My 2 Cents & I am ....

THALAIVA!!!

Pic Courtesy: www.chandramukhithefilm.com

There are few things in this world that raisese my exectations sky high and one of them is the Rajini film and one other would be Jeppiar's speech in English. Any attempt to address the later would make me an "archa-maavaye-arraikara" expert and I will have to share the dias with Mr. Rangarajan, the director of Chitti, Annamalai, Akka, Thangai, Anna, Anni, Thambi, Periyappa, Periamma etc etc etc.

Rajnikanth is the man who has held my awe even before I learnt ABCD. "Thalaivar" [ which in simple english means supercalifragilisticexpalidocious] as he is called all over Tamil Nadu is a rare combination of style and substance, which everyone in the Tamil film industry from the light boy Muruganandam to Vaiyapuri to Illaya Thalapathi Vijay, tries to replicate and fails miserbaly.

Thalaivar's latest film "ChandraMukhi" is going to hit theatres on April 14. Unlike most other films, the female lead doesn't even matter as the Thalaivar carries the show on its shoulders. In this movie Thalaivar shares the screen space with three huge animals. Naynathara- the elephant, Jyothika- the rhinoceros and Prabhu- the giant hippopotamus and diecting him is the african elephant - P.Vasu, whose only claim to fame was his film Chinna Thambi, a movie in which Prabhu has the body of an elephant and the I.Q of a mosquito and thinks marriages are all about food and not sex. Also, the movie had the "sorrow siren" Manorama [ she was nicnamed achi, only later did I realize that it was the short form of "ada chi"], if we had captured all the tears that she had shed and desalinated it, Chennai will have no water problems for the next three generations...P.Vasu also wanted to cast the great man Chandrasekhar in this movie as a union leader but our man was busy with his daytime job trying to hitch up Muttiah Muralidharan with Madhi Malar.

Coming back to the focus of this post, Rajini- I am hoping that the punch oneliner in this movie will make fans go crazy. Something along the lines of Moondru Mugam or Baasha or Padayappa would make fans like me delirious. Rajni revolutionized Tamil Cinema, whose biggest(pun intended) stars till then were Shivaji and MGR. His movies energized the theme of Tamil cinema, whose audiences till then were used to historic movies or histronic middle class movies. He was the true reason for this "larger than life" hero status and is rightly proclaimed the superstar. "Idhu Eppadi Irukku" said our man as Parattai in Padhinaru Vayadhinilae and announced his arrival in a big way on the big screen.[ his first movie was aboorva ragangal but it was only for a few minutes]] The cigarette flipping act in ninaithale innikum, the rowdy husband in apoorva ragangal, the upright police officer in Mundru Mugam, the devious friend in Mundru Moodichu, the tanglish speaking do-gooder in guru Shishyan, the ever forgetful tamil professor in Dharmathin Thalaivan, the confortational son-in-law in Mappilai, the friendly surya in Dalapathi, the nice hearted milkman in Annamalai, the underworld don in don, the everyday liar in Thillu Mullu, the atukarran in Baasha, the charioteer in Muthu, as a tamer of the shrew in Padaiyappa, a a doting brother in Mullum Malarum, as a struggling patriach in Arilirundhu Arubadhuvarai and the preachy Baba in baba are all stand out performaces by the great actor..

Can't wait for Chandramukhi and prostrate before the man as I did when Baba was screened in Tempe :-)