Thalaivan Thalaivii movie review: Vijay Sethupathi and Nithya Menen’s loud and regressive film yells without clarity

Thalaivan Thalaivii movie plot:

Somewhere in Madurai, Aakasaveeran (Vijay Sethupathi) who runs an eatery along with his family, gatecrashes the first tonsuring ceremony of his daughter conducted by his wife Perarasi (Nithya Menen) and parents. Angered over how such an event could happen without his permission, we get to know that Aakasaveeran and Perarasi are on the verge of separation as their married life is full of fights, bickering, and yelling. But why forms the story of Thalaivan Thalaivii.

Thalaivan Thalaivii movie review:

After two hours and 20 minutes of Aakasaveeran and Perarasi yelling at each other, as their toddler daughter keeps shifting between their arms, all I cared about was to know what would be the memory of the child 10-15 years from then. Of course, I don’t expect that the child to have memories of its first tonsure ceremony, but Aakasaveeran and Perarasi’s dysfunctional, toxic and extremely loud marital life is no escape route for their child who is destined to witness if the couple choose to live together and bicker for life.

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Thalaivan Thalaivii more or less happens over a day. Perarasi’s family has come to temple to perform the ceremony, and so does a petty thief (Yogi Babu) who has come to seek blessings before beginning to do his day’s work. A couple have also arrived in town for a celebration, and that’s when Aakasaveeran gatecrashes his daughter’s function. From there on, Thalaivan Thalaivii goes back and forth to explain the “rugged love story” of the leads, and the bickering couple they became to me.

To be honest, the core conflict of Thalaivan Thalaivii stems from the family discord. Aakasaveeran and Perarasi who live with his parents, begin to see interventions from their respective family members, and for some reason, they seek solution through shouts and fights. If Perarasi is triggered by her mother to stay away from her in-laws, Aakasaveeran’s family is no less in keeping her alienated. Yelling becomes the couple’s language, and in turn the film’s way of communicating to its audience that a conflict has been established. The rural landscape of the film is used as an excuse to make characters shout on top of their lungs, that I almost gained the lived experience of going deaf. But coming back to the sorrows of Perarasi, a woman who went out of her house to get married to Aakasaveeran, we seldom see she taking stances for herself apart from resorting to shouting. And sometimes, the shout also turns physical.

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The film, has its moments, and on its way, gives some quips too. The loud film also wants to keep you engaging. It is honest in that sense, and the film carries on only to get louder in decibel and weaker in its ideology. For a film which wants to talk about the highness and so-called sacramental concept of marriage, it need not put down the liberating idea of “freedom and independence” that divorce gives for some much-needed people. Thalaivan Thalaivii, in its way to talk about the need to hold on (which it can choose to do), did not had to put down the idea of divorce and separation as a sour take on life. The film also does not do enough to justify its characters fighting and shouting round the clock, with less to no substantial backing.

Vijay Sethupathi and Nithya Menen play their parts well, but it’s the characters that needed the backing of a progressive writer. It is no wrong that relatives and extended family are crucial for a human support system, but when a joint family stumbles to crumble, the film should have taken the responsibility to address without inflicting its regressive ideas on divorce. The film also treats its supporting characters as a way to put salt on the wound, as if enough voices shouting is not enough.

Thalaivan Thalaivii movie verdict:

Thalaivan Thalaivii is a loudly engaging film and it does not quiet hit the mark. Its noise keeps you hooked to the screenplay, but that cannot be considered to being hooked. Even as Vijay Sethupathi and Nithya Menen try to salvage it, the regressive (anti-divorce) writing packed with noisy making, makes the film all over the place and little unruly.