Goosebumps!!
That is what happens when ‘The Man’ Rajnikanth enters the
screen with his scorching screen presence. Flower petals shower, horns blare
and the theatre lights flare, taking you right next to him. Then the magic
happens, as Rajni slowly but surely pulls you on a momentous journey with him
in his movie.
My first tryst with the ‘Mass Opening Scene’, as it is
called, started with the movie ‘Arunachalam’ and continued with ‘Padayappa’.
The first 10 minutes of the movie, starts with the heroine (the late Soundarya)
being amazed by everyone in a village who speak only about one phenomenal
person, Arunachalam. He is depicted as a demi-God who has descended upon this
world to erase all our difficulties. The build-up reaches a climax when she
(along with us) finds ‘Arunachalam'. And Lo Behold! Therein enters ‘thalaivar’
in all his glorious form and there in, starts the opening song, where he spreads
the pearls of wisdom needed for life.
The opening act along with the opening song had even a
non-movie buff (at that time) cheering on for him. That set me and the others
on this campaign for justice against all the evil thrown at him (being thrown
out from his home, denied his father’s rightful property and finally his lady
love questioning his integrity). The movie ‘Padayappa’ does one better as Rajni
kisses a snake in the opening scene, which to this day has been a remarkable
feat. If we add in the opening scene and songs of Annamalai, Basha, Muthu (to
name a few), no other actor has or will generate the whistle and shouts as much
as ‘thalaivar’
These strong images of ‘thalaivar’ are imprinted into every
little kid from the 90s and form the backbone of ‘Rajni’ folklore. However,
after the drubbing of movie ‘Baba’, Rajni has understood to underplay these
opening scenes so as to give more credibility to the characters in his story.
His movies’ Sivaji – the Boss’ and ‘Enthiran 2.0’ have raked in the moolah, but
failed to generate the hysteria of the past.
However, the last few movies have neither failed to generate
the money nor furthered Rajni’s fame. My disappointment reached a crescendo
with the movie ‘Kaala’, wherein Rajni is shown playing cricket in the first
scene in a non-emphatic fashion. It is understood that his character would need
to be realistic, but this level of ‘non-impactful’ opening scene is now available
in the regular Facebook videos
.
With Rajni’s imminent political entry, the last of his films
is expected to be with Karthick Subburaj (his ardent fan). I hope it will, for
one last time, will generate the goosebumps that is so much sought after, by
thalaivar fans and ordinary people, who try to haul themselves from their
normal boring life with a Rajni movie and scream ‘Thalaivaaaaaaa….’.
P.S: I am not a Rajni fan, but love all his masala movies immensely.
1 comment:
every 90s kids n kids before that generation would have enjoyed all his opening scenes.. I still remember the day when our class teacher asked everyone to tell what they r going to do over the summer vacation, one brilliant student told he’s going to watch padayapa with his famil, that caught up as a rage among other students n everyone just told the same, suoerstar was/is such a phenomenon, no prize for guessing that intelligent boy :).. . About ur closing note, I agree that kaala didn’t have an impactful opening scene like his previous movies but it somehow worked for me, am sure 2.0 will have a similar or even much toned down opening scene, but am betting all my money on the creative director Karthik suburaj to mint a perfect masala movie that will mark the end of this legends career (hoping so ;) )
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