Tamil AL Vijay’s Thalaivaa sparked controversy after theaters in Chennai, which had originally intended to screen the film, received bomb threats, causing it to be a no-show in the first week of its release. However, it has arrived at a movie theater in the picturesque but economically prosperous city of Vadodara, my hometown. And my brothers, or rather bros, in Chennai, consider yourselves saved (except for that poor fan who killed himself after his idol Vijay’s movie (meaning the lead actor and not AL Vijay, the director) didn’t is premiering in Chennai Brother, a piece of advice: there are better things worth giving your life for! Because the movie is such bloody ridiculous garbage that it should be kept out of human reach. Here’s another piece of advice, this time for the first Tamil Nadu Minister Jayalalitha, who has been approached by actor Vijay to approve his film for Chennai cinemas: don’t listen to him! Do this instead: install gas chambers like those used in the concentration camps WWII rally and have a million people killed. Install a nuclear power plant in the middle of the city and escape. You’ll probably see your name taken along with Hitler’s, but if you make the biggest mistake of opening this movie in the city that dir iges, consider your precious CM seat taken! In the first case, you would be a dictator and still not lose your precious ‘kursi’ (seat)…
I believe one SRK Karnan has filed a petition with the Chennai High Court alleging that the film portrays the life of his father and grandfather, two social leaders in Mumbai’s Dharavi slum, in a very unflattering light by distorting the facts. and depicting the two men as gifts and thugs. His petition would probably be rejected, but if he makes another claiming that his lineage is portrayed as stupid idiots, he would probably win the claim. Thalaivaa is not a biopic. Nor is it about “the people”, as the film’s protagonists often claim. This is not about Anna, who if Karnan’s claim is true has been based on her grandfather. Nor is it about Karnan’s father. It’s about the idiotic hero Vijay. Screen time and close-ups of him confirm this. He dances, romances, sings, jokes, does lots of dishum-dishum (fighting) and some bad imitation of Robert Di Nero in Godfather and Abhishek Bachchan in Ram Gopal Varma’s Sarkar/Sarkar Raj whenever he has free time. Of all the dances, romances, and dishum-dishuming.
He is a would-be dad/don. The film itself is a Godfather wannabe, a Sarkar wannabe, a typical Indian romance wannabe (but with a twist), and sometimes even an ABCD wannabe (Prabhudeva dance movie). He spends much of his time worshiping his hero Vijay, to the point that he kills off the character of Anna (played competently by Sathyaraj) rather quickly. He wastes no time in revealing his true intentions to become just one more in the endless list of forgettable, money-spinning ‘romance-drama-action’ kitsch being thrown out by Kollywood and Bollywood to mass audiences. Sathyaraj, who plays Anna, is a former coolie who eventually becomes the protector of the honest slum dwellers of Dharavi by meting out justice through violence and force. But the movie relegates him to a shadow, occasionally showing up to tell her son how busy he is, as soon as Vijay walks in. He plays Anna’s NRI son, Melbourne-based Vishwa, and the film abruptly switches from entirely serious drama to gag comedy. Comedian Santharam joins as Vishwa’s friend Logu to push the film’s path of self-destruction, and for a while we get the unappetizing feeling of watching ‘Sarkar + Comedy’.
Enter love interest Meera (played by dark beauty Amala Paul) and the movie goes into ‘romance mode’, with almost an hour passing before we exclaim “Oh my God! What happened to the original plot?!” (which comes just before the interval, so you can be bold enough and try to ask if you can come after the interval and pay half the price of the ticket. I wouldn’t recommend it either as things get even worse after the interval). Vishwa and Meera enter a dance contest and win, overcoming obstacles such as being attacked by their competitors. But why are these things important in a film about Dharavi, its people and its self-proclaimed leaders? Why the hell would I think it includes a series of comedy skits, one involving a chef who can’t cook, another about a group of single men in Melbourne pining for Meera, and the third involving Meera lying about her marriage to a sleazy-looking B-? degree movie star, would it be a good idea? Because they do absolutely nothing to further the plot, and they last as long as durex condoms. And how ridiculous is it for a movie to forget itself and jump from drama to comedy to romance and come back only to kill Anna’s character, poor little Anna in a car crash? And hearing Vishwa and Logu call each other ‘Bro’ every time because, you know, they’re in Melbourne and all that, it’s almost painful. Imagine hearing something like: A- ‘Brother… ‘ B- ‘No, brother… ‘ A- ‘Of course, brother’ B- ‘Brother!’, (10x).
Twists before the second half: Meera and her father turn out to be undercover cops after visiting Mumbai together with Vishwa under the guise of arguing with Anna about Vishwa’s marriage to Meera, and a guy named Bhima who claims responsibility for killing Vishwa. Anna to avenge her father’s murder (Anna had killed a hate monger named Varadarajan Mudaliar in the past). Bhima is really a weirdo – he meditates by chanting Anna’s name (then Vishwa’s – actually the words chanted during meditation help relaxation so it’s hard to understand how chanting the villain’s name will increase animosity towards that topic: strange spirituality) and sounds like a villain. cyborg, horrible dub credit (played by abhimanyu singh, a punjabi puttar pucca). Meanwhile, Vishwa spends her time channeling the Sylvester Stallone/Salman Khan within her, beating up man after man with raw energy, or drinking bhaang and making masti (fun). The condition of this post-interval movie goes from trash to manure to sheer atrocity. A song in the film says ‘Thalapathy Thalapathy’; Meanwhile, he would be experiencing a great deal of talai-vali (headache). I recommend a CT scan after seeing this movie.
If Thalaivaa is the movie of 2013 then it is a clear indication that it is the Dark Ages for Tamil cinema. This movie doesn’t deserve the controversy it’s having (controversy = publicity = ka-ching!). This time he wanted a little more. The film, however, takes ages to come to a head and still hasn’t made an impact. Now why would you sit for a pointless three hour watch?
