Tamil Cinema's 8 Lessons From 8 Films In 2024

Tamil Cinema's Highs & Lows In 2024: 8 Films, 8 Hard-Won Lessons

2024 was a poor year for Tamil cinema that left hard lessons for the industry in its wake, writes Aditya Shrikrishna.

THE STARS DID NOT ALIGN for Tamil cinema in 2024. Not for lack of trying. Highly anticipated big productions were in store. Stars, old and new, had releases at regular intervals. Hugely mounted films, following the pan India template, created insurmountable pre-release buzz. But almost all of them came up short.

They were not just categorical disappointments; they were downright embarrassing and offensive to the audience. They took the fans for granted and almost revelled in that attitude. 2024 was a poor year for Tamil cinema that left hard lessons for the industry in its wake. Such as: that the industry needs more mid-budget films that widen the variety of stories. Everyone learned that it is not as easy to mount a pan-India project as simply casting actors from other industries and organising pre-release events and promotions in north India.

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Tamil cinema is in a transitional period where it cannot rely on the old ideas anymore and is desperate to unearth a workable model, both in terms of art as well as business. Here are eight films from 2024 that particularly underscored these lessons. Four of them left us wanting more. They widened the slate and were wildly different from each other in sensibilities and treatment. The kind of cinema that the Tamil film industry would do well to learn from.

Kottukkaali

In PS Vinothraj’s Kottukkaali, a sour road trip progressively turns bitter as a woman’s determined restraint and silent rebellion implodes a family feud. Vinothraj, the assured voice of Koozhangal, returned with a film that reinforced the promise in him, this time with Soori as lead actor and Sivakarthikeyan as his producer. The film had its world premiere in Berlinale and later found a theatrical release, a feat possibly more shocking than its festival accolades, but just as necessary. There were noises about the festival tag behind the film, but Indian cinema would be better off if it could find more Vinothrajs and take Kottukkaalis to the theatres. (Stream the film.)

Meiyazhagan

Like Vinothraj, C Premkumar too returned after his impressive debut. After 96, Premkumar did not chase huge stars and big budgets for his sophomore feature, unlike the majority of successful debutantes in Tamil cinema. Though one conversation with him would allay such fears, it is still a rarity worth celebrating. Meiyazhagan walked calmly into an atmosphere of blood, action, gore and stale familial stories. It spoke to each one of us, it rekindled memories, it reminded us how great it is to watch a film with characters that talk like regular people, feel and yearn like regular folk. It showed vulnerable men who open up to each other, acknowledge their insecurities and eschew saviour mentalities. Meiyazhagan is the kind of film Tamil cinema needs more of at this stage.

Lubber Pandhu

This year we had two films on cricket rivalries. Blue Star came earlier in the year, an ordinary film that didn’t offer anything fresh for the genre. Tamizharasan Pachamuthu revitalised the sport film 16 years after Venkat Prabhu did with Chennai 600028, with his own debut in Lubber Pandhu. The film had well written, flawed, egotistical men going for the throat, while also having fun playing cricket. It negotiated caste with soft hands, saw through complex young and old love stories, threw ironic film references to go with the snarky live commentary, and followed it all up with a hitting rampage through its third act, a blend of the best of theatrical mass cinema in the guise of a small film, with strong actors in Attakathi Dinesh, Geetha Kailasam, Swasika and Kaali Venkat.

Vaazhai

Mari Selvaraj’s follow up to the strictly functional Maamannan is a film of pristine beauty and pain, a semi-biopic going hand in hand with a semi-coming-of-age story. The film’s success lies in how it balances the innocence and joy that is only possible at a young age, with the pain and suffering that comes from a society built on caste hierarchy. Vaazhai remains one of the best shot films from this year, its wealth of greenery never masking the centuries of labour behind it. It’s great to see Mari Selvaraj in this zone, relieved of the star trappings and doing his own thing, borrowing from his life and his literature. The kind of cinema we would like to see more of from our best filmmakers.

AND THEN THERE WERE (THE OTHER) FOUR. Four films that taught some hard lessons to the Tamil film industry as well as the audience. Four that promised fans a ride, but instead dropped them from a great height without a harness. Four kinds of films that directors and producers and stars must reconsider, if they are worth their name at all.

The Greatest of All Time

Venkat Prabhu’s GOAT starring Vijay was one of the most anticipated biggies of the year. All eyes were on what Venkat Prabhu’s too cool-to-a-fault team would create with Vijay, after delivering a fun film like Maanadu with Simbu. It was also apparent that it would be Vijay’s penultimate film by the time it arrived. But the film had nothing to offer, neither for Vijay fans nor for Venkat Prabhu’s filmography. Not even for those looking for some harmless fun. It had no script or story to speak of, all it had was gimmicks like Vijaykanth via AI and footage from an IPL match involving Chennai Super Kings. GOAT turned out to be one damp squib, a terrible follow up for Vijay who was on a high after two wonderful films with Lokesh Kanagaraj in three years.

Kanguva

Siva’s Kanguva made a lot of noise. It was billed as Tamil cinema’s first pan-India film. There was no evidence for it in any of the rushes that came out. It was just hearsay. The producers (Studio Green) made a huge deal about what a great film they had made. Suriya, the lead actor, made a huge deal over what they had all made. The producer Gnanavel Raja went on record saying the film could easily make a thousand crores, the holy number that all Tamil cinema fans on the internet seem to want considering the neighbours in the Telugu film industry have an assembly line for such cinema. But Kanguva was not just a failure, it was a colossal loss that nobody would wish upon their worst business rival. Its fall sounded louder than the noise it made in its promotions. A lesson in how not to make and market a film. A film where almost nothing worked, on any level. It only had everyone wondering what the makers really did see in this to sell it so confidently.

Vettaiyan

TJ Gnanavel is one of among several filmmakers who turned to a big star and bigger budget after launching into the limelight with a smallish film like Jai Bhim. He had Rajinikanth, Amitabh Bachchan, Manju Warrier, Rana Daggubati, Fahadh Faasil and Dushara Vijayan to fit into his narrative calling out encounter killings. It is a neat idea on paper. But Vettaiyan bit off more than it could chew, unable to balance its several big names and stay consistent with its ideological trappings. It couldn’t sacrifice Rajini the star at the altar of its messaging. It pretended to make him a flawed character only to circle back to an ed-tech corporate criminal as a villain so that the hero can get his grand reconciliation. In a more courageous film, he would have been a villain or at least redrawn in such a way that the film stayed true to its universe. Just ask Pa Ranjith how to do that.

Indian 2

The long suffering production of Indian 2 ended with a long meme-filled reception at the box office. The production that stalled several times and was five years in the making showed in the finished film. It was crass, offensive, silly and funny to the level of parody. The film made it clear that Shankar is out of his bag of tricks and Kamal Haasan’s fans felt relieved that Vikram inadvertently became the actor’s comeback and not this. What the film will ultimately be remembered for are the memes that flooded the internet, recontextualising the shots from a film that should never have been made in the first place.

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