ANYONE AFTER VIJAYKANTH?

Patriotism is an emotional attachment to a nation which an individual recognizes as their homeland. That is what google tells me. According to me, patriotism is the thought to keep your nation hale and healthy. Being an ardent fan of movies, for this Independence Day I would like to share a few thoughts about patriotism in Tamil movies.

Post Vijaykanth and Arjun's era, I strongly feel patriotism in movies has considerably reduced in Tamil movies. It is not the director’s fault for not making many patriotic movies, but it is the audience who is to be blamed.

At the recently held Behindwoods Gold Medals function, Mohan Raja the maker of Thani Oruvan regretted making the film because he felt people were celebrating Siddharth Abimanyu. Movies like Joker get acclaimed by the critics but it might not grab the attention of people. Shankar, Kamal Hassan, and A.R.Murugadoss are the three directors who have been making movies consistently based on patriotism in the recent times.

Shankar is someone who has been educating us consistently about the importance of our nation since his debut. His Gentleman, Indian, Mudhalvan and Anniyan were considered entertainments. I would rather call it edutainment. Yes, he educated us about the importance of education in Gentleman and meaning of freedom in Indian and Anniyan. My favorite from his list is Mudhalvan.

Kamal Hassan doesn't just stop with movies. He gets into the advertisements for free of cost and educates all. His love for the nation is more evident than his love for movies. My dad says his movies educate us about social responsibility. Being a 90s person I haven't got chances to watch too many movies of Kamal. But still a movie like Unnaipol Oruvan and a dialogue like "when terrorism is instant why not justice is?", created a huge impact of Kamal on me.

A.R.Murugadoss-The man who owns the most number of 100 crore clubs in the nation has always a keen eye on patriotism. Except Dheena and Ghajini, all his movies have a perfect mixture of entertainment and edutainment. Ramanaa was the first movie of his to speak about social responsibilities. Since I haven't watched a lot of Vijaykanth movies, I consider Ramana the best amongst the movies I watched. The way Vijaykanth behaves on screen and his subtle mass has always made Ramana in my repeat watchlist. 7am Arivu spoke about the importance of our language, culture, heritage, history and most importantly the "Bravery of our ancestors”. The movie deserved a lot more at the box office for these dialogues. "Malaysia’la Adichanga, Srilanka’la Adichanga, Ippa Namma Oorlaye vanthu Adika Aarambichitanuga. Oru Tamizhana 9 nadu konnuchuna athuku per Veeram illa dhrogam". Thuppaki is another important milestone in the career of both Vijay and Murugadoss. The views he presented on the importance of military people are mandatory. Until watching the 100 Crore club I myself used to think in a way that a soldier's life is fun during the non-war period. With a very simple thought and a plot, he executed it at a top class level. Kaththi is undoubtedly a gem in the crown of ARM. I watched it more than thrice for the press meet scene. It needs guts to write a dialogue about 2G scam, methane gas issue, and Vijay Mallaya's loan scam. My favorite dialogue of ARM is "Verum Kaatha Vachu Kodi Kodiya Oozhal Panna Oor ya Idhu". His next flick Akira is also said to be on the lines of Mounaguru.

Tamil films have always cultivated us enough patriotism but we as audience leave the thought in the movie hall itself. We have never made the impact possible in our routine life. With this Independence Day, we should take an oath and start behaving as a more responsible person "socially". Jai Hind !!