant Anucharan, Kirumi will baffle you with the way he crafted his grey shaded characters. The first few minutes of the movie where Kathir does sequence of things shows how good the movie is. You have to watch it to understand it.

5. 144

144 is a hilarious take on how a motley crew tries to do a heist in a village that is under curfew. Even if you don’t watch it for Shiva or for the dialogues and the frivolousness but watch it for the acting of Ramdoss who just cracks the screen with his antics as a deaf and dumb man.

20 best songs/albums of 2015

1. Merasalayitten/Pookale Sattru Oyvvedungal/ Ennodu Nee Irundhaal (I)

Wish the movie was as good as the songs

2. Kaathirunthen (Touring Talkies)

I wish Ilaiyaraaja didn’t give this song to this movie

3. Danga Maari Oodhari (Anegan)

4. Unakkena Venum Sollu/ Idhayathai Yehdo Ondru (Yennai Arindhaal)

Although they sounded repetitive from Harris Jayaraj, these should be on the list just for the lyrics.

5. Anbe Anbe (Darling)

6. Mana Mana Mental Manadhil/ Malargal Kaetten/ Paranthu Sella Vaa (O Kadhal Kanmani)

7. Pachai Vanna Poove (Vai Raja Vai)

8. Uttama Villain – The entire album and the original soundtrack

9. Vaadi Raasathi (36 Vayadhinile)

10. Dandanakka Dandanakka (Romeo Juliet)

11. Kadhale Kadhale (Indru Netru Naalai)

12. Vazhum Naal (Moone moonu Varthai)

That song you should listen to when you are down and SPB

13. Maari Thara Local Song (Maari)

14. Irukkirai Illamalum Irukkirai (Idhu Enna Maayam)

15. You are my darling (Vaalu)

16. Theemaidhan Vellum (Thani Oruvan)

17. Yaar Indha Muyalkutti (Paayum Puli)

18. Naanal Poovai (Kirumi)

19. Thangame/Yenai Maatrum Kadhale (Naanum Rowdythan)

20. Aaluma Doluma (Vedalam)

May contain spoilers 

There is a scene in Pichaikkaran where Magzhini (played by Satna Titus) is searching for Arul (played by Vijay Antony) in the rain. Arul is a beggar and Magzhini couldn’t fathom the fact that he is a beggar (she falls in love without knowing it). She tries to give him a rain coat and Rs.1000. He returns them to her and she asks “Pichaiya potta vangippiya” (Will you get if I give it as alms?). He kneels down and begs while she kisses his hand.

Sasi as a director scores at that moment and makes you question why the entire movie is not about their love story. Sasi has handled such stories in Sollamale and Dishyum. His premises always have a big what if question that Tamil movie audiences love (except for Poo). Pichaikkaran is also a big “What if” question. Based on a book (which Sasi reveals at the end of the movie), it’s a story of a rich businessman who lives a life of a beggar for 48 days as part of a penance that he undertakes to save his mother.

The premise will baffle you and the way Arul explores the lives of other beggars draws you in to the movie. While Sasi evokes sympathy, he doesn’t shy away from fun, philosophy and the cheating in the begging world. Sasi’s dialogues are sharp, witty and thought provoking at the right moments.

When you take notice of the premise and expect something interesting, Sasi travels in to the usual territory of masala due to commercial compulsions. Except for the jealous uncle, two other villains are entirely forced narratives that are placed inside just to show the action hero side of Vijay Antony. Vijay Antony is so blank and expressionless that you actually need an optical microscope to identify micro expressions in his face. It could have worked for movies like Naan and Salim but Pichaikkaran needs someone who can evoke sympathy and pain. Vijay Antony shows that he is incapable of carrying such a role.

The two characters who portray the beggars are the standout because of their natural portrayals. Satna and Bugs (Bagavathi Perumal) are adequate but Muthuraman as the evil uncle is irritating after a point. Nenjorathil, Nooru Saamigal and Unakkaga Varuven are excellent melodies in Vijay Antony’s music (can he do more music?)

Pichaikkaran is not a bad boring movie. It does provoke you to think. But in the current format it just stays as a movie that people will forget once they leave the theatre. The possibilities with this premise are endless. It could have been a love story between the beggar and the girl or it could have been a philosophical debate on money and begging. The problem with Sasi is that he chose to take the commercial route and it really affects the noble idea he wanted to plant in our heads. Pichaikkaran could have been a classic but the idea is lost among the villains, needless fight sequences and some awful acting.

Pichaikkaran is about how much a son can sacrifice to get back his mother’s life. But ironically, Sasi has sacrificed so much to give us a half-baked movie that had an idea so dear to him. It has become a perfect example how external commercial forces kill the creativity of a director. Did he have a choice is a larger question to answer.

A 2/5 for Pichaikkaran and give it a watch just for the premise.

Disclaimers

1. The review contains spoilers. Apologies that I couldn’t a spoiler free review.
2. I have watched the original and the comparisons were inevitable because the movie was exact photocopy of the original.

I watch a lot of Korean movies and whenever I find an interesting movie. I make sure I store a copy of the movie. But some movies will be transferred to the trash folder. For example, Memories of Murder will never get deleted. I watched My Dear Desparado (2010) a couple of years back and it went to the trash. So, I was really baffled when a director like Nalan Kumaraswamy chose to remake Kim-Kwang Sik’s romantic comedy (his Tabloid Truth was better – and, it will make for a better Tamil/Hindi movie).

Kaadhalum Kadanthu Pogum is one of those most faithful remakes that you will see except for songs, the love-making scene (that part in Ka Ka Po was one of the weirdest sequences I have ever seen) and a kiss. Yazhini (played by Madonna Sebastian) loses her job after her company goes bankrupt and moves to a house with low rent. The house opposite to hers is occupied by Kathiravan (Vijay Sethupathy), an ex-convict and a henchman who went to jail for a murder committed by his boss/friend. Yazhini and Kathiravan slowly develop a friendship while Yazhini is trying to find a job and Kathiravan is waiting for a bar license. They end up drinking together one day and Yazhini ‘sleeps’ (am still confused what Nalan tried to imply) with him. In order to convince her overprotective family, Yazhini tries to make Kathiravan pose like her educated boy friend. The rest of the movie is about how Yazhini lands up in her dream job and what happens to their relationship?

If you actually play both movies side by side, it would be impossible for you to find six differences. May be the performances of lead actors might be different because I don’t think Vijay Sethupathy and Madonna watched the original. The way they have treated their characters are diagonally opposite to how Park Joong – Hoon and Jung Yu-Mi handled theirs. Nonetheless, both are brilliant in their own unique way and that’s refreshing in Ka Ka Po.

There are two key scenes in the movie. The relationship moves from friendship to platonic when she sleeps with him (unlike Nalan, I will be overt. They both have sex in the original). Nalan doesn’t tell you what has happened in Ka Ka Po. But Kathiravan goes into a euphoric song that doesn’t give you any clue to what has happened between them. If she had just hugged and slept along with him, does it need such reaction from Yazhini? She hides, tries to escape and even calls it “sleeping with a dog”. In the original, the reaction is justified because they have sex but the entire sequence was weird in Ka Ka Po. Is it because of so called “culture” or censorship issues?

The other key scene in the movie is where she thanks him for helping her in tackling her father. At that moment, the relationship progresses to a romantic one from platonic. In the original, she kisses him while it’s just a hug in Ka Ka Po. A kiss in the lips has a larger meaning in this context than a hug.

When the whole movie is a photocopied version of the original, Nalan missed the cut in these two important scenes that defines the relationship between the lead characters. When you have decided to make a faithful remake in which you don’t even want to change the attire of the hero, why miss pivotal scenes? I agree that you need to remake a movie based on the local cultural sensibilities but is it a big crime to show pre-marital sex and kisses on screen?

Remakes are dangerous territory for any director. If you faithfully remake the original, you will be referred to as a photocopier. Directors like ‘Jayam’ Raja had to come up with Thani Oruvan to change the perception. Movies like Panchathanthiram are perfect examples of how to adapt an interesting premise in to a Tamil movie taking cultural sensibilities in to consideration. The only reason why some Tamil movie buffs know “Very Bad Things” (1998) is because Panchathanthiram takes the basic plot from that movie. Nalan could have taken the premise of My Dear Desperado and made an interesting movie out of it. He is not a bad screen writer. Is it the dearth of creativity or financial compulsions? Only Nalan will be able to answer it.

My dear desperado was yet another Korean rom-com for me and Ka Ka Po will be the same, in fact a little less romantic.

A 1.5/5 for Kadhalum Kadanthu Pogum and watch it if you are a sucker for rom-coms. No! Only if you are a sucker for comedies. If you for looking some Nalan magic, skip Ka Ka Po.

Trailer of My Dear Desperado

Most of the time, I choose movies based on the director instead of actors in a typical reviewer style. This week I chose to go with Guhan Senniappan’s Sawaari. Guhan Senniappan is another “Nalaya Iyakkunar” product who impressed me with movies like Uyir Vaasam, H2O and Sennaai Vettai (the action for the small screen was quite impeccable). So I was keen to see what he had done on the big screen. And I should say, it was quite a roller coaster ride.

Sawaari is road psycho thriller movie that you have seen since 1950s in Hollywood but Kollywood hasn’t tried it yet. Rajat Mukherjee from RGV stable tried his hand on it with Road in Bollywood and it bombed miserably. It’s not an easy path to take because you have to do a lot of work to preserve the attention of the audience.

The movie starts with a police investigation of a triple murder that is suspected to have been done by a psycho serial killer. The investigating officer, Samson (played Benito Franklin Alex) is about to get married the next day and tries to take a break by subordinating the investigation. On a parallel side, Ravi (Karthik Yogi) is on the road to deliver a car (a Contessa classic 1990 model) to a superstitious MLA at Nellore. Samson’s car breaks down and he hitch hikes with Ravi. The rest of the story revolves on how the psycho killer is identified in the road trip they take from Chennai to Nellore.

Honestly, if you have watched such psycho thrillers in English, you will not find anything new in Sawaari. It’s straight forward, narrated in a linear manner with some thrills at the right moments. What makes Sawaari different is the wonderfully laced humour that runs until the end of the movie among the horrific incidents. Karthik Yogi carries his role with aplomb and cracks the screen with his quips. Sometimes you might feel he so irritating with his constant ranting but I felt it was by design to make the audience feel the same. Vishal Chandrasekhar’s background score is another strength to the movie.

Having said that, Guhan suffers from what I call Short Movie Maker Syndrome – the lack of ability to transform a short movie screenplay to the larger format. For instance, he reveals the killer way too early in the movie and it forced him to drag the scenes. Honestly, the movie should have been 90 minutes. It’s the same reason why the movie is tad predictable which is not good for a psycho thriller. But, the good thing is he hasn’t tried to give a back story to the actions of the psycho killer. In fact, one of the characters jokes about the back story to the killer himself.

Sawaari is not a classic but definitely a bold attempt to bring in road based psycho thriller to Kollywood. It is predictable, but it’s not boring because of the acting. If you are not worried about predictability but want to watch a thriller, Sawaari is your choice. But if you have watched a lot of such psycho thrillers, you will find it boring.

A 2.5/5 for the bold attempt but Sawaari could have been better if Guhan had focussed on the screenplay. I wish it was better.

PS: I think Guhan Senniappan loves that Contessa. He had already used it in a photo movie posted on his Youtube Channel.

My first brush with Veedu was really funny. I saw it probably when I was 10 or so on National Television. It was one of the most iconic scenes in Tamil cinema when Murugesu (played by Chokkalinga Bagavathar) visits half-built house of his grand daughter for the first time. At that age, I didn’t understand the scene and Ilaiyaraaja’s background score was more mystical than enlightening at that age. After many years, when I started analysing movies, I saw the movie again with fresh eyes and I understood why it’s one of the best movies ever to be made in Indian cinema.

Veedu (1988)

Sudha (played by Archana) lives with her sister Indhu (played by Indhu) and her grandfather Murugesu (played by KA Chokkalinga Bagavathar) in a rented house. When her landlord decides to construct a new building at her place, Sudha is forced to look for a new house. As she couldn’t find a place under her budget, her colleague Iyengar suggests that she should construct her own house. Murugesu has two plots in the outskirts and they start raising the money.

With the help of her fiance, Gopi (played by Banuchander) and her jewels, Sudha starts the construction of the house. Whenever she takes a step forward, she is pushed back couple of steps backward. She is forced to bribe for approvals and then rain halts the construction. The cost escalates and she finds the contractor has been cheating her through Manga (‘Pasi’ Sathya), a construction worker at her site. Manga promises that she will help to complete the construction with the help of supervisor (Oru Viral Krishnarao). As a final jolt, she finds that the metro water officer has given wrong approval and the site is going to be acquired by the water board for construction. The movie ends in a poignant tone when she is still fighting for her land against the government.

The story was written by Akhila Balu Mahendra while Balu Mahendra wrote the screenplay, edited, shot and directed the movie. Ilaiyaraaja used his pieces from “How to name it” to provide a minimalistic background score.

What is so special about the movie?

1. Owning a house is an ultimate dream of Indian middle class and the movie showed how difficult it is to build a house on your own. It becomes even more difficult when you are a woman fighting the system. The mental agony undergone by the middle class was clearly portrayed without melodrama by Balu Mahendra in this movie.

2. The movie is timeless because the issues haven’t changed for the past 30 years and to be fair it has become more difficult to construct a house. If you or your parents have constructed a house, you can feel the pain that the characters go through in this movie.

3. The biggest asset of Balu Mahendra is the way he constructs his characters. Sudha is one of the strongest female characters that you will see in Tamil cinema whil Manga shows another side of feminine strength.

4. The wonderful portrayal of the entire cast. Balu Mahendra has the knack of extracting the best out of every actor. Archana, Pasi Sathya, Banuchander and Chockalinga Bagavathar were a class apart. Archana in particular gave a nuanced portrayal that showed the resilience and frailty of a woman. On the other hand, Chokkalinga Bagavathar portrayed the helplessness of an old man. His acting in the final sequence (mentioned at the start of this article) is a testimony to the brilliance of this man. ‘Pasi’ Sathya as Manga was a revelation.

5. The movie boldly showed the problems in the society that a middle class woman faces. At one point of time, her higher-up at work asks her to sleep with him for money to be sanctioned – the subtlety in the scene is hard hitting and impactful. Balu Mahendra never held back the reality and the sad ending makes the movie more realistic.

Why it should be on the list?

1. Veedu portrayed the reality of the middle class without exaggeration and at the same time the movie didn’t hold back its punches.

2. It was path breaking in the way it was made. Right from character sketches, screenplay and cinematography, it’s one of the flawless movies in Tamil Cinema. Balu Mahendra rated it as one of his two best movies along with Sandhya Raagam.

3. For Balu Mahendra and his vision to make such a brilliant masterpiece on screen.

Trivia

1. 1987 was the International Year of Shelter for the Homeless and the movie was made in the year. Surprisingly, the movie was censored on the last day of the year right in time for National Awards consideration. The movie was dedicated to the homeless ¹.

2. Veedu won the National Award for the Best Tamil Feature film in the 35th National Awards. Archana won the Best Actress award ². Chokkalinga Bagavathar was said to be in contention for the Best Actor award which eventually went to Kamal Hassan for Nayakan.

3. The house that is being constructed in the movie housed Balu Mahendra’s Cinema Pattarai until his demise. After his demise, the school slowly folded up due to lack of patrons ³. The name board of Cinema Pattarai was written by Balu Mahendra himself ⁴. The first picture that Balu Mahendra hung inside Cinema Pattarai was of Chokkalinga Bagavathar ⁴.

4. KA Chokkalinga Bagavathar was a commercial drama artiste and singer made his debut with this movie at the age of 83 ⁵. Here, I need to make a note. According to Randor Guy, one of the film historians, there was another KA Chokkalinga Bagavathar who acted in movies like Thukkaram (1938) and Rambayin Kaadhal (1939) ⁶. Probably, these are two different people as the age doesn’t match. It’s a pity that we don’t have any information about this wonderful actor (there will be another movie of his in this list). He also sang the title song of the movie.

5. Veedu was inspired by Balu Mahendra’s mother and her difficulties while building a house when he was 8 years old ⁷. The story is credited to Akhila Balu Mahendra – his wife.

6. Balu Mahendra noted that Veedu and Sandhya Raagam (will be part of this list later) are the two movies that he made with the least number of mistakes ⁷.

7. One more anomaly is that Best of Tamil Cinema – Part 2 (written by Dhananjayan) lists the movie was shot in black and white while the movie available on YouTube is in colour ⁵. I don’t remember the movie in black and white, I think even the Doordarshan version was in colour. Can someone throw light on this?

Credits

Producer: Kala Das for Sri Kala International; Story: Akhila Balu Mahendra; Screenplay, Dialogues, Editing and Cinematography: Balu Mahendra; Music: Ilaiyaraaja; Art Direction: Ramasamy;

References

1. Veedu Movie – YouTube link.
2. The official press release for 35th National Awards by DIFF.
3. ‘Cinema Pattarai’ – a thing of the past – The Hindu
4. பாலுமகேந்திரா… தமிழ் சினிமாவின் வீடு! – Artilcle by Director Ram on Ananda Vikatan
5. The Best of Tamil Cinema – Part 2 by G.Dhananjayan
6. Tukaram (1938) – The Hindu
7. Balu Mahendra – The Method, the madness – Rediff.com
8. Image credit: The Frontline

YouTube link for the movie

Disclaimer: The review contains spoiler (but seriously, I don’t think there is anything to spoil in this movie)

What’s the probability of writing about the same movie within a span of a year? There are a lot of old movies that get rehashed every time. For example, Enga Veetu Pillai (Ramudu Bheemadu is the original) is one such movie when it comes to dual roles. In the cop movie series, Chathriyan is the one that gets rehashed quite often. I am not mad at directors because it’s a brilliant script by Mani Ratnam directed by his assistant Subash that got released 26 years back. It was a landmark movie for Vijayakanth and had an amazing score from Ilaiyaraaja.

Last year, Gautam Menon adapted it (I do not know if he will accept) but Tamil movie buffs can clearly see the inspiration. Yennai Arindhaal was a worthy adaptation and a tribute to Chatriyan whereas Theri is a distressing attempt to recreate the magic.

I do not know where to start on what is bad.  The biggest problem of Theri is the way Atlee conceived the movie. I used to reiterate in my reviews on how important is the conflict in a movie. Atlee decides to show it to you only at the intermission. The second problem is the characterisation of Vijay.  He is rather a self styled vigilante who uses his position to guard himself rather than a self-righteous police officer. In fact, the conflict happens because he boasts his vigilantism to the villain (and nothing else). That’s how stupid it can get.

Vijay’s tired and stereotypical acting is so painful to watch that you wish the movie never happened. The movie is agonisingly predictable that you can say what’s going to come up with your closed eyes. You have the heroine (Samantha) fall for the hero at the first instance because he is a do-gooder. You have four hero introduction style mass (?) scenes out of which in three you have a vehicle drifting. You have a second heroine (Amy Jackson in a forgettable role) who finds the truth about the hero. You have a cute little daughter who acts more than her age. You have scenes in which children clapping for the hero when he doles out vigilante justice. You have a sidekick whose only job is to praise the hero. Last but not the least, the hero shouts “Nee amabalaya irundha en ponnu mela kai vachu paaruda” (Harm my child, if you are a man). Immediately, the henchman leaves the child, second heroine and the sidekick to attack the hero who is tied up. Even 90s director wouldn’t do the same scene if they have to make a movie now. My heart skipped a beat when the hero started lecturing the villain.

The only good thing about the movie is the cuteness of Nainika. She takes the looks and acting from her mother (Meena). She nails her role to perfection although it was another typecast role. I wish she gets movies like what Shalini and Shamili did as child actors. Although Mahendran did a good job, I could see only Thilagan (Arumai nayagam from Chathriyan) instead of Mahendran. Except for Jithu Jilladi, GV Prakash’s music is lacklustre. Eeena Meena Deeka sounds eerily similar to Mera Joota Hai Japani while Chella Kutti’s pallavi sounds similar to Sippi Irukkuthu and he is still in Raja Rani hangover in his background score.

Theri is intolerably boring because the premise is beaten down to earth. Atlee was smart when he rehashed Mouna Ragam for his Raja Rani (I still had issues with it) but he was a promising director. Theri is a pathetic adaptation of another Mani Ratnam premise that shows the immaturity of a young director. I hope Atlee changes path soon.

Watch Theri if you are Vijay fan, you might say it’s a mass masala movie but give it a thought on how you want to look at your favourite star. Honestly, if this is what you want to see, you deserve a Theri. It’s the same for Ajith fans when they celebrated Vedalam. If you are just a Tamil movie fan, watch Theri if you don’t have anything else to do (you can also watch Chatriyan).

A 1.5/5 for Atlee’s Theri and if you come out of the theatre without yawning, good for you.

PS:

I saw a lot of kids watching the movie today with their parents. Every time, Vijay gave out vigilante justice, the kids were shouting and enjoying those scenes. It was so disturbing to see. Will write another post on censorship and kids.