"Paruthiveeran" (Language - Tamil) (2007) - Movie Review

Ameer’s “Paruthiveeran” is the landmark what “16 Vayithinale” did for Bharathiraja. And the same goes for Karthik Sivakumar in a role which would be a dare for debutant to do it with a seasoned capability his brother Surya was able to achieve after many abysmal performances. For Surya it came through many chances as such and a major break of Bala taking him for “Nanda”. Karthik has been able to get into that right away through the same film maker only that it is through his student emerging from his school of direction which is Ameer.

Tamil cinema has a genre created for itself in the 80s and that was the village. Apart from being culturally rich and bound by the same, it also has sparsely educated or illiterate previous generation. A school teacher with big glasses usually played by a suave and sophisticated personality like Sarath Babu would come to that village of nowhere and either he will be extremely good or creepily devious. He will be that leverage in becoming that twisted mentality to make the lovers suffer in those or he will be the lover who will be suffering from the people from village seeking him blood thirsty to guard their “honour”. It died off and came up a little above the surface in “Kizhakku Cheemayile” from the mastery of that genre, Bharathiraja. A slight sporadic surprise hit in that genre came as the ever matured classic in Kamal’s “Devar Magan”. After that it pretty much played in utter failures or in mediocre attempts. It got saturated or so it was thought. And then comes this film and as though the gold pot has been discovered people are rounding up the region of my native Madurai in every inch from mega films to mega serials.

There were horrible films in that cadre. It showed a sort of immaturity in showing the people as fanatics of religions, honour and what not. Not that it is something which is not present, in fact it is all the more present but the films approached it with an absence of compassion. Rather it glorified the violence in it. Sure it was made for the people out there so that they can easily relate and see it as a validation. The pure sense of what the villages were rich was turned off and the negativity of it was praised in many ways. “Paruthiveeran” retains that nativity and says something more. It tells something about the blind emotions and ruggedness in showing and arduously believing in love. It has the characters caught by the past complications and the enmity migrating from one to another but it has also the consequences of it.

It follows an outlaw in the village Paruthiveeran (Karthik Sivakumar) stabbing people to show his testosterone levels and he does it with wicked fun through the help of his uncle Chevvaazhai (Saravanan). Immediately we forget the gravity of what they have done and Ameer shows how much they were aware of the consequences following that introductory scene to their lock up sequence. These are the people with an obsessive chore of marking their presence through acts of violence, drunkenness and debauchery. They live like cave man in their times with the zeal to maintain their regime of fear and respect. But a child hood story of Paruthiveeran shows as this kid with same attitude with his aunt’s daughter and then later saving her which wins her heart at that age. Mutthazhagu (Priya Mani) is the girl who promises him that she will be forever with him till she dies. She maintains it and despite Paruthi’s ruthless sociopathic behaviour and actions, she is madly in love and I might add boldly.

In Ramji’s cinematography Ameer uses the tone what Bala used for all his films. The actors wear dark solid coloured dresses to carry the theme of the film. It has brightness but with a shadowy silhouette for the underlying darkness in the story. With Karthik and Saravanan as a pair anyone would never have imagined, they provide the black comedy in this movie. They do nothing but create chaos. While we enjoy them disturbing people and making their life miserable (especially the character of “Ganja” Karuppu), we would avoid the notion of them living in the region they would walk by. Yet Ameer wants us to like them and as the back story unravels of Paruthiveeran’s dad and Mutthazhagu’s dad being brother in law, we understand what will be at stake.

A village male’s arrogance is a given thing. People who have lived by the native would not be surprised by the daring nature the film’s female characters show. While Mutthazhagu would go the extent of kill Paruthiveeran if she will not be able to get him, her mom, Paruthiveeran’s grand mother and the lady boss in the flash back are all have the stubbornness and the power to dismiss these violent men into nothing. For showing that realism I salute Ameer.

But there is more than that I have for him to be appreciated. It is the ending which every one flinched and sure would have been affected for days after watching the film. I was warned by many and in fact knew what was going to happen. That might have reduced the effect of it but nevertheless it is a heart wrenching scene. But why would he do that is the question floating around? Even when the character of Mutthazhagu performed with such a zealous and emotionally painful effort by Priya Mani asks where his male chauvinism for bravery went when she lay there helpless, it does not answer many. I appreciated it for first of all making the culprits who were totally unrelated to that situation but have a relation to Paruthiveeran. I appreciated it because not to forget the act and the consequences of the life he chose. Why not give him a chance for forgiveness? Yes, precisely. But that is sure to be there and no one denies it. Yet for this film his realization of his love does not alone make him a good man. In that tenure of film, it got to be presented so that we crave for the good life the couple would have had. We should learn that opportunity of survival and understand how the acts of one affect the innocent loved ones.