Tag: tamil comedy

Categories
cinema cinema:tamil

Siri On You Crazy Diamond

Crazy Mohan: A Remembrance

“Margazhi thingal!

Adutha line enna?”

“Margazhi sevvai”

I think my life changed when I picked up a cassette of Crazy Thieves in Palavakkam (CTIP) in a basement book store..

Ok strike that that out, life did change really and I would never be able to listen to Thiruppavai without a chuckle.

The golden age of Tamil Drama was well behind me, I have heard only stories- the ones I had listened (not seen) by that time featured Sve Shekar.

 Natakhapriya cassettes would be bought, to be exchanged with another friend who could recite “Alwa / 1000 Udhai Vaangiya Aboorva Sigamani” at will, when teachers looked the other way. I marveled at his ability.

But this Crazy Thieves in Palavakkam cassette was something different; it did feature Sve Shekar but claimed to have been written by Crazy Mohan. I never knew, honestly- a rare and perfect combination- the timing of Sve and the dialogues and situations of one Mr. Mohan, who I had known from multiple collaborations with Kamal.

By this time MMKR was curriculum.

Perfect because of the coming together of talents.Rare because this is the Tamil comedy drama equivalent of Eric Clapton playing with the Beatles and like ‘While My Guitar Gently Weeps’ it was pure gold; there was a joke in every line, hell there was a joke even when there were pauses. It was that good.

Within 5 minutes I knew that this would trounce”Alwa” or such in any discernable comedic aspect and I took it upon myself to memorize it and became a quoting repository.  Despite the cassette being a live scratchy recording complete with a wailing kid and continuous laughter probably from the seventies!

I didn’t know it was Mohan’s first play and I didn’t realize its importance, then.  

Oh I love the movie dialogues, don’t get me wrong- but I believe everything started from this heist comedy at Palavakkam. Mohan had the ability to begin with situations that seem quite normal – like for example the perpetually jobless hero (Uppili) but add increasingly crazy elements to it.

In Crazy Mohan’s world situations are more important than the story, the situations that are formed in his head knows no bounds because imagination does not come with an input cost.

A character reading the newspaper is his favourite and I know translating into English won’t help, but nevertheless will attempt.

<Situation: Kuppusamy is convincing Sudarsanam to purchase a house in the outskirts of Chennai and asks his son, the foolish Uppili to read aloud a particular advertisement from the newspaper>

Kuppusamy: Uppili come on read the advertisement from the paper’s 4th page

<pause>

Kuppusamy(dissing his son) : Do you know number 4? It is the number that comes after 3

<Mild laugh>

Uppili: OoooOooo number 4? I thought the one that comes before 5

<Still more laughs>

Uppili continues: Nonsense Appa, do you think I don’t even know 4.

<Pause>

I have studied till SSLC

<Pause>

I can count till 10

By this time the whole auditorium is laughing. Also count me giggling with my Walkman on multiple train journeys, this was my Hamlet. I should internalize it.

 Uppili then goes on to read murder stories and inappropriate advertisements for the next five minutes till they come back to the situation of buying the house.

Uppili continues to my greatest hero- he says the most random things-makes insane movie references- and is a master in irritating others and doesn’t really want to work. It’s probably Sve’s best role and he carries the persona into his other plays, but albeit without Mohan’s situations and the dialogues.

Personally, CTIP is worth obsessing over for a lifetime(again, my Hamlet). It features kind thieves- a kidnapping gone wrong- deaf assistants and literally a Vinayakar Ex Machina and countless jokes in between. The fact that Uppili thinks Sholay is a Malayalam film is absolute looool material.

Mohan would also take many things with him from CTIP to the movies, including ‘Ekalyvan’, a reference which would continue till his last collaboration with Kamal(Vasool Raja MMBS). It is a work which will sow the seeds for many Crazy variants.

Has there been a more fruitful writer-star combination (well Kamal is not just a star) than that of Kamal and Crazy?

There have been and will be too- many impactful working relationships, but I doubt if there would be anything that would reflect the quality with which Kamal and Crazy would produce.  All 11 of them gems, designed to appeal to different types of humor seekers; there can be no one clear favorite.

Come to think of it, most of the stories that Kamal would have pitched Crazy are inherently sad ones and heavy drama material that could on any day fit Kamal’s serious part of the filmography

  • Panchatantiram: hero is unable to overcome the separation from his wife
  • Avvai Shanmugi:  hero somehow wants to win back his child
  • Kadhala Kadhala: two orphans must succeed in life to help other orphans
  • Thenali: hero is unable to come to terms with the reality of losing his homeland

Amazing how they developed situations over each of these- they throw in some Wodehouse-there’s some classic Hollywood screwball- and some Keaton/Lloyd/Chaplin-there’s some Nagesh too. It’s a professional relationship made in comedy heaven. They literally completed each other’s sentences.

Mohan would continue to be one among many of the crown jewels at Kamal’s RKFI court contributing to other movie discussions.  

Just a crazy thought/prophecy: MMKR will live forever and when the future cineaste digs up the others in the list is bound to be surprised.

“They made MMKR and made these too? Mind-blowing”

A body of work which is also a gift that keeps on giving (laughs).

Will we find someone crazier?

 But that how do I know sir?

Thank you Mohan for being Crazy.  

Categories
cinema Essay Essential viewing

SCENES FROM A MARRIAGE SELECTION| ESSENTIAL VIEWING: MANAL KAYIRU

“Scenes from a marriage selection”

4

I do not remember when was the first time I saw Manal Kayiru, but it must have been a very long time ago and with  some certainty I can say that it was an afternoon movie; I have since watched it multiple times at multiple points of time; classic is a word that has been tossed around as tags for many movies and is a word that should be used only after much deliberation, but Manal Kayiru has the word classic written all over it.

No one has made films relentlessly on the problems of the middle class woman like Visu, can only be compared to the nothingness and existentialism in the films of Woody Allen.(Unmeasured comparison)

And in the core of the problems of the fairer sex was marriage.

Oh but wait, weren’t Visu’s films stagey? Thoroughly dipped in the sentimentality of the time and mostly adapted from stage plays and really looked like a televised one, that they may be but, they are not without their own inventiveness.

To continue with the Woody Allen analogy, Manal Kayiru can be called the ‘Annie Hall’ of Visu’s career which began from the stage, the film in which he found the balance and his own space within Tamil film making.

It is the world of 1982, unknown and seemingly distant to the now world of shaadi and bharat matrimony; a middle class man has aspirations, not two but eight(including bizarre ones like failing in college). If you had been a daughter’s father in eighties and before, conditions is not a word that you would have wanted to hear.

2

That is the thing with comedy, it takes away that tears that go behind the thought of these jokes; and this is where Visu stands tall as a maker of socio-comedy films, he never cuts down on the seriousness of the issue; yes the eight rules seem ridiculous but by the time we reach the end, these rules represent the stupidity of ourselves and how big a deal it was to get a girl married. An achievement worth putting into your CV types.(Again now, everyone will put anything on the CV, I was talking about the eighties)

To thank God for how things have changed is being childishly optimistic, marriage selection has remained a sort of gruelling job interview, the only things that have changed has been the medium and now that both sides can do this ticking of checkboxes exercise, before thanking God reflect on Darwin and this quite unnatural selection.

3

Enter Naradar Naidu, who completely randomises this process; with Manal Kayiru, my formative thoughts about marriage has been about co-existence rather than the one of selection, and this is primarily because of Manal Kayiru, selection in this case so seems like a recruitment for a slave, but what about expectations?

Is it possible to live with someone who does not meet even one of your expectations?

Pardon my middle class movie loving brain, but the act of marriage is really much higher than fulfilling individual’s expectations and that is what the world is moving towards, bespoke dating.

Visu is like that teacher who comes back to the starting point of the lecture at the end of one, most teachers don’t. He knows his subject in depth, the lesson here is: let not your expectations bring tears to the other party.

Like the job of the ‘marriage broker’ whose occupation has been quietly replaced by the match making sites, Visu’s family dramas have been replaced by television soaps starring murderous mother in laws and wailing working women, but more so it has the generation that has been replaced, a generation that looks at marriage and family in the long run, as this India Today article puts it ‘obliquely’.

Maybe the events that happen in Manal Kayiru are exaggerated, and the days of conditions are long gone; but as number of divorce applications and new family courts suggest that there are more broken marriages than broken hearts and the saddest part is that there will be no Naradar Naidu to liven things up for you this time.

Epilogue

Dowry Kalyanam can be seen as a companion piece to Manal Kayiru, while the former deals with the struggles that happen during the course of marriage, the latter covers the pre-marriage irritations

Sve Sekar plays the fool of a groom in both these films and is tremendously effective.

While lovers of good old drama might not have anything to complain, cineastes might be pleasantly surprised by Visu’s handling of a deaf character. Gimmicky and stagey yes, but the film is not without substance and the characters hold up well even after years have piled over the film. Class apart, Manal Kayiru is an extremely easy film to love, proving again the best way to approach serious stuff is by making comedy.

PS:  The title of this column was originally called “we cannot be friends if you do not like this movie”, but changed to the more boring but just-about-doing the job “essential viewing” because the previous title was considered antagonistic to our already dwindling audience.

PS2: None on the staff of the Lowly Laureate is married, except the 86 year old printing press operator. His Facebook relationship status as of today is: I won’t tell you, go.

Xbox: Naradar Naidu is the first in a long list of typical Visu characters, a wily outsider who sets up the film’s flow and provides the solution as well, but here he faces a saddening end, not unlike the one Kamal faces during the climax of Panchatantiram(well, almost)

Categories
cinema:tamil FRS

MAAN KARATE: DEATH BY UNDERDOGISM

 

This film is strictly reviewed according to the FRS™, for more details on our completely unscientific way of watching movies, do refer to our Irandam Ulagam review.

Maan Karate

 

-10: Self negative points to our FRS team which could not come with a better title and had to resort to the Neeya Naana Gobinath School of inventing words like Underdogism
-1.5: The protagonist is from Royapuram, calls himself Royapuram Peter. How does the location help the hero/story? Now they have a ‘reason’ to have an opening song at the harbour lines. Other than that no use of location.
+37.7: All the songs, no really. With all those things happening on screen, you might as well set your smart phones to do a countdown for the next song. Them songs, not so classic, but still refreshingly good and tastefully (ok subjective) shot.
-3: Usage of Pondicherry French Quarter in song routine to up supposed classiness. Yes yes, that same painted retro wall with that retro scooter every heroine seems to be having these days.
-12: Wayward-wisecracking-notlisteningtoparents-still the talk of the town type protagonist
-4: portrayal of IT guys as people with too much money and too little to do, which maybe partially true but you have no idea about appraisal system. So take negatives.
-56: Wayward-wisecracking-notlisteningtoparents-still the talk of the town type protagonist preference of white skinned girls is proudly brandished and so he finds love too.
-3: fart jokes in lift lead to love
-5: Thirukural as groom selecting device is not only not funny but also insulting to the couplets.
-10: whenever a Godly-sainted-mythic guy offers a boon, humans will try to test the power of the “Godly-sainted-mythic guy” rather than ask anything fruitful cliché
+14.5: interesting plot which makes no sense in the end of it all, but still interesting.
-109: the underdog story which will makes all the dogs in my city hangs their head in shame, as said complete random guy making it big in life and all is okie and probably hope giving, but at the cost of a professional and no basis is only irritating, the proposed rationalisation of the same is clearly troubling.
+8: for Udhayam corn Puff
-56: No matter how many tournaments you win all over India and how many hours of practising you do in any sport, you will always lose to a guy(yes yes underdog) who has no clue of it all because he is doing it for love.
-6: Love is what happens in the fields of pune with heroine shaking required body parts, hero does shake too. <You can see that we are not being sexist>
-89: Completely watering down one sport in the name of comedy, which again was wanting in humor always.
+67: usage of the phrase “Killer Peter is going to kill you”
+12 chillarai: here and there some one liners which make you chuckle
-3: after chuckling you go into depression for chuckling.
+1: guy who usually plays the rich father of the rich heroine is playing the rich father of the rich villain #changes
+8: Udhayam corn puff (we bought two packets)
-120*2 : We bought two movie tickets
If you don’t care for the review and think that against all odds the underdog should win and love should finally triumph, then this review is not for you. This movie is however tailor made for you.
All numbers are arbitrary and instantaneous and have no bearing on the film, this review, the writers and the readers.
PS: the boxing stadium in the film is named after John Pennycuick, who as you might be aware is the builder of the Mullai Periyar Dam. One only wonders why.
Categories
cinema:tamil

TRAINS OF FANCY: KEDI BILLA KILLADI RANGA

ImageIn a world filled with theatres which are filled with a comedy movie every Friday. Kedi Billa Killadi Ranga (KBKR) is a rare breed, a breed that is so rare that makes you pause and make you think on what makes you laugh.

I saw a film two weeks back, which was perhaps the worst movie ever made and I had seen, a collection of shit recycling shit  sequences pretending to be a comedy. It was so bad that the movie almost pushed me into a sea of depression.

Now at least I will swim out of it.

I believe the basic thinking that goes behind every movie is very limited, it is based on the assumption that whatever worked previously will continue to work. That again is assuming too much and leaving very little space for improvement.

It is these assumptions that provide the familiar scenes in every movie say for examples, “buddy-buddy drinking, buddy-buddy drinking and discussing about not drinking, buddy-buddy drinking and dancing, girl meets boy while retro soundtrack plays behind, item song at a place that seems like a tippler’s paradise, duet love song under umbrella” these things solely exist because of the fact that these have worked at some movie before.

They represent what a collection of movie makers think that the audience will like, laugh and enjoy.

Surprisingly KBKR has all of the above but still manages to be fairly engaging and has some serious laugh out moments even in the absence of any structuring, it is clear that the director’s intent is hell bent on making the audience laugh within the pressures he is allowed to operate, admirable really, but never insulting.

Achieving expectations itself is laudatory, exceeding and all we will see later.