| GAUTHAM
AND HIS EYE FOR ROMANCE! |
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What kind of films is Gautham Menon good
at making? Looking at the majority that
he has delivered over the 8-9 year career
in Kollywood, it might be easy to conclude
that he has a special penchant for cop
stories and action, especially with the
upcoming project with Ajith too being
on similar lines. But, he does take regular
detours to explore the more sensitive
emotions in life.
That is how it would seem at first, but
taking a closer look at his movies would
reveal that this director’s specialty
is in fact love, more than anything else.
Why would one say that? Well, that is
because, however action packed or riveting
his cop thrillers might have been, they
have always had a very beautiful, poetic
and endearing love story at the fulcrum.
In fact, it is the love story which serves
as the engine to move the story forward.
Remember Kaakha Kaakha and the love story
of Anbuchelvan IPS and Maya. Though, prima
facie, the movie is the story of an encounter
specialist going head on against a deadly
gang, it is the Anbuchelvan-Maya romance
and separation that pushes the movie post-interval.
Without the character of Maya, Kaakha
Kaakha would not have been half as interesting
as it ended up being. A similar thing
can be said about Vettaiyaadu Vilaiyaadu.
Here, there were two romances, one of
Raghavan and Kayalvizhi which had a tragic
end, again something that was very significant
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the story and in defining the relationship that Raghavan
shared with Arokiaraj (Prakash Raj) which makes him
pursue the case all the way to New York. The other
romance in the movie (a far more matured one), that
of Raghavan and Aradhana, was more akin to the Anbuchelvan-Maya
romance in Kaakha Kaakha. Again, Aradhana’s
character was pivotal in the final few reels of the
movie.
Of course, there are many ways to look at this. Some
have said that Gautham has a way of making his heroines
scapegoats for the heroics of his leading men. Some
have even said that Gautham has a fondness for cruelly
finishing off his heroines. This argument got especially
strong after the character of Meghna (Sameera Reddy)
in Vaaranum Aayiram was made the victim of a bomb
blast in USA just when everything looked fine and
rosy. Speaking of Vaaranam Aayiram, it is another
example of Gautham’s eye for romance, where
a movie that was built around a father-son relationship
had three romances, all of them likeable, popular
and very important to the movie.
We have seen many cop and action stories, so have
we been treated to many love stories. In fact, love
and action are so much staple to Tamil cinema, that
it is tough to spot a movie without either of these.
But, it is indeed tough to spot a movie where romance
and action are so equally and beautifully balanced
that neither looks more important than the other.
In fact, in Gautham’s movies, they move hand
in hand to take the movie forward. In many other movies,
especially, action or hero centric ones, we get a
feeling that sometimes the romance is there just as
an additive rather than being a main ingredient. In
love stories, we get the feeling that situations are
deliberately created to introduce some action. It
is only very few directors who have been able to take
romance and action together in harmony. Lingusamy’s
Run is one of those. But, the master at this is none
other than Mani Ratnam.
Looking back at some of his best movies, be it Roja
or Bombay (both set against very turbulent backdrops),
dealing with very serious issues like terrorism and
communalism respectively, there is always a very powerful
love story at the center, which, in fact, drives the
movie forward.
So, while we might consider directors like Gautham
and Mani Ratnam as specialists in action and subjects
of societal relevance respectively, the fact remains
that their forte lies in beautifully depicting the
finest human emotion - love.
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