March 01, 2006
 

Common thread in Mani Ratnam movies

We watched some parts of Kannathil Muthamittal when it was shown on TV last weekend. While seeing the movie, I was struck by how there was some sort of a common thread running across quite a few movies by Mani Ratnam. The nature of birth of the protagonist is sort of a raison d’etre for why the movie was made.

In Agni Nakshatiram, Karthik was the 'illegitimate' son of Vijay Kumar while Prabhu was the 'legitimate' son. There were repeated clashes between the two with the illegitimacy of Karthik as the centre-stone.

In Anjali, Shamilee turns out to be Revathi & Raghuvaran's daughter, who was born autistic and grew up for a couple of years in a special children's home.

In Dalapathi, Rajinikanth is scarred by the fact that he was dumped by his mother Srividya, who gave birth to him as an unmarried woman and cast him away on Bhogi Pongal.

In Kannathil Muthamittal, Keerthana's life undergoes a churning when she is told by Madhavan that she is an adopted child and that her real mother, who was originally a refugee in Rameswaram, now lives in Sri Lanka.

I know there're many other Mani Ratnam movies where the birth of the main character doesn't have any impact on the story, but hey, there is some commonality across a few of his movies. Obviously this seems to be one theme on which he bases his movies. The other is patriotism/terrorism, as is evident from Roja, Bombay and Dil Se. Interestingly enough, Kannathil Muthamittal neatly fits into both categories!

Labels: movies