Emperor of Tamil Cinema

The moment his title card comes up on the big screen, whistles that could make you deaf blows out from every corner of the cinema and if you didn’t get goose bumps, you’re not a true Thalaivar fan. I vividly remember shouting until my throat got so raspy and I had to chug up the whole bottle of Coke to make my throat feel better, and guess what? It was all worth it, for Rajnikanth, or how we call him, Thalaivar (the leader).

I grew up looking up to him. His brisk walking, his smile, his on screen mannerism, his off screen humble personality, his generosity, the way his cigarette tumble down and plants itself between his lips when he tosses it in the air, the way he say “santosham” {Translation: happiness (commonly pronounced with a silent T; Thalaivar stresses on the T) }. I just loved everything about him.

Although the movie that made me fall head over heels over Rajnikanth is Padaiyappa, his badass acting skills was portrayed better before Baasha, before his god-like stardom in Tamil Cinema. Amongst my favourite will always be Thalapathy, 16 Vayathinile, Netrikann, Moondru Mudichi, Apoorva Raagangal, Aarilirinthu Aruvathuvarai. C’mon, we all need to agree the emotion poured out during the boat scene in Moodru Mudichi is something that no other actor would be capable of doing that. And the dialogue “Ithu epudi irukku?” (Translated: How is this?) is made famous by this man before Aanandha and Uthaya said it over a million times on air through THR Raaga

Things were pretty different before his stardom, his acting skills was portrayed better, he was daring enough to accept movies like Thillu Mullu and Anbulla Rajnikanth. Now, Rajnikanth is being a typical Indian hero, romancing girls twice younger than himself, hitting 20 men at once and dancing with minimum 5 choreographers working on each and every of his step. My question is-why? I understand that his stardom is coming with great responsibilities to be fulfilled and his movies are now made for his fans, but if you were to compare him with the Bollywood Superstar, Amitabh Bhachan, who is picking up roles for his age and one good example will be his current movie where he played as a sickly father of Deepika Padukone discussing about poop for the first 20 minutes of the movie (Movie Name: Piku).

Kabali- the latest project of Superstar Rajnikanth, releasing tomorrow, 22^nd July 2016, is walking in with a whole new level of expectation. The hype and craze for this movie is in a whole new level. From customized phone cases to companies in Chennai and Bangalore declaring an official holiday for the release, the pumped feeling for this movie is getting surreal as it the day is getting nearer.

Pa. Ranjith, A new generation director whose third movie is with the Emperor of Kollywood has already broken the stereotypes of classic Rajnikanth movie formulae, which was used from Muthu till Lingaa. His title song is not by S.P.Balasubramaniam and the music is not the legendary A.R.Rahman.  He was brave enough to tell the world that he wrote the script not to fit Rajnikanth’s shoe, but the other way around. The Hindu even reported that Pa Ranjith requested Rajnikanth to slow down his brisk walking because that is something Rajnikanth would do and it is not Kabaali. this time. Pa Ranjith stuck to his roots and brought his team with Rajnikanth shows his boldness to bring a different side of Rajnikanth. That explains Santhosh Narayanan for the music and Kalaiarasan’s appearance in the movie.

Selfishly, I hope Pa Ranjith, a fellow man from Gen-X would’ve seen what I saw as the flaws to Rajnikanth’s stardom. I hope he scrapped off the unrealistic expectations the fans has for Rajnikanth, which makes him feel obliged. I hope he took Rajnikanth out of the audiences’ comfort zone. I hope Thalaivar is portrayed for his acting skills and his stardom comes secondary. I hope to see Kabali as a new-generation of Kaali.

With all this hopes, I’ll be sitting somewhere in one of the theatres in Penang Island, again shouting Thalaiva on the appearance of the title card till I feel like my throat is going to tear off, not regretting any bit of it, but this time, with expectations from a fellow youngster to give me the Rajnikanth that I want to see. The Rajnikanth without his stardom and who is there standing tall filling the screen, for his talents on acting alone.