“Yen sir, indha factory ellaam, nejamavae yedhachum seyvaangala, illa namma maadhiri gangster sanda podakatti irukkaangala?”
Vedha knows the cop gangster movie genre inside out in Vikram Vedha. Vijay Sethupathy’s Vedha, a rendition of Vethalam, play mind games with Vikram, a brutal and loyal Cop played by R. Madhavan. These two are having a ball in Vikram Vedha, so are we.
Plot: Vikram and his encounter specialists are after Vedha, a gangster. They kill one too many thugs in a bid to hunt down Vedha’s racket, but Commissioner closes the case. Bummer.
Vikram believes he is in the right side of the law, and that all his killings are morally right. Vedha believes gangsters are loyal than cops and that both are morally corrupt. Vikram disagrees, but the movie suggests a possibility, what if a cop is to be more corrupt than gangster.
Similar issues were tackled in Michael Mann’s Heat. Words are not minced between these two. They are riveting to watch on screen. No mass heroism typical of commercial Tamil movies. I watched Vikram Vedha’s climax with a grin.
Thanks to the performances and the script and the direction, cliches are overturned. Never again you would see an encounter and laugh about the consequences of the two main characters in a cop flick. From scare to laugh, Vikram Vedha throws you into a state of zen mindfulness and shows you what could be done with the genre if you think it through.
Magizchi.