Pudhupettai

Infobox_Film
name = Pudhupettai


imdb_id = 0459516
writer = Selvaraghavan
starring = Sonia Agarwal,
Sneha,
Dhanush
director = Selvaraghavan
producer = Lakshmi Movie Makers
released = May 26, 2006
budjet = Rs. 21 crores
runtime = 166 mins
language = Tamil
music = Yuvan Shankar Raja

"Pudupettai" (2006) is a gangster movie with Dhanush in the lead and was directed by his brother Selvaraghavan. Lending glamour to the film are Sneha and Sonia Agarwal who were paired with Dhanush. The movie is based on the Brazilian film City of God. As the title suggests, the movie is set in the backdrop of the slums of Pudupettai in Chennai.

Review

The story is set in the slums of Chennai where a high school kid Kokki Kumar (Dhanush) sees his mom dead after he comes back from watching a movie. His father, the murderer is also planning to kill his son Kumar also. Kumar sensing danger runs away from home. Homeless and with no food Kumar resorts to begging until he is falsely arrested while standing by and watching a commotion on the street. In jail he befriends handymen of a local goon who take Kumar with them and give him petty jobs to do. In a confrontation with goons of another gang Kumar kills the brother of his enemy gang thus earning the respect of his gang and making enemies for himself both within his gang and outside.

Kumar falls in love with a prostitute Krishnaveni (Sneha) and she moves in with him. Kumar requests his boss who is also Krishnaveni's boss (pimp) freedom from being a prostitute but he refuses. In a fit of rage Kumar kills his own boss thus becoming the gang leader himself. He helps a lot of politicians during election times and becomes popular in the underworld circle.

He then meets Soniya Agarwal on the eve of her wedding and falls in love with her and marries her forcibly during her wedding ceremony. Soniya is the sister of his favorite henchman who now becomes his sworn enemy and joins the enemy gang. Slowly Kumar starts accumulating serious enemies and eventually everyone start targeting for Kumar's head. Does Kumar survive the wrath of his enemies? forms the rest of the story.

The movie was criticized for it's display of violence and bloody gore. Some felt the movie had too much of graphic detail about the life of the goons. The violence helped the movie to be a hit with predominantly front benchers.

The hero though exhibits superhero qualities in a few instances is not a superhero. He is vulnerable. There are no power dialogues. The hero's thought process suits his level of education and lifestyle. He is not shown wearing boot cut jeans and Nike shoes. His costumes are very apt. The dialogues are also well penned. Dialogue delivery, characterization, casting, music, direction, lighting are all very well done.

Theme Controversy

After the release of 'Pattiyal' whose theme was the same as Pudupettai (dwelling on gangsters in Chennai), Selvaraghavan wanted to re-do many of the scenes to make them look fresh and new, hence the delay. The re-recording is being done in Bangkok, with everyone involved working overtime.

Musical Milestone

This film Pudhupettai is described as a "Musical Milestone". Yuvan Shankar Raja and Selvaraghavan share a rapport as in their previous movies and this is reflected in the songs of this film’s album. Yuvan Shankar Raja has churned out good music along with Chapraya Symphony Orchestra of Bangkok. And what is special about the album is the fact that Kamal Haasan has sung a song.

Technology

"Pudupettai" is the first Tamil film to be released in the "Super 35mm" format which allows for a larger image area packing in more details in the frame. It enhances viewing experience. Technologically the film has many other firsts to its credit.

According to Director of Photography Arvind Krishna, the movie will be a very different experience. "It has some intensive matt-based color correction, and also altered color tones for different scenes and moods.' It is also the first film to be digitally projected by directly scanning the negative at 2K resolutions and converting them to digital projection format.

Box Office

The film opened in 162 screens throughout Tamil Nadu. Though it opened at No.1 in Chennai box office,Fact|date=February 2007 It was trashed by critics due to excessive violence and profanity. It is considered one of the worst movies of Selvaraghavan. It was dubbed in Telugu as "Dhoolpet" where it was an average grosser. The film opened in 250 screens worldwide and grossed Rs. 70 million in its opening week and eventually grossed Rs. 20 crores, the exact budget of the movie.