Aadhavan - Bullets, Babes And Bluetooth

I realized that my fortunes had taken a turn for the awesome when I chanced to see the insanely awesome movie Aadhavan. The movie revealed to me how far the Tamil Film Industry has progressed from bland movies like Kamal Haasan's Nayagan or Rajnikanth's style-without-substance flicks. In fact, Aadhavan is so full of substance that watching it more than once at a stretch can be termed substance abuse. Enough beating around the bush of awesomeness.

Aadhavan is the thrilling story of a master assassin named (you guessed it right!) Aadhavan, played by Suriya. The movie begins with our hero diving into a pool and firing a gun underwater to assassinate an unsuspecting saffron-clad holy man. As an astonished crowd looks on (jaw drops and shrieks all around), Aadhavan vanishes without so much trace as a stray bubble.

This unbelievably bombastic kill propels Aadhavan to international fame and as the credits roll by, we see the master assassin at work dispensing unwary targets all around the world using calibers of all variety, bazookas and even a sniper rifle, without so much as batting an eyelid. We see some minor product placement in action when Aadhavan takes a bite off an Apple, throws it over his shoulder and whirling around, shoots it in two.

Now comes the main story. Aadhavan is asked to kill a judge (played by actor Murali) who is about to submit a report on some nasty doings of a Doctor (played by Rahul Dev) and his henchmen. Aadhavan misses his target and we stare in disbelief. As we see hints of familiarity in the ensuing chase, where Aadhavan takes off like an orangutan on stolen steroids, we realize how makers of various Hollywood thrillers blatantly made use of the time machine to rip off snippets from Aadhavan's escape and inculcate them into their own cheap creations. (Among them, I noticed Wolverine, The Bourne films, Baby’s Day Out, The Matrix and Spiderman. I hope the director K.S. Ravikumar sues the studios responsible). Aadhavan takes the defeat to heart and pledges to knock off the judge himself, free of cost. Spinning a web of Machiavellian craftiness, Aadhavan traps the servant of the judge's household, a simpleton played by Vadivelu and manages to get into the house as an assistant servant. A retard might ask the insignificant question of why Aadhavan, who relegates people to the past with the ease of knocking over a domino tile, might go through this elaborate scheme, but I knew from the start that there was more to this thriller than meets the untrained eye.

Aadhavan's first two attempts to get rid of the judge mess up in what people of lesser intellect and even less patience might term as buffoonery or tomfoolery, but which in reality are purely awesome twists of Fate. As Aadhavan goes on with his schemes, he falls in love with the judge's niece Tara (played by the gorgeous Nayantara). I felt a little cheated at this but then consoled myself. After all every Romeo needs his Juliet, every Shah Jahan his Mumtaz and every geek his right hand.

As the edge-of-the-seat chiller proceeds, we are treated to several flashbacks that in the end succeed in tying up all those unwanted loose ends. In one of them, we see the magnanimous TN Police catch Aadhavan, the feared killer of men, and release him after eliciting only so much as a promise from him. I was touched by this rare show of faith in the human character and cried out in genuine sorrow only to be scolded by my neighbors. As for how the movie ends, you will have to see for yourself the epic climatic battle where Aadhavan reprises his role of the heavily drugged orangutan.

Purists might argue that there is no real comedy in Aadhavan and they would never have been wronger. Vadivelu (the quintessential comedy man) manages, as has been his norm for the past few decades, to be slapped by every character with a speaking role. Just like the laughter track in an English sitcom signals the presence of a Joke in the vicinity, Vadivelu getting slapped means that a Joke is lurking around (sometimes in disguise, but mostly having drunk the Invisibility Potion). Once you get the hang of it, it its all downhill from there. As for the director's 10 min comic-caper-cameo that concludes the movie, it was so wanted and hilarious that I must hire a couple of people to share the burden of laughing the next time I watch it.

The film stresses on advanced technology like laptops and pen drives and hidden cameras inside turbans and also manages to transcend the realm of Sci-fi with it timer attached RPG and Bluetooth bombs that can be detonated from a mile away. In short, Aadhavan succeeds at being the gritty story of an assassin as well as a fun filled romantic comedy at the same time, that is to be watched with the whole family, if only to let them know how much you love them.


PS: In possibly related news, Ubisoft announced that it had purchased rights to the story from director K.S. Ravikumar. Assassin's Creed 3: The Chennai Chutney Conspiracy (TBR: June 2011), the final chapter of the best-selling trilogy, will have Aadhavan as the playable character.