Kaththi – A Dope of Entertainment and Advocacy

When you buy a ticket for Vijay-starrer, it means a roller coaster ride of comedy, emotions, romance and of course, action. Kaththi does not make any exception to this and fulfills the demands of the Izhaiya Thalapathi fans. The movie is executed in the best possible way for such an entertainer, much better than Thalaiva.

Kaththi has message, not logic; it has entertainment, not banal stuff; it has performances not artisanship...overall, it is a Diwali present to be enjoyed without much hesitation. Most importantly, it has characters who I could find around myself unlike the Bollywood garbage where all characters live in some foreign countries and try to act like any other Hollywood actor had done in his latest flick. In Kaththi, as in all Tamil movies, individuals are not fiber or foam personalities, they are persons in flesh and bones who would react to the situation as anybody living 10-15 kilometers from me would. It is Indian way of living, no doubt about it.

The storyline is as old as it could get. One is forced to think - had Dadasaheb Phalke not made a mythological movie, he would have settled for something similar. A fugitive  criminal taking up the cause of his look alike in forced circumstances spans the narrative of the 166-minute movie, direected by A. Murugodass. In Thuppaki, he infused dose of Patriotism. In Kaththi, he ventures into the realm of activism. There was no need to hint at the communist ideology of the main character. But the director might have thought that only communists are activists or all activists are communists.

The activist and the criminal both advocate the case of the poor farmers who get a shoddy treatment by police, administration and corporate. The villain, played by Neil Nitin Mukesh, heads a cola company whose swanky office is seen numerous times. For some strange reason, the director has not named the company and even the court mentions it as MNC – nothing else.

The movie raises an important question – who has the right on the underground water? On one side there are farmers and on another multinational giants who are all bent on bending the rules and exploiting the resources, throwing law to the wind. In a unique style, the protagonist recounts a plethora of statistics and there is even a faint mention of Vijay Mallya. Kaththi or Kathiresan, played by Vjiay, says in front of media persons, “A beer producer borrows Rs 5000 crores and fails to repay it. Neither he nor any bank official commits suicide. But a farmer taking loan of Rs 5000 commits suicide.”

What adds interest to the plot and narration is super performance by Vijay. He steals the show all the way in both roles, and in one of the roles, literally. His voice modulation in Jeeva’s character is specially notable. He has even managed to utter few lines in Bengali in the start of the movie.

However, the movie has taken a beating on comedy front. Even though the plot has places where audience cannot but laugh or smile, at least, but it could have been better. A bit of Santhanam or Vadivelu would have been preferable.

Samantha does what all actresses are meant to do – be ready at the spur of the moment to entice, enliven and ensnare the main actor for dance and song sequences.

Personally, Kaththi is the fourth entertainer of the year for me which proved value for my money. The first three movies being ‘Rama Madhav’, ‘Poster Boys’ and ‘Punha Gondhal Punha Mujara’.