Saturday, October 29, 2011

7aum Arivu Movie - A bold attempt indeed....

A Bold attempt indeed…

I watched “7aum Arivu” movie this weekend and was thoroughly impressed with the strong basis for the story, a good attempt at Science Fiction Genre and a relevant villain (China) for the present time. This movie is very different from the usual genre and doesn’t really fit into any existing categories as well. Usually the movies are all about heroes and punch dialogs and heroines as decorative ornaments and with liberal that calls out secularism usually in the form of a Muslim or a Christian father as the only kind group of souls in the society. This movie has given all the usual lines a go by, that in itself in my opinion is remarkable and bold.

The movie starts off tracing the Pallava dynasty till 5th century and calls out the achievements of “Bodhi Dharman” who predicts a major disease in China and starts of on a lone crusade (not the conversion army kind) to stop it within the existing region and cure the people as well. How is deified by the locals in China and eventually they archive him permanently is well captured and narrated as well.

The story then switches to modern day Chennai where in a circus performer is pursued by a Bio Engineering student (excellently portrayed by Shruti Haasan), initially it appears illogical that such a beautiful and smart girl will be after a circus guy but the director reveals the mystery down the line with each and every scene being tied into a brilliant script in the end. You have to watch the whole movie to understand it.

Suriya’s already a very good actor and has delivered on his roles with an element of naturalness that is missing in most heroes of today. He becomes and defines the characters. Whether it is dealing with the village folks that don’t trust him initially, falling for Shruti, realizing and portraying disappointment after understanding her motives, dialog delivery, action he has done them all well. Even in dancing, which is his Achilles heel, he has done well !

I must say that I was surprised by Shruti’s performance. She delivered excellently on the character and has a role that is equal to suriya’s - in length/time, scope and influence in the whole movie. Shruti looks refreshing with a girl next door charm and looks uniformly beautiful in a variety of dresses. After a long time, we have a “Tamil” heroine who knows the language and has actually dubbed for herself. Make no mistake, this is also a “bold concept” in Tamil movies now-a-days !

This movie also calls out how we as a society are deriding ourselves, without even thinking and giving credit for the fact that “our forefathers were not fools either”. In the end it implores people to look at the possible scientific motives behind our traditions. It also somewhat appeals to Tamils in particular to back each other up and not to pull each other down. In that there are some slightly chauvinistic dialogs deploring the condition of Tamils in Malaysia and Sri Lanka but stays within the realm of truth in that also.

This movie is sure to rile several critics, usually the media in India particularly the Anglo and the “Dravidian” kind have all been constantly fed crap that ancient Tamils are not Hindus, everything was forced on them and hindu/ancient religious practices and traditions are bad etc. Most of the media critics will be afraid to write anything about the hardnosed message in the movie, which is “Approach and understand your traditions scientifically, don’t be dismissive of them”. Murugadoss has to be given credit for having the guts to write “Religious conversion is also destroying your ancient knowledge wealth”, Suriya also for having the guts to actually deliver that dialog. This is anathema to the secularists.

I am of the opinion, if some Western director had made the movie on Bodhi Dharma and had the same science fiction angle in the later half, immediately all the so called critics will line up like moths to light to call out “How the facts have been researched in depth, how some anglo actor has portrayed the character excellently”. If Aamir Khan had done this, then our media reviews would have been will be totally different as well. Well that is another topic for another blog.

Hats OFF to the team that delivered this great experience ignore the critics - go see it. Definitely paisa vasool and then some.

முன்னோர்கள் முட்டாள்கள் அல்ல - just about summarizes the message of the movie.

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