Vetri Maaran: A significant hyperlink between Tamil cinema and literature 

Tamil filmmakers have seldom acknowledged the untapped potential of Tamil literature. The argument that Tamil cinema is just too ‘masala’ for it to borrow from literature doesn’t maintain water as a result of Tamil literature doesn’t simply have ‘serious’ and ‘deep’ books. It has a humongous repository of pulp fiction. For each intense work like Pa Singaram’s Puyalilae Oru Thoni, there’s one gripping page-turner like Sujatha’s Ratham Orae Niram or Rajkumar’s Kaatrin Niram Karuppu. Thus, it’s dumbfounding when stars complain concerning the paucity of excellent tales from filmmakers.

However, novel diversifications in Tamil should not fully nonexistent. It is an age-old phenomenon. Films like Jayakanthan’s Unnaipol Oruvan (which acquired a National Award in 1965), Rajinikanth’s Priya (1978), Karaiyellam Shenbagapoo (1981), and Kamal Haasan’s Vikram (1986) are a few of the notable examples. Yet, these are simply flashes within the pan. A sustained pattern of movie diversifications hasn’t occurred in up to date Tamil cinema. But filmmaker Vetri Maaran appears to be giving some hope.

The National Award-winning filmmaker has thus far directed 5 characteristic movies of which two are diversifications of Tamil novels. His upcoming movies Viduthalai and Vaadivasal are additionally based mostly on Tamil literary works, which makes Vetri Maaran, an important hyperlink between Tamil literature and cinema. Not simply that, he has additionally cracked the formulation of utilizing critical literature for making business movies.

Literature and Vetri Maaran

The relationship between literature and Vetri Maaran ought to have begun manner early in his childhood as his mother Megala Chitravel is a famous Tamil novelist. On high of that, the director additionally studied English literature at Loyola College, Chennai. When he wished to work together with his mentor, prolific filmmaker Balu Mahendra, it was his information of literature that aided him to get the chance. In an interview with Tamil journal Anandha Vikatan, Vetri Maaran shared that Balu Mahendra requested him to give you a synopsis for a novel as a part of his interview course of for the assistant director position. Though solely his third movie, Visaaranai (National Award-winning movie and official Indian entry to the 89th Academy Awards for Best Foreign Language Film) turned out to be his first adaptation, one can see that his tryst with written phrases has been an integral a part of his journey.

Making literature mainstream

One of the criticisms towards Asuran, Vetri Maaran’s movie adaptation of Poomani’s Vekkai (Heat), is that the story was commercialised and untrue to the supply materials. Yet, his mainstream therapy of the novel is what contributed to the movie’s business success. Vetri Maaran gave a ‘Baasha’ twist to Poomani’s novel, which turned the layered novel right into a story of an underdog.

Vekkai is about Sivasamy and his 15-year-old son Chidambaram, who’re on the run from the police after the latter kills an higher caste man Vadakooran to avenge the homicide of his elder brother. As the dad and son spend round eight days within the forest hiding, the story of oppression and caste politics unfolds. The novel is devoid of heroism and offers with on a regular basis individuals and their excruciating ache. Vetri Maaran made a big change in his movie by making Sivasamy the ‘hero’ of the movie, whereas within the e-book, Chidambaram is the ‘protagonist’. Also, Dhanush’s Sivasamy is a completely completely different particular person from the one we discover in Poomani’s e-book. In addition, your entire backstory of Sivasamy, which depicts him as a rebellious younger man, is absent within the novel. This made Dhanush’s Sivasamy a well-known trope of mainstream cinema – a person with a violent previous. This very important change made the movie accessible to all sections of the viewers.

However, critics of Vetri Maaran are additionally not mistaken. A devoted remake of the movie aided by Vetri’s sensible cinematic language would have yielded a much better cinema, however it could have been a big gamble on the subject of the enterprise side of the movie. One ought to solely take a look at Vetri Maaran’s makes an attempt as a small step in the precise path.

Challenges forward with Vaadivasal

I’m trying ahead to seeing what he does with CS Chellapa’s novella Vaadivasal. The story of the novel doesn’t have sufficient meat for a typical Tamil characteristic movie as it’s only a story of occasions taking place in someday at a Jallikattu occasion. A man named Picchi arrives at a neighbouring village for the jallikattu occasion. He desires to tame the scary bull named Kaari, which killed Picchi’s father years in the past. That’s all there’s to the story of the novella. Yet, it stands as an excellent literary piece for its dialect and the depiction of caste politics within the sport of jallikattu. It would make up for an excellent cinema if Vetri Maaran recreates every little thing faithfully on display screen.

Yet, I wouldn’t be shocked if the director opts for a whole flashback portion for Picchi’s father (Reports, already recommend that Suriya is taking part in a twin position within the movie).  Despite the commercialisation, such diversifications proceed to maintain the significance of literature. I imply with out the movie diversifications, the mainstream would have remained unaware of those literary gems.