Thani Oruvan (2015)

For Mithran (Jayam Ravi), the protagonist of Thani Oruvan, a person's friend shows his character while his adversary shows his capacity. Mithran is a young IPS officer whose only goal in life is to find a worthy rival — a kingpin who is the root cause of all other crimes — and destroy him. He meets his match in Siddharth Abhimanyu (Arvind Swami, making a glorious return), an ambitious scientist-businessman, for whom money is all that matters. This is how Mohan Raja sets up the conflict in Thani Oruvan, an efficient thriller, which packs a mighty punch. Raja's films so far have been competent remake efforts, but nothing prepares us for the smart writing (the director has co-written the film with writer duo Suba, whose experience in pulp novels comes in handy as it did earlier this year in Anegan) and the sleek filmmaking we see here. The plot kicks in once Mithran learns of Siddharth's plan of sabotaging a deal that would result in cheaper medicines for the poor and tries to thwart it without his knowing, but the wily Siddharth manages to succeed. Realizing that he has an opponent who will not stop until he is defeated, Siddharth begins a cat-and-mouse game with the cop. There are some terrific moments — the scene where an assassination plan swings both ways, the scene where Mithran discovers Siddharth has paid his place a visit, the scene where two lives depend on Mithran finding a bug, the scene where Siddharth negotiates with the chief minister. What is refreshing is that, to a large extent, Raja manages to avoid diversions in the form of romance and comedy. Mithran's batchmate Mahima (an ideal Nayanthara) is in love with him, but she isn't just a love interest. She is intelligent (a forensic expert) and fearless and an essential person in Mithran's battle against Siddharth. In fact, when he says that he is ready to give up his life in order to bring down Siddharth, it is Mahima who makes him see his flawed approach to stopping crime. Yes, we get some fun moments with Thambi Ramaiah, who plays Siddharth's father, but it is never at the cost of the narrative. Thani Oruvan is a bit too long (Siddharth enters the picture quite late), there are leaps of logic (like the one involving a dubbed video evidence) that we are asked to turn a blind eye to, but such downsides are minimal. And even though it is a plot-driven film, the film gives us well-rounded characters, who lend the slightly far-fetched story plausibility. The film doesn't shy away from showing Mithran for who he actually is — an angry young man whose ideals have turned him into an almost psychotic person. Crime, for him, is an obsession. What keeps him grounded are his fellow cop friends and Mahima. Jayam Ravi's body language — the purposeful strides, the clenched fists, the stern face — displays the determination of the character but doesn't really capture the craziness of the character. But Arvind Swami aces the role of Siddharth. He projects the insouciant arrogance that tells us not to be taken in by his classy style which hides the character's toughened hide, and it is no surprise that we even root for this character, the villain, when he makes his moves against the hero. 'Show me your enemy and I'll tell you who you are', the film tells us in the beginning. With Siddharth, the film shows that you could paraphrase that statement and get the recipe for a thriller — 'Show me your antagonist and I'll tell you how effective your film is'.

> A cop vs an evil scientist! The ultimate clash! This is definitely your regular Indian style film, but the script was top notch, that's the vast difference you would find in this. It was a cop-thief clash theme something like the Korean film 'Veteran'. Initially I thought it might be a remake of some Korean film, because it looks like a Korean thriller, but after learning that it was an original, I was amazed. Because, you know, the director has a nick name called remake Raja. He's known for bringing the Telugu blockbuster to the Kollywood. That's not bad and I'm not against remakes, he sure did do a wonderful job with those projects to succeed. The actors were brilliant, especially like everybody saying Aravaind Swamy in a negative role stole the show. The plus point was minimizing the musical track. I mean the narration was not interrupted by unexpected and unnecessary musics and dances like usual Indian films does, except on one occasion I think. The two and half an hour was too long, but that's the average Indian film length and totally worth it. Not easy to predict, but in a few segments you would know what might come in the next scene. Because it might be an awesome film for the Indian audience who are seeing it for the first time, but in the world stage it is just an above average with partial cliché. There were a couple twists, the ending was excellent too, and looks like a follow up might come. My only disappointment was they missed a wonderful opportunity to make this film more realistic in the line of 'Unnaipol Oruvan'. Instead, they opted to narrate it more commercially appealing way. So if you are an Indian or watch regularly Indian films, you would find it great. I was impressed with the film's promotions and it did well at the box office. Now it is getting remade in a couple of other languages, I hope they would as well do well. The brothers; the lead actor and the director did many projects together, but this one was a very special and will be a game changer for their respective career. So you might need to check it out if you haven't seen it yet. I'm not saying it is a masterpiece, but if you know Indian cinemas, then would learn how unusual it is. 7/10

There's good news and bad news. The good news is that this is an awesome, award-winning good-cop versus evil-villian action flick. The pacing is rapid, the script is great, the fight scenes are exciting, and the love-story subplot is mature and realistic. In spite of it being primarily a drama, Mohan Raja included the requisite Bollywood-style music interludes for the lovers, complete with seven costume changes in one song. (LOL- We always count the dress changes!) The setting is, of course, the corrupt Indian government. The three primary protagonists of the film do a terrific job in character. The bad news is that the pacing is so tight that subtitles barely stay on the screen long enough to speed-read. The first 20–30 minutes of the film are all backstory, and it's pretty confusing. It's a Tamil movie, and we saw the Hindi-dubbed version, which was a little annoying. Even if we don't understand either language, we understand that the lips don't match the sound. We nearly turned the film off, and we're so glad we didn't. After the back story, it started to make some sense, and this film turned out to be one terrific action film. It's one of those chess-match style, intelligent conflicts that are always great fun to watch.