TAMIL cinema’s heroes have always given way for a genre of unintentionally funny movies: Those in which the characters take themselves so seriously that it actually seems funny to the audience who later immortalises such movies/ scenes in the oft-watched columns of Youtube, as funny videos.But a clear departure from that is director Vijay’s 'Poi Solla Porom', which is serious about being funny. Vijay had earlier directed the Ajith-starrer 'Kireedam'.
PSP, set to hit the screens early September, is an adaptation of National Award-winning rib tickler 'Khosla Ka Ghosla', starring Anupam Kher, Boman Irani, Ranvir Shorey and Parvin Dabas.
'Poi Solla Porom' is the first production venture of Priyadarshan and Vijay, after being an assistant for seven years, has finally turned out the chosen one. “It wasn’t like we’d ever had a discussion or something about a movie. He just called me one day and said I’m directing his maiden production venture and it has happened,” he recalls it all.
The movie was what experienced actors at the audio launch called a milestone in Tamil cinema in the genre of humour. “What’s going on is serious business, according to the characters.
But their serious-ness gets to a level that it tickles the funny bone of our audiences,” he explains, just as he is readying his movie for release in September.
Surprisingly, this strict comedy doesn’t boast of any of today’s comedians in its credits. Instead, it has some industry veterans like Mouli, Nasser, Nedumudi Venu, Delhi Ganesh, Lakshmi, evening it with younger talent like Evam Karthik, Bosskey, RJ Balaji and so on.
“It’s a film that centres on 15 people hatching a plot to win against one man, played by Nasser,” the director explains, adding that it wouldn’t be fair to term anyone a protagonist here. “Nor is anybody a villain.” Evam Karthik and new faces Omar, Justina and Piaa form the core, with Venu and Lakshmi playing Karthik’s father.
“While it’s an adaptation of a Hindi movie, its climax, which will be a highlight, is original and unexpected,” the director adds.
Vijay has two movies to his credit, and both of them were remakes. Is that what we call treading his mentor’s footsteps? Vijay comes with a quick answer to deny it.
“Kireedam was a storyline I thought of. Later, Priyadarshan sir said it resembled the Malayalam movie and so we extrapolated from that one to make the Tamil version. PSP was Priyadarshan’s choice. While it’s not wrong to do a remake, I’d prefer writing my scripts. I am a writer first, a director next,” he says.
It was around the week he made this statement that Priyadarshan’s 'Kanjeevaram' was announced to be premiered at the Toronto Film Festival. And in the credits section for the dialogue writer was found Vijay’s name.
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