Deteriorating quality of Tamil movies

Selvaraja, Marimuthu, Mani, Babu, Pandi, Raja – all of them are aspiring actors. Their current vocations may be different but what binds them together is their love for Tamil movies, dappangutthu dance (a crude form of Lungi dance in which all that you have to do is to shake all parts of your body vigorously) and dreams of owning a palatial mansion and a Ford fiesta.
Selvaraja is our local newspaper vendor boy. Mani is a plumber by profession. Pandi and Raja manage the local raddhi (old newspaper mart) near our home. Babu works in a hair cutting saloon. Marimuthu is a car driver.
There was a popular villain known for his unique style of dialog delivery called Mansoor Ali Khan whose car driver became a hero. It is even alleged that some of the popular actresses who tasted success in Tamil movies had actually worked as housemaids in the homes of other actresses who were on the top of the popularity charts.
Post the popularity and success enjoyed by actors like Rajnikanth, Vijayakanth, the late Pandiyan, the late Murali, Tamilian Dravidian males with dark complexions realised that their complexion was an advantage for them. Nothing wrong with this. In this scheme of things, fair skinned actors like Jeyam Ravi, Bharat, Ganesh Venkataraman or Arvind Swamy did not stand much of a chance.  Without doubt, this is definitely a good trend.
While the Congress party talks about financial inclusion and Aam Aadmi Party says that the party’s focus is on we – mango people, a movie industry where even a common citizen can aspire to be an actor can be truly called as progressive. But the buck stops here. The content of these movies has stooped to such abysmal levels that these movies have to be seen to be believed.
In most of the recent movies, invariably the plot revolves around a boy who meets a girl and falls in love with her. So, what is new? Barring a movie called “Sindhu Samaveli” where the main heroine (Amala Paul) was shown to be succumbing to the charms of her father-in-law (oh, god, how the quality of Tamil movies has deteriorated!), all other Tamil movies have mainly focused on the boy-meets-the-girl and they elope to counter the opposition from their families.
I happened to watch a so-called super hit movie called “Sundara Pandian”. For close to 1 hour, the movie revolved around the heroine (Lakshmi Menon) travelling in a bus, wearing a half saree (dhavani) and accompanied by a friend. The hero (Sasikumar) falls for her charms and goes to the extent of committing a murder. On the lines of Mani Ratnam’s “Roja” (the song Rukmini Rukmini), we have the hero dancing with a bunch of old ladies to a dappanguthu dance.
Across the board, most Tamil movies made today revolve around a similar theme. Boy is mad after the girl, there are villains, boy escapes with a girl in the bike and then the movie ends on a happy note or on a tragic note. In between this plot, actors and actresses gyrate wildly (so called dance sequences) as if they are finding a cure for constipation.
While any man on the street can aspire to be an actor, when it comes to actresses, Tamil cinema also lays stress on actresses who are plump and fair skinned (not necessarily in that order). Talented actresses like Archana, Abitha and Iniya were sidelined precisely because of their colour. So, where is the question of inclusion? Why are there double standards when it comes to actresses? Why does Tamil cinema have one set of rules for its actors and another for its actresses? Why does Tamil cinema constantly depend on talent from other states (Tamanna, Hansika Motwani, Anushka Shetty) rather than encouraging local talent? These so called actresses can’t speak a word of Tamil, so we have the same dubbing voice for all these actresses and it looks so absurd.
Even more absurd is the third rate comedy in Tamil movies. A man passing wind and another suffering from flatulence is what is supposed to be comedy. Someone defecating on the road and another urinating on a wall is supposed to be a comedy that audiences have to watch and laugh. Santhanam, the man who took over from Vadivelu and Vivek, now has become so boring and repetitive that his doomsday is not far. Then there are jerks like Vimal, Sivakarthikeyan, Sundar C, Jeeva, Arya and Siva who are anything but star material but continue to taste success only because their movies are successful.
Not just this, even as far as supporting actors/ actresses go, Tamil cinema relies only on the same old faces. Saranya who debuted with Kamal Haasan in Mani Rathnam’s Nayakan must have done around 200 movies as a mother who is stupid but loves her son dearly. In how many more movies are we going to see her in the same avatar is the big question mark? Aren’t there other actresses who can fill the slot? Saranya is the only actress who must have made her millions in her roles as a mother than in her roles as the leading heroine. Like the late actress Sujatha and danseuse-actress Sukanya, Saranya transitioned to character roles at a much younger age. It was absurd to see her play mother to Vikram Kenny in a movie (Dhandavam) when the latter is 10 years older than her in real life.
So, Tamil cinema which prided itself on classics where the story and the content of the movies were the main drivers, is now in a situation where there is severe dearth of ideas and creativity. The situation has already turned from bad to worse. It is only the audience that can bring in a renaissance!