Soulful Violence. Review on Pudhupettai Movie

There are action packed screenplays with violence as thecentral theme and then there are screenplays where violence is the soul.Everything else is just superficial detail. Selva Raghavan’s latest offering“Puduppettai” (Dhoopeta in Telugu) is a fine example of the latter.

The movie starts off on a grim note and maintains the samemood till the credits roll at the end. This is not a movie for the weakhearted. If you are looking for a movie to unwind with your girlfriend, look somewhereelse – not at the screen.

It is very easy to hate this movie. There are ampleopportunities for the determined viewer to pinpoint scenes and say “There! Thatis the reason I hate Selva Raghavan”. However half an hour into the movie, theviewer will resign to the grim reality that such scenes/incidents arethecentral theme of the movie. The movie is – simply put – a series of unfortunateand dark incidents. This one is not Jim Carrey’s cup of tea though.

Right from the first scene, which is a masterfully craftedsong on Dhanush to the hilarious final scene, which brings to the table SelvaRaghavan’s sarcasm of Tamil Nadu election campaigning – Selva Raghavan is inabsolute control. He ensures that the script is the main hero. There is Dhanushin a main role. The character he plays is not your typical hero. He is in factnot hero material at all. He is – to put it bluntly – a scum bag withabsolutely no qualities which would earn him the title of hero. He takesdecisions in haste. He doesn’t need a strong reason to kill somebody. He is notloyal to his lady love – Sneha in a very different role. The “system” dictateswhat he has to do and how he should love.

There is one scene – extraordinarily written by SelvaRaghavan and brilliantly carried out by Dhanush which sums up “Puduppettai” intwo minutes. The pain, the frustration, the anger and the tears when Dhanushleaves his months old baby in a dustbin to save the baby’s life is the SystemInternationaldefinition of this amazing movie.

It is futile to try to understand the story of this movie.It has so many twists and turns and moments that at some point you will justhave to accept the fact that you are not going to be able to trace and tie allthe threads wavering on the screen. The sooner you do it, the better will be themovie experience for you.

Yuvan Shankar Raja’s score is absolutely fantastic. Hisbackground score is one of the reasons why the movie manages to immerse theviewer into the story. The first song is shot amazingly well – Excellentconceptualization and terrific editing along with a first rate cinematographymakes this song a pleasure to watch.

And finally, it is hard to distinguish Dhanush the actorfrom the character he essays in this movie. He fits into the role like a glove.It is hard or downright impossible to imagine anyone else in that role.

Let me warn you again. This is by far the most serious movieI have seen in the recent times. In comparison Ram Gopal Verma’s Company feelslike a laugh riot. There is no Vadivelu/Vivek comedy track. There are no duetsin Switzerland.There is no sugarcoated romance.

There is bloodshed, severed limbs and an intricate networkof complex individuals. The girl sitting next to me (Not sitting withme)told me that she was not able to handle the amount of blood. “I don’t think Ican sleep today.”

If that is the state of an adult, I don’t know what thethirty odd children in the movie hall had gone through. Why would the parentssend their kids to a movie like this? Well, maybe Tamil Nadu censor board has athing or two to learn from its Andhra Pradesh counterpart.