Madharaasi

After a series of underwhelming misfires, Madharaasi brings back glimpses of a forgotten AR Murugadoss that had made him our top commercial movie director. This isn’t just because he still has it in him to stage elaborately choreographed, neatly cut action blocks. This isn’t because he knows how to pander to a star’s fan base and still make a film relatively entertaining to the star-agnostic. The reason Murugadoss remains a brand is because he continues to have the ability to sell you a far-fetched high concept that sounds outlandish, but without allowing you to think of just how impossible all of it is. In Madharaasi, this includes a setup that tells you that six containers filled with the latest guns are just one toll gate away from entering Tamil Nadu. Fifteen minutes later, he sells you another concept, this time about Raghu (Sivakarthikeyan), a man who suffers from delusions after he witnessed his entire family getting charred to death as a child. But instead of using this just as his backstory, the PTSD has given Raghu superpowers, the sort that let him take on a tiny army when triggered.

Sivakarthikeyan, despite being one of the celebrated mainstream heroes in the Tamil film industry, continues to surprise everyone with his script choices. His last few films, while fitting into the commercial tropes, have also stood out for their storytelling. Will ‘Madharaasi’, his latest collaboration with director AR Murugadoss, add to his success streak? Let’s find out! Raghuram (Sivakarthikeyan) is an orphan with a traumatic past. While battling delusion syndrome, love strikes him. As Malathi (Rukmini Vasanth) enters his life, he changes for good. Meanwhile, NIA officer Prem (Biju Menon) and his team are on a mission to stop a notorious North Indian gang involved in a weapon smuggling syndicate. Virat (Vidyut Jammwal) and Chirag (Shabbir Kallarkal) are leading the syndicate’s plan to smuggle arms into Tamil Nadu. Prem’s failed mission and Raghu’s unsuccessful suicide attempt bring them together. Prem hatches a plan to stop the arms from entering the state. Raghuram gets entangled in this mission. Will he be helpful to Prem? Will Raghuram and Malathi end up together? What happens to Virat and Chirag’s mission? All these and more are answered over the course of two hours and 48 minutes.

It is a silent night, and something really huge is expected to unfold. The cops are ready, and a huge consignment of guns is being transported. A nefarious plan to make Tamil Nadu the ‘Gun Capital’ of India is underway. The top brass of the police have surrounded the trucks. But things go awry. The big dog among the cops, Officer Prem (an assured Biju Menon), has his binoculars trained on one man who is nonchalantly dismantling people in his way. His mere presence is unnerving, and everyone there knows that the fight would be one-sided. And nope, that is not the introduction of Sivakarthikeyan’s Raghu, but Vidyut Jammwal’s Virat, the primary antagonist of Madharaasi. In contrast, Raghu just walks into the frame, gearing up to drunkenly dance and sing to the crowd about his love failure. This is quite a ‘different’ start to a film, but one that is absolutely in tune with whatever follows in this mad ride that hopes you have faith in the filmmaker to steer things home safely, even if it hits a few roadblocks on the way. And for the man who made films like Dheena, Ramana, Ghajini, Thuppakki, and Kaththi, Madharaasi might just be a reminder that he still has it in him.