Aadukalam

Aadukalam
Poster
Directed by	Vetrimaran
Produced by	Anand
Written by	Vetrimaran Vikram Sugumaran (Dialogues)
Starring	Dhanush Taapsee Pannu V. I. S. Jayapalan
Music by	G. V. Prakash Kumar
Cinematography	Velraj
Edited by	Kishore Te.
Distributed by	Sun Pictures
Release dates	14 January 2011 (2011-01-14)
Running time	156 minutes
Country	India
Language	Tamil
Budget	₹150-200 million,
Box office	₹300 million

Aadukalam (English: Arena) is a 2011 Indian Tamil drama film written and directed by Vetrimaran. The film stars Dhanush, Taapsee Pannu, V. I. S. Jayapalan and Kishore. The film was released on 14 January 2011 to positive critical feedback. The film won six awards at the 58th National Film Awards, including Best Director, Best Screenplay and Best Actor. The film was also felicitated with five awards in 59th Filmfare Awards South - Best Film, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Music Director and Best Cinematography. Based on an online poll by The Times of India, Vetri Maaran was chosen as the best director for Aadukalam. The Telugu dubbed version Pandem Kollu released on 30 January 2015.

Plot

In Madurai, veteran rooster trainer Pettaikaaran (V. I. S. Jayapalan) and police inspector Rathnaswamy (Naren) are tough competitors in cockfights and it is often Pettai who wins because nobody knows his way of maintaining the quality of the birds.

Karuppu (Dhanush) and Durai (Kishore) are the favourites in Pettaikaran's team. Karuppu is very talented in breeding and training roosters. Durai is very rich and he owns three bars in Thiruparangundram town. He is also talented in cock training. Rathnasamy keeps insisting on having one last fight to win and satisfy his old mother’s wish but Pettaikaran declines to have any more fights with him because he feels Rathnasamy has lost faith in his roosters and will be using nefarious methods to win. Rathnasamy keeps insisting and tries to make him accept the challenge through cajoling, threatening, bribing and other vile acts.

Karuppu falls in love with an Anglo-Indian girl Irene (Taapsee) who dislikes him. He does not recognise this initially and keeps following her. One day the residents of Irene's colony confront him and ask Irene to tell who she is in love with – Karuppu or Dinesh (Attakathi Dinesh), another man in the locality. She points her finger at Karuppu and he goes into rapture. She explains later that she had to lie in order to avoid Dinesh who has been bothering her for a long time. Later, Irene too falls in love with Karuppu.

Meanwhile, one of Pettai's associates, a doctor-like for roosters, is killed in a hit and run accident. In a rage Pettai, suspecting Rathnasamy of the murder, agrees to the rooster fight and it is decided that their roosters will compete in the following tournament. If they fight against each other, the loser will get his head tonsured and must quit rooster fights. The grand state tournament is arranged by Pettaikaran's team, getting funds and official permission. In the crucial fight, Rathnasamy brings high breed roosters from Bangalore. Karuppu asks Pettai to let his rooster fight against Rathnasamy's but Pettai puts his rooster down and says he will choose the best competing rooster himself. Karuppu surreptitiously enters the contest before Pettai can choose the rooster because he needs to repay Irene for the loan he took to prepare his rooster for the fight. Pettai does not believe in Karuppu and his rooster and announces that Karuppu will not represent Pettai and the result of Karuppu's match will not affect him. The 'underdog' however emerges victorious in three consecutive rounds even when the opponent has spiked his rooster to scald the other rooster. Karuppu gets best coacher award of the tournament and his bet money of ₹10 lakh (equivalent to ₹18 lakh or US$26,000 in 2020).

While initially Pettai is happy that Karuppu won, he is overcome with anger and jealousy by the end of the day. His ego is hurt by the fact that Karuppu earns both popularity and money, by refusing his judgement. Karuppu is not aware of the changes in his mentor's mind. Pettaikaran is so jealous of Karuppu that at first he refuses to speak to anyone and then starts scheming. The money from the competition that Karuppu gives to Pettai for safe keeping, that he plans to use to start a business, suddenly goes missing. Pettai also starts spinning stories about his associates and makes everyone suspicious of each other. He incites Karuppu and Durai into pitting their roosters in a fight. Meanwhile, Karuppu's mother dies of the shock of losing all the money. Pettaikaran meanwhile poisons all of Durai's roosters making him suspect Karuppu, who is arrested for this. Pettaikaran then lies to Irene that his wife was in an adulterous relationship with Karuppu. Irene's family also pressure her to move to Chennai which pushes her into attempting suicide. Pettaikaran meanwhile calls Karuppu to a location near a temple and informs Durai about his whereabouts. When Irene gets better, she calls Karuppu and informs him that Pettai is badmouthing him. So Karuppu, who puts 2 and 2 together, goes to find Pettai to confront him. Karuppu finds that Pettai was the one who stole his money, and Pettai kills himself. Karuppu does not want to reveal the fact to the public that his mentor was the criminal who stole his money and schemed against him, so he flees with Irene and the money to start a new life in another city.

Cast

• Dhanush as Karuppu
• Kishore as Durai
• Taapsee Pannu as Irene
• V. I. S. Jayapalan as Periyasamy/Pettaikaran
• Naren as Rathnasamy
• Meenal as Meena
• Murugadoss as Oole
• Senrayan as Nicholas
• Periya Karuppu Thevar as Ayub
• Dinesh as Dinesh
• Velraj as Police Inspector (special appearance)

Production

A lot of research has gone into the script. I was born and brought up in Chennai and to learn new things, I had to unlearn many. I went to Madurai with a script in mind, but I had to change the script to accommodate reality. To make my film authentic, we have cast people who belong to the sub-cult. I even share credits for scriptwriting with Vikram Sukumaran [sic], who hails from Madurai.

— Vetrimaaran in an interview with V. Lakshmi of The Times of India.

Following the success of their 2007 collaboration Polladhavan, the entire team of that film — director Vetrimaaran, lead actor Dhanush, producer S. Kathiresan, and music director G. V. Prakash Kumar — collaborated again for Aadukalam. Vetrimaaran spent a period of two years in Madurai to understand the local dialect and lifestyle of the people living there. Aadukalam was the first film of Vetrimaaran to have a production office set up outside of Chennai. Vetrimaaran took a year to complete the screenplay, script, and dialogues for Aadukalam and held a bounded script for the venture, which is considered rare in Tamil films. Vetrimaaran narrated only half of the film's script to Dhanush before the latter was impressed with it and agreed to act in the film. The film was initially titled Seval, but since the rights to the title were already taken by director Hari for his project with Bharath, Vetrimaaran decided to rename his film as Aadukalam.

Shriya Saran was signed on for the project in February 2008 but eventually pulled out citing schedule conflicts. In April 2008, it was reported that Dhanush too had walked out of the project due to schedule issues, and that Silambarasan was set to replace him. However, Dhanush remained and continued with the film. Subsequently in June 2009, Trisha Krishnan, who was selected to replace Saran for the role of Irene, was forced to opt out of the project after her schedule clashed with the allotted dates for her other films, Namo Venkatesa (2010) and Vinnaithaandi Varuvaayaa (2010). Newcomer Taapsee Pannu, a Punjabi software engineer, was named as her replacement. Sri Lankan Tamil writer and political commentator V. I. S. Jayapalan portrayed the role of Karuppu's mentor, Pettaikaran, thereby making his debut in Tamil cinema. Attakathi Dinesh makes a small cameo in the film as Dinesh, Karuppu's nemesis when it comes to winning Irene's love. Murugadoss plays Karuppu's friend Oole while Naren appears as Rathnasamy who is also Pettaikaran's rival in cockfighting.

Principal photography began in Madurai in February 2009 with scenes featuring Dhanush being shot. The first look of the film was released shortly after the commencement of filming. It featured a series of promotional posters depicting the characters played by Dhanush, Jayapalan and Kishore. During early stages of production, Dhanush revealed he would play the role of a local cockfighter named K. P. Karuppu, and described the venture as his "dream project". The cockfight sequences that take place before intermission was filmed for 26 days. Filming was completed in August 2010. In addition to being shot in Madurai, some portions were also filmed in Thiruparankundram. The cockfights were filmed using Computer-generated imagery (CGI). The post-production works on the cockfight sequences delayed the film's release. The voices for Kishore, Taapsee, and Jayapalan were dubbed by Samuthirakani, Andrea Jeremiah, and Radha Ravi respectively.

Soundtrack

Aadukalam
Album Cover Art
Soundtrack album by G. V. Prakash Kumar
Released	2011
Genre	Feature film soundtrack
Label	Sony Music
G. V. Prakash Kumar chronology
Va (2010)Va2010 Aadukalam (2011) Narthagi (2011)Narthagi2011

G. V. Prakash Kumar's soundtrack consists of seven tracks including two rap numbers performed by Malaysian Tamil rapper Yogi B. It was released by Sony Music and the audio was launched at a small function at Lady Aandal School auditorium in Chennai on 10 November 2010. The song Yathe Yathe topped the charts and remained in the No.1 position for nearly five weeks.

Original Tracklist

No.	Title	Lyrics	Singer(s)	Length
1.	"Yathe Yathe"	Snehan	G. V. Prakash Kumar	5:44
2.	"Otha Sollaala"	Yegathasi	Velmurugan	3:58
3.	"Porkkalam" (Tamil Rap)	Yugabharathi	Alwa Vasu, Yogi B	4:20
4.	"En Vennilave"	V. I. S. Jayapalan	KK	7:17
5.	"Ayyayo"	Snehan	S. P. Balasubramanyam, S. P. B. Charan, Prashanthini	5:24
6.	"Warriors" (English Rap)	Yogi B	Alwa Vasu, Yogi B	4:20
7.	"A Love Blossoms"		Navin Iyer	1:28
Total length:				32:31

Critical reception

Aadukalam received positive reviews from critics. Sify called it "a gutsy and brilliant film" and mentioned that it " lives up to the expectation that the film carried and the credit goes to Vetrimaran whose research and hard work shows on screen". Behindwoods wrote "Aadukalam is an attempt that requires appreciation where the director has hacked his way through the path less trodden with aplomb". Karthik Subramanian of The Hindu praised the film stating that "The detailing of every characters in the story is intricate. The narrative moves like a good novel where the first few chapters are all about etching and detailing the players, and the plot and the action unfold much later". Pavithra Srinivasan of Rediff.com called it "one of Dhanush's best works to date". Tamil magazine Ananda Vikatan rated the film with 44 marks and mentioned that "This arena is new for presenting cultural nuanecs of a region and changes in human emotions beautifully".

Accolades

Main article: List of accolades received by Aadukalam

Aadukalam won six awards at the 58th National Film Awards ceremony, thereby sharing the record with Kannathil Muthamittal (2002) for the most number of National Film Awards won by a Tamil film. It won awards under the Best Direction (Vetrimaaran), Best Actor (Dhanush), Best Screenplay (Original) (Vetrimaaran), Best Editing (Kishore Te) and Best Choreography (Dinesh Kumar) categories with a Special Jury Award being presented to V. I. S Jayapalan. The film was nominated in seven categories at the 59th Filmfare Awards South, winning Best Film – Tamil (S. Kathiresan), Best Director – Tamil (Vetrimaaran), Best Actor – Tamil (Dhanush), Best Music Director – Tamil (G. V. Prakash Kumar), and Best Cinematographer (Velraj). At the 6th Vijay Awards, it was nominated in twenty-two categories and won in five, including Entertainer of the Year (Dhanush), Best Director (Vetrimaaran) and Best Music Director (G. V. Prakash Kumar). Among other wins, the film received four South Indian International Movie Awards, three Mirchi Music Awards, and one Norway Tamil Film Festival Award, Chennai International Film Festival Award, and Chennai Times Film Award each.

External links

• Aadukalam at IMDb