An Indian serial killer

Por Thozhil (2023)

Director: Vignesh Raja

https://indianexpress.com/article/entertainment/tamil/por-
thozhil-trailer-sarath-kumar-ashok-selvan-starrer-
action-packed-gripping-thriller-8637264/

Thanks to SD for recommending this. SD is a childhood friend with a photographic memory for anything Bollywood when Bollywood was simply known as Hindi cinema. Back in school, during recess, he would attract an audience of friends who would listen as he belted out old Hindi songs and provided detailed backgrounds on the film's actors, music composers, release dates, and even the studios that produced the movies. Even now, he can still rattle off the same information after all these years. However, his interest came to a grinding halt in the 1980s when he felt that Bollywood had lost its charm. These days, SD is into Tamil and Malayalam cinema, which, he claims, are more interesting in storytelling.

 

This is a Tamil film that faithfully adheres to its intended genre. It is meant to be a thriller about a serial killer, and it remains true to its premise. It is not your usual Kollywood fare. There is romance, but it is barely developed. The songs are kept in the background, and there are certainly no item songs.

 

The film narrates the story of a series of murders involving young women who are killed similarly, with their hands tied back and their throats slit with a sharp object. After the local police struggle to make any progress, Logathan, a grumpy senior police officer, is called in to solve the case. A rookie officer, fresh out of the Police Academy with top marks, Prakash, is assigned as his deputy.

 

This sparks a little drama between the senior officer, who believes the young officers are worthless, and the newbie, who endeavours to impress his superior with his theoretical knowledge. The story unfolds slowly, with a solid build-up, before the potential killer is suddenly revealed to the audience. Sarath Babu, the darling of 1980s Tamil cinema, made his final appearance as a serial killer before passing away in the same year the movie was released. But wait for the twist at the end, hinting at a possible sequel.

 

Good show, 4.3/5.

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Beware of the circle of deceit!

Ardh Satya (Half-truth, Hindi; 1983)

Director: Govind Nihalani

This Indian movie is said to be a benchmark upon which other police dramas are compared. Acted beautifully by doyens of the silver screen of Bollywood then, Om Puri, Amrish Puri, Smita Patel, Naseeruddin Shah and Sadashiva Amrapurkar, it paints a multidimensional view of the job of a policeman. 

Our social system is flawed. The very system that had been devised to be law and order is anything but orderly. Things that go under the guise of upholding the law are anything but by the book. There is an unholy alliance between law enforcers and law breakers. The political dogs who made the gangsters their running dogs have made a lapdog of the police. The police, it seems, under the pointers of the politicians and the umbrage of the baddies. In a world where money can right a wrong, the brunt of law enforcement is only felt by the poor. The rich can literally get away with murder. They can quash evidence or buy the best legal representation that money can afford.

With increasing pressure to fill up the coffers within a lifetime, everybody is becoming increasingly creative in creating revenue for their own pockets. The whole shebang, from the low-ranking staff to the administrative panel, has their hands dug deep into the cookie jar. It is a mess out there.

Law enforcement is a messy affair. Too much in the hands of enforcers is bad, for sometimes the innocent get caught in the crossfire. Giving in too much to human liberty and human rights makes policing more difficult. In this type of Catch-22 situation, our man in blue tries to make this country safe.

This movie is said to be one of the most balanced Indian police dramas made in India. Unlike most Bollywood movies which usually showcase lone honest cops fighting singlehandedly a putrefying system and putting the fear of God into the villains, this one explores the challenges a cop has to face to do what is right. Following the footsteps of his father and grandfather against his own wish, Anant joins the police force. After getting into the police force, Anant tries to do what he perceives as right.

He finds that all in his station are working under the thumb of a local politician/thug. Anant tries to keep himself away from the clutches of the gangster, but it becomes increasingly more difficult. He hits a wall when a convict he interrogates dies in custody, and Anant has to get the help of the thug to bury the wrongdoing.

Meanwhile, Anant meets a literature lecturer who is his love interest and motivates him to do the right thing. Then there is a disillusioned drunk cop who was suspended because he fought the system. On his home front, Anant has to deal with an assertive father who wants to micromanage his son.

What is doing the right thing when exposed to the circle of deceit? Do we, like David, fight the Goliath of the system? Do we leave everything and start anew as if the grass elsewhere is any greener.

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Turn hunters to the hunted.

Nayattu (Malayalam, The Hunt; 2021)

That is how the world is today. One day you are doing all the dirty job, not because you like to do it but because you are part of the system. It is not within your capacity to change the status quo but just follow through as you have been doing all along. You know that the battle is unwinnable. You oblige as there are down lines who depend on you. Your leg is so deeply entrenched in the muck there is only one way to go, to get dirty. 

You perfected the system. You wanted it to work for you to serve your masters. It only strikes you to realise what a monster that you have created when the system is used against you when your masters are angered with your actions. 

Most Indian movies highlight police brutality and try to put the police personnel in poor light whilst the laypeople go around with their heart on their sleeves to prove their innocence. In Nayattu, the role is somewhat reversed. 

A sub-inspector and two of his subordinates are accused of drunk driving and killing a motorcyclist. The trouble is that the dead is a goon who works for the local politician, and the three of them were not driving. The driver, upon realising whom he had knocked, fled the scene. Because the local elections are days away and the victim is from the backward caste from which the local politician relies on votes, there is a dire need to apprehend the perpetrators before balloting day. The incumbent leader wants to show the public he has the gravitas to put things in order.

The accused have no chance to prove their innocence. Under the instruction of politicians who hold the strings of administration, their seniors deceptively decide to put an all-points bulletin on them. The accused are hot on their wheels, trying to disappear at least until the elections are over. 

Everybody agrees that for a democratic society to function optimally, there must be the separation of powers between the legislative (law-making body), executive (puts the law into operation) and Judiciary (interprets the law and settle disputes) arms of administration. This division of powers is essential to ensure checks and balances. No one man is yet to born is beyond reproach in carrying his duties without an error of omission or commission. Of late, we have seen how the Legislative part of the country tries to influence and control the other branches of power. And we know what devastation happened in the 1988 Malaysian Constitutional Crisis. We also can see how political leaders use and abuse the executive and judiciary arm of the country. The pandemic, the control over media and utilisation of cybertrooper facilitate them in their endeavours.  

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What really makes us happy?

Happy! (Season 1; 2017)

What actually makes us happy? It seems that from time immemorial, we go around looking for that unattainable wish. Happiness, Bliss, Utopia, Eudaimonia, we refer to it with different names. What we actually yearn for a state of mind oblivious to things that happen around us and one that puts us in a state not wondering what tomorrow may bring and whether we will be left out from it. We want to feel, experience, the wonder of our brain immersed in the feel-good chemicals, serotonin, dopamine and oxytocin. The question why this drowning is self-limiting, numbs itself spontaneously with tolerance setting in. We need ever more of the same for the desired effect. We are still in search of true happiness if there is one. In the meantime, we divert our attention to other paths and convince ourselves that that indeed is happiness even though most do not buy it!

We create stories. We tell ourselves that the Law of Nature is just. Somehow happiness is portrayed as a wrong virtue. We should suffer in pain in that therein lies true happiness. Enduring pain (the antithesis of joy) is looked upon as a respected virtue which would be repaid in many folds in another realm. The mortals are left confused, scratching their heads wondering which part to follow. Like Sisyphus, we are told to find happiness within the gruelling continual rolling of the boulder uphill which repeatedly rolls back when we thought the peak is reached and our job is over. In that mad cycle of torture and disappointment, we are expected to find peace.

We threaten our kinds that happiness is indeed not to be experienced here on Earth but in the afterlife. Is it just a pacifier to thumb people down to submission and subjugation.

A simplistic formula to happiness. We try to
convince ourselves that indeed it is. Deep
inside we know but, with the dearth of any
other suggestions, we persevere.
We call this cognitive dissonance.

'Happy!' is anything but a happy story. It tells of a 'down-and-out' disgraced cop who is now a hitman. He is a walking zombie after suffering a massive heart attack. He sees an apparition of a talking blue unicorn who tells him of his child (which the cop is unaware) who has been kidnapped. The cartoonish looking flying unicorn is his daughter's imaginary friend who appears in his consciousness. Together they have to tract the site she is kidnapped against the mob who is out for his blood and the deranged man who is up to something no good with the children he has kidnapped. Then there are the kidnapped girl's mother and the cop's ex-partner who are all engrossed in their sorrows.

The cop finds happiness in intoxicants; the mother finds it in her child; the madman in the weird things he does; the mob in exerting authority; the ex-cop's partner and caring for her mother; the mother with her anti-depressive medications and the mob's family find solace in reality TV. The miniseries indeed show a rather weird world that we live in.

The problem with looking for happiness is that it is not a finite destination. The goal post always keeps shifting. We work hard towards a goal thinking that by achieving it, we will be happy. Unfortunately, when our desire is reached, we find no happiness. Conversely, we find a higher bar to reach and the vicious cycle continues.

Maybe we are looking for contentment in all the wrong places. This seemingly attainable feat may just lie within us but in the outside. Like Saint Nicholas who find joy in giving presents at Christmas, we should do the same. Incidentally, this season is set around the Yuletide with the message of giving screaming all over the set. And whats more, the main character's name is Nick Sachs! Christopher Leoni of 'Law and Order: SVU' fame stars.

 https://asok22.wixsite.com/real-lesson 

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Am I missing something?

Thani Oruvan (Lone Man, தணி ஒருவன்,  Tamil; 2015)


This movie was highly recommended by a friend, a connoisseur of Tamil films of sorts, for its atypical storyline. So, I gave it a go. Sadly, it was nothing like how he described.

I fail to understand why some films keep on using the oft-tested formula of a lone man fighting and eventually defeating a corrupt society controlled by an evil conglomerate. How many times we have seen perfectly executed outlandish plans going on with Swiss-like precision. And how many police jeeps-flying stunts, dodging the bullets scenes and pyrotechnic display can one stomach?

Too many stories of shady politicians working in cahoots with corrupt law enforcement officers and unscrupulous people in business come to mind when we view this movie. The only different thing here is Arvind Swamy, the favourite moustachioed droopy-eyed heart-throb of the 90s. He is back. Instead of playing his usual lover boy role, he plays the role of a ruthless badass scientist who has no qualms about selling an Indian discovery which can potentially cure diabetes to foreign establishments for profit.

And another new in this flick is how a father is abused verbally and even murdered off by his son! This must surely be a downright low stunt to create sensationalism.

Maybe I am missing something here. This movie cannot be all that bad if, after this Tamil release, it was remade and is planned to be made in Telugu and Bengali as well as Hindi (Salman Khan starred), Kannada and Marathi respectively.