My review of Padikadhavan

After much pleading, begging, bribing, Raghu and Madhu finally agreed to watch Padikadhavan. We watched this movie on Republic Day at Sathyam.

The plot can be summarized thus:
Illiterate guy from a rich and educated family woos a gorgeous girl who turns out to be the daughter of a goon. After clearing out the issues resulting from inter-gang rivalry, the lovers unite.

The details:
Tamanna is the daughter of a big dada of Andhra Pradesh; since you will come across more dadas in the movie, let us call him Dada_01. This dada's rival (Dada_02) is out to kill her since Dada_01 killed Dada_02’s son, when Dada_02's son asked Dada_01 to get her married to him.

So Dada_01 packs off daughter Tamanna to Chennai to protect her. Here she runs into Dhanush who is basically a guy who has not cleared his Class X exams, though he is economically well-off and has a family full of well-educated folks. She meets him when her car breaks down and her driver enlists Dhanush’s help to drop her at college since she has exams. Tamanna in the white Salwar dress looks more gorgeous than she is and Dhanush is naturally smitten by her.

In true filmy style, he proposes to her and in spite of her initial aversion, he manages to woo her. There are 2 songs featuring her and Dhanush. Needless to say she looks gorgeous, beautiful, sexy, alluring, charming and quite ravishing in these songs.

One day when they are out on a date in a mall, Dada_02’s men manage to catch up on Tamanna and are about to shoot her down. Just then Dada_01’s men appear on the scene and then a fierce gun-battle ensues. This gunfire reaches the parking lot where suddenly a helicopter appears.

Dada_02’s men panic and try to escape, but Dada_01 who is actually on the chopper manages to wipe out Dada_02’s men, their weapons, their vehicles and probably even their jewelry. Tamanna is then whisked away by her father Dada_01. Dhanush watches all this from afar and Tamanna leaves by the chopper, unable to tell her love about her position. The “Interval” title appears at this stage.

Post interval, Dhanush plans to bring Tamanna back to Chennai. There is another song sequence here in which too Tamanna looks stunning, attractive, fascinating, ethereal, cute, pleasing and drop-dead gorgeous. While she is waiting in her home in Andhra Pradesh, Dhanush manages to show up there along with Vivekh. At one stage Dada_01 and Tamanna are in a local temple festival when Dada_02’s and his gang arrive in full strength seeking to remove Dada_01 and Tamanna from the face of the earth. Thankfully Dada_01 is able to finish off Dada_02, while Tamanna is saved by Dhanush.

Dada_01 is happy with what Dhanush did and invites him over for lunch. Dhanush asks Dada_01 to get her married off to him. This surprisingly enrages Dada_01 who then gets the shit beaten out of Dhanush. Tamanna then has discussions with Dada_01 where she manages to convince him about their love. Dada_01 then decides to go with her agenda.

Tamanna then meets up Dhanush and asks him to return to Chennai to get his family over here and complete the formalities. There is another song at this stage featuring Tamanna and Dhanush. In this song too, Tamanna looks sexy, seductive, glamorous, dazzling and quite tantalizing.

Just as Dhanush is about to board the train, he is attacked by some local goonda. Turns out that this goonda was acting on Dada_01’s behalf. So Dhanush confronts Dada_01 in front of Tamanna who then starts suspecting her father Dada_01’s motives.

Dada_01 then uses his powers of interrogation and deduction and finds out the truth. Apparently, there is a Dada_03 who belongs to and controls the neighborhood of Tirunelveli in Tamizh Nadu. This Dada_03 had a brother who was killed and the person who caused Dada_03’s brother’s death was Dhanush. Tamanna’s love Dhanush, was only trying to protect the honor of some random girl whom Dada_03’s brother was molesting in public. But Dhanush is not aware that he’d killed Dada_03’s brother.

So Dada_03 had reached out to all the Dadas of India with a photo of Dhanush. This photo reaches Tamanna’s father Dada_01 as well, who without seeing the contents, simply instructs his goons to finish off the guy in the photo.

Then Dada_01 says that since Dada_03 is behind Dhanush’s life, he is now afraid about the future of his daughter Tamanna. He says that Dhanush has either got to get the pardon from Dada_03 or finish Dada_03. Dhanush finally meets up Dada_03 and asks to be forgiven for an innocent mistake.

But Dada_03 invites him to a one-to-one duel which will decide if Dhanush can go back alive to Tamanna or let Tamanna suffer the passing away of her love. Finally, Tamanna’s love triumphs and the movie ends.

I want to step back for a minute and think about the movie in toto. I think it is safe to say that, barring some miracles, it will not be nominated for the following award categories, even in Besant Nagar Thursday Ladies’ Club’s Movie Awards:
1. Best Actor (male)
2. Best Comedy Actor
3. Best Supporting Actor
4. Best Movie
5. Best Direction
6. Best Story
7. Best Editing
8. Best Screenplay
9. Best Dialogues
10. Best Background score
11. Best Music
12. Best Songs
13. Best Choreography

Since the movie is produced by Sun TV, I want to ape their style and say "படிக்காதவன் மொத்தத்தில் பிடிக்காதவன் " or "படிக்காதவன் - Fail".

P.S.: In case I didn’t mention it earlier, I want history to record that Tamanna is absolutely gorgeous.