Cinema, Karam, Kapi

Ace Director Mani Ratnam and septuagenarian actor, the multifaceted Kamal Hassan have joined hands after 31 years in their latest outing Thug Life . Co-produced by both personalities themselves, the film was released at over 1,000 screens in India and worldwide, amidst a huge publicity undertaken by the crew over the last fortnight. Kamal Hassan, Mani Ratnam and the lead actresses Trisha and Abirami, along with Simbu alias Atman TR Silambarasan travelled extensively across the southern states, Mumbai and even to Dubai to promote the film, while they also gave a lot of interviews to mainstream and social media. Songs by AR Rahman, who comes together with Kamal Hassan after 25 years (since Indian which released in 1999) have been hitting the charts for a while. The music release event a fortnight ago in Chennai was well received with live orchestra by the singers and artists.   The film, which was hyped a lot over social media platforms by various Influencers and media houses for t...

The first dialogue Superstar Rajinikanth utters in Petta is “Naan Veezhven enduru ninaithayo” after bludgeoning a few bad guys in his inimitable style. One cannot but remember the golden words of Neelambari “Vayasanalum un stylum azhagum  innum  pogale” - except that she actually said that 20 years back when Thalaivar was 49 years young. From this scene which is 4 minutes after the film reels on till the last scene - where Thalaivar ends with a pistol shot, its Superstar galore for over 150 minutes. Every fan who came out after watching the film has only one thing to say about Director Karthik Subburaj - “Only someone who has consumed Rajinikanth in every vein, muscle, blood and brain can create such a screenplay” - so true. KS has literally “Rajinified” the viewers with such a strong and gripping storyline which is a potpourri of Superstar’s antics for 40 years which most of his  ardent fans have enjoyed every bit and byte, literally . Kaali joins a convent...

Releasing “Singles” ahead of the main album release has been prevalent in Tamil Cinema for over 4-5 years although I don’t recall which was the first movie which did this. So Music Director and Film Director of Petta Anirudh and Karthik Subburaj released the first single “Marana Mass” on 3rd December which opened to a thunderous response and garnered 1 million views on YouTube in just 4 hours.  This was followed by another number “Ullaallaa” which released on 6 Dec., a peppy number with a bit of reggae and rock. Finally, the full music album was released on 9 Dec. 2018 at a grand gathering which was well attended by the Cast & Crew of the film including Superstar Rajinikanth and Kalanidhi Maran of Sun Pictures. Subsequently, Sony Music released the entire album on YouTube the same day at 9pm and finally Amazon Music released it on 10 Dec. 2018 at 6pm. Marana Mass is a peppy tune sung by Anirudh and a short yet interesting part sung by SPB, perhaps as the...