Review of Aadukalam (2011) by Rameshwar N — 12 Aug 2011

Rooster fighting is an age old custom in many parts of India and it evokes a sense of pride and a means of revenge for most people involved. Here the location is a rural part of Tamil Nadu a southern state in India.

It is brilliantly written and a decent effort put in research on the subject shows. It features well written characters portrayed even superbly by a cast of mostly unknown actors. Dhanush has a real gift in acting which gets rarely utilized in this over commercial industry and this is one such occasion.

There was room for improvement mostly in the post production part of editing and dubbing. The romantic angle of Karuppu with an Anglo Indian girl, though well written drags a bit. It takes up criminal screentime when some other plot was just about to thicken.

The guy playing the lead negative character should be given a mention as the result of what goes on in his mind drives the entire story. His depiction of ego, jealousy, betrayal and manipulation was so hard hitting and real and coming ftom a new face without a known history of histrionics was very fresh.

Overall it is a milestone for Tamil cinema and an excellent work by the director who had an impressive debut with Polladavan, here he does an even better job.