In
my 20 something years of watching and
understanding movies, I don't think
I've ever seen a non-Hollywood movie
that had the chops to beat a Hollywood
one in technical aspects. In areas such
as makeup, visual effects, animation,
graphics, cinematography, editing and
stunts, no single movie has been equal
to a Hollywood one in all these disciplines
at once. The creation of a fantasia
that suspends our collective disbelief
has never been better accomplished than
in a Hollywood movie. Movies such as
Terminator, Jurassic Park, Avatar, Indiana
Jones and Star Wars have had facets
to them that simply could not be reproduced
by a contemporary movie made anywhere
else but in Los Angeles. Today, that
world in which Hollywood ruled the science
and technology of movie making changed
for me. Well, it actually changed a
couple of days back, on 1 October 2010.
To appropriate a much bandied about
quote from politics (thank you, sister
Sarah for making it the slogan of wolf
hunting hockey moms all over the world),
"there is a crack in the glass
ceiling." Endhiran has arrived.
What can I say about this movie? There's
no way to put into words the accolades
that a technical feat of this magnitude
deserves. To talk about each behind-the-scenes
area of movie making for this film will
require an individual blog and more.
So, I've decided that I'd rather talk
about what this movie did for me, and
I hope, for many more as well. If its
a review of the film and its various
facets you're looking for, I'd recommend
this excellent video review: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fL_55IVCCRY.
Unfortunately, its all in Tamil, so
you need to know the language. But hey,
if you're already here having braved
the blog's moniker, you would, wouldn't
you?
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There have been countless films in which robots, and
more specifically androids - or a human looking bucket
of bolts - have featured prominently. Mr. Sujatha's
core story, while not unique in any way, is still
a nice platform on which to build a colossus. You
see, for a movie like this, where fantasy has to carry
the underlying reality, presentation is everything.
That is why a post-apocalyptic world in Blade Runner
or a superhuman cyborg killer in Terminator carried
us away, while Robin William's Bicentennial Man or
Robocop have faded from memory. Okay, the basic story
of an innocent entity gaining sentience and being
manipulated by the fickleness of human nature with
a love triangle thrown in (yennadhaan Hollywood padathukku
yeedu kuduthaalum, Tamil sentiment iruukanomudaa!)
is quite predictable. But the flow from scene to scene,
the picturization of each event in the movie, and
the visual effects that are used to show unrealistic
situations with as much verisimilitude as possible
boggle the mind and addle the brain. You are left
with a look resembling that of a dying duck gasping
its last - mouth agog and eyes bamboozled by the sheer
grandeur of each shot. This movie works not so much
because of the story, but because of the breathtaking
visuals, sublime background scores and Rajni's superlative
acting that all gel into a cohesive unit.
Suspension of Disbelief:
The Chennai city of 2010 that Shankar has created
for us, replete with its opulent houses, buildings
that are architectural marvels and roads cleaner than
a baby's freshly powdered bottom probably only exists
in some parallel universe where India has no politicians.
Several times, like when looking at scientist Rajni's
lab, or the fictional AIRD (the Indian Army's advanced
technology procurement division) headquarters, I was
left scratching my head, wondering where these places
are supposed to be located...
When Chitti, the robot says that his processing speed
is 1 terahertz and memory capacity is one zettabyte,
you have to wonder. The World's fastest computer today
has 225,000 processors operating in parallel, and
has a speed of 3.4 gigahertz, with total RAM of 360
terabytes. That sits in a room the size of two football
fields. So, Chitti, the size of Rajnikanth, with limited
cooling options, has about 300 times the processing
speed and three billion times the RAM capacity of
this computer. Interesting that such a robot was developed
in Chennai by one man.
Chitti's varied talents include technical wonders
for which we simply do not have the know-how today
to be able to incorporate into the space constraints
of one average human sized body. As a simple example,
his ability to become a high intensity electro-magnet
would require roughly the same power as to run an
MRI scanner.
But, Shankar asks us to take all this in stride, and
reassures us thus: accept that this might be all be
possible at some point in the future, that's all I
ask. I'll give you a watertight explanation for every
stunt, every action sequence and every superhuman
action that follows. That is this movie's greatest
strength.
Visual treat:
Without giving anything away, its impossible to describe
the feelings the visuals in this movie evoke. Because,
more than the story itself, its the visuals that,
if I were to describe in any detail, will give away
a lot of what you will see on screen, probably for
the first, and maybe the last time in your lives.
All I'll say is, while every visual effect is a treat
in itself, watch the last 45 minutes of the film.
There is a sequence in which thousands of cloned Rajni
robots join electromagnetically to blitz from one
shape to the next - starting with simple shapes like
spheres and cuboids and finally culminating in...
well, that last one has to be seen to really understand
its magnificence! I will wager you anything that you
won't be able to find another movie that was ever
made that has anything that comes close to this sequence!!!
Asimov, Sujatha and Shankar:
Isaac Asimov gave the world the robots of dawn, the
three golden rules of robotics and the first true
romanticization of robots. Sujatha, I'm told, gave
that romance with machines a distinctly Indian flavor
with En Iniya Iyandhira and Meendum Juno, two novels
on which the movie is loosely based. Shankar has given
the concept wings. I honestly believe that there is
no director in the world today with Shankar's imagination
and selling power. In him, we have a bit of P.C. Sarkar,
a tad of P.T. Barnum and a whole lot of P.G. Wodehouse.
He can create new world on celluloid, snare us into
it for those three hours the 20 dollar ticket is worth,
and give us a ride in that world which leaves us with
a warm and fuzzy feeling.
Rajnikanth:
What can I say about his performance in this movie.
Playing characters like robots is usually described
as very difficult, because the performance has to
be muted. But, what starts out as such a performance,
goes through the full gamut of thespian prowess as
the robot changes from an emotionless machine, to
one gaining sentience, to one exposed to the evils
of human nature, and finally one succumbing to that
same evil. His gear shifts from phase to phase are
seamless, and when the final villainous being emerges,
you can actually experience the definition of evil
first hand. This is a very different Rajni that we
see here, and I am in love with his performance. Many
said that this being a movie originally intended for
Kamal, Rajni would be a misfit. But I believe Kamal
could have at best matched Rajni's performance here.
No more.
So, as Vivek said in the music launch function, Endhiran,
the mass. Ergo, watch it in the theatre with the mass.
Like Haley's comet, this kind of thing happens once
in a lifetime in Tamil cinema. This is its first occurrence,
and if you think I'll wait until it comes on TV as
a Deepawali or Pongal special, you'll probably die
having missed one of the celluloid wonders of our
lifetime.
Vamsi
(Vamsi Krishna Sridharan, PhD student, Stanford University)
vamsiks@stanford.edu
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