My Dear Father
Father – a wonderful personality, who can give us the first essential life lessons.
He teaches the right moves in his favourite sport.
A character who can bring calm even in the middle of a tempest.
A character without whose tireless hand holding none of us would have taken the first step.
I had the freaky opportunity of watching two movies on the theme “Father” in this week.
The first movie was Telugu super hit “Bomarillu” directed by Bhaskar who has translated some of his personal experiences on screen with the magical Prakashraj, superb siddharth and affable Genelia DSouza cooking us a “laugh”, “feel” fest.(One scene would be hilarious and the next a little touchy). The urban feel of the movie combined with great sense of humour kept the movie very entertaining and engrossing.
The second movie was “Emdan Magan” a thamizh film by the serial master Thirumurugan also called “Metti Oli” Thirumagan after the phenomenally successful Thamizh soap in SunTV Metti Oli.
I had initially thought of just writing a review (nah! I dont write reviews, just encomiums in appreciation) of the second movie, when I was stuck by the difference with which the subject of Father-Son relationship had been handled in both these movies. Also I was a great fan of Cheran’s “Thavamaai Thavamirundhu” another great tribute by an Indian film maker to the most stereotyped and understated character in Indian cinema – The Father.
Before getting into greater depths on The father character a few words on “Emdan Magan”. Emdan Magan is a story about Krishnan – son of Thirumalai who is fondly called as Emdan (after a german U boat that had Chennai in terror in the world war days) for his short fuse and uncontrolled anger which he unleashes on Krishnan at the slightest suspicion of indiscipline by the former. Emdan is the owner of a provision shop and Krishnan assists him in addition to going to college and getting great grades. How the two fall apart and reconcile is shown in a very engaging and touching fashion by Thirumurugan. Emdan is played by Nasser who must now have become an acting super-computer. The whole movie is all about emdan’s short fuse and instead of over hyping it, Thirumurugan has cleverly used it to create some funny sequences. Saranya plays the role of meek but grumbling emdan’s wife and helpless mother of Krishnan. There is also much abused Vadivelu playing probably his second best role after “Thevar Magan”. The movie is no great cinema, but effectively capturing moments that describe the undercurrent of affection and respect that the father has for his son and vice versa. In that way I would rate it very high. Finally bharath as Krishnan has put in an effective performance keeping in line with his increasing good report card of films like Kadhal and Veyyil. Please watch out for the hilarious scenes surrounding the death of Krishnan’s grand father. The fact that a death scene can be made so hilarious is a revealation of director’s abilities. Again no great cinema, but effective considering the scope and target audience(ladies who have watched Metti Oli to wet itchy eyes week after week). The message of the film is that fathers are responsibility figures no doubt, but could also be more soft to their children and need not be unncessarily stern. However a father who is not responsible cannot be a good one no matter how well he treats his children. This message is not missed in the movie and thanks to that Thirumurugan can take a bow.
Now getting back to the Father character, in the twenty first century the role of the “Father” has moved on and has become modern compared to that of the “Mother”. Some top Father moments in films that i have seen
1. Major Sunder Rajan in Major Chandrakanth as Major Chandrakanth a movie by K.Balachander where the father gives refuge to a man who killed his son.
2. Sivaji Ganesan as SP choudhury in Thangapadhakkam as a police man who has to kill his son whom he loved so much, but couldnt bring up properly due to his duty.
3. Kamal hassan as a superb dad who is adored by his son, but detested by his daughter in Nayagan.
4. Gemini Ganesan as a disapproving father in Rudra Veena/Unnaal mudiyum Thambi – another master piece by K.Balachander.
5. Biggest Daddy of all – Sivaji Ganesan as Periya Thevar in Thevar Magan – watch out for the rain scene where he asks his son not to leave the village.
6. Vijayan/Chandramohan as a father who cannot admit his appreciation for his son in front of him in 7-G rainbow colony – a film by Selvaraghavan .
7. Prakash Raj in Bomarillu
8. Raj Kiran – who has reinvented the dedicated father character and breathed life into that in “Thavamaai Thavamirundhu” by Cheran.
9. Nasser as emdan in Emdan magan – great portrayal of a rough but responsible father.
We see that “Father” character is getting more attention duly and that sets the screen balance that was always tilted in favour of the mother. In addition, fathers on screen are now getting slowly, but surely more natural and realistic and are no longer the stereotypes that remain stiff like starched cotton throughout the movie.
Tags: Tamil
Anurag Kashyap
Abhay Deol
Dibakar Banerjee
Hansal Mehta
Khalid Mohamed
Kundan Shah
Anish Kuruvilla
Jaideep Verma
Manish Gupta
Navdeep Singh
Bhavani Iyer
D. Santosh
Onir
Ashvin Kumar
Ramu Ramanathan
Sudhir Mishra
Pankaj Advani
Revathy
Saurabh Shukla
Shilpa Shukla
Sujoy Ghosh
Suparn Verma
Santosh Sivan
Shashank Ghosh
Shivajee
Pavan Kaul
Partho Sen-Gupta
Prroshant Naryannan
Sam Langoria
Satish Kasetty
Nicely compiled, However, it would also be important to note that the father need not be an old man. I think Raghuvaran`s portrayal of a father of a spastic child in Mani Ratnam`s Anjali, is also a good example.
Also I think there have been several interesting father roles in Malayalam movies like Thilakan, in the original ‘Kireedom’. Nedumudi Venu in several movies. etc.
In Hindi, simlarly, I think recently Anupam Kher`s portrayal in ‘Khosla ka ghosla’ was also fabulous.!
Emden Magan was a really nice movie,but only complaint i had against it were the songs which kinda got on my nerves.Bharath is a pretty good actor,but they should make good use of his talent.Thavamai Thavamirundu was simply amazing.Great follow-up to Autograph.