Azhagar Samy Kuthirai

It is 2012 already. I wanted to write this post for quite sometime now. But I never got around doing it. You probably would have watched this movie. I am still not sure if I should be writing about this movie. But Azhagar Samy Kuthirai is a kind of movie that we should write about. Such movies deserve a lot of appreciation and encouragement. When I started watching this movie I thought “Here we go again. Another Tamil movie about rural Tamil Nadu with a average looking hero (more of an unkempt looking hero) and some silly sentiment.” But as the movie progressed I began enjoying the movie.

In a nutshell, the movie is about an idol of a kuthirai (horse) which is seen as the protector of the village. This idol goes missing and then miraculously is replaced by a live horse. The live one actually belongs to the hero, Azhagar Samy, who wants to take it home. The entire village is against him because they believe it is their God. The hero has very little time to take it home because his marriage depends upon his successful career and his career depends upon the horse.

Now if you are hoping for a few thrilling stunts by the horse, I am sorry there is none of it. It is a story of simple folk who lead monotonous lives. The director sketches the lives of rural people and their everyday struggles. But he does not want you to pity them. He touches upon the social evils of the country. But he treats you like an intelligent viewer who can note the irony in the situation. He does not din about any of these evils with loud dialogues and so on. For instance, the hero is portrayed as one who does not score very high in the looks department and that is an understatement actually. He owns one horse. He is hired by people to transport things across hills and valleys using his horse. The hero is presumably illiterate. The heroine fits into the south Indian definition of good looks. You know the fair, soft spoken, and so on type. She also presumably completed primary or high school because she dresses up decently well. Yet her dad promises pieces of jewels and a small piece of land as dowry. Nobody in the movie reacts to the situation. But as a viewer you cant miss the irony and you acknowledge that such things do happen in every part of our country. Similarly, you will notice child labour, child labour in sweatshops, death of farmers, struggling artisans and so on. They make you sad but you watch helplessly just like we watch them in our daily lives and do nothing about it.

There are hilarious scenes with innocent yet street smart kids, bogus gurus, blind beliefs, and so on. I loved the scene where a few elders of the village go to the police station to report the theft of the horse. All kinds of conspiracy theories come up during the investigation. The local youth to the visiting foreigners are all blamed. You see the trust and the cynicism of the villagers simultaneously. I also loved the last scene where the president curses the village that it will not receive any rains and immediately it starts pouring.

Every time, I watch Iranian movies with simple yet gripping stories, I wonder if we will ever get to watch such movies on Indian cinema. This movie raised my hopes. Watch it if you haven’t already watched it and if you can understand Tamil. You will like it.