Review: Pandigai

Film: Pandigai

Director: Feroz

Cast: Krishna, Anandhi, Saravanan, Nithin Sathyaa, Sabarish, Karunas, Madhusudhanan

Music: R H Vikram

Cinematography: Aarvi

Very rarely does one get to watch a film that has been made with so much care that every single scene in it rises to the occasion and manages to keep the audience hooked on to it. Director Feroz’s Pandigai is one such film. The intense action thriller provides a detailed insight into the unlawful activities that go on in the city unchecked.

Velu (Krishna) is an intern in a star hotel who has experienced nothing but suffering from the time he was a boy. Having had to fight for even his basic rights, Velu is looking to raise his stature in society. His dream is to work in a foreign country, make it big and thereby earn the status of being a respectable man. Until the time he leaves the country, he chooses to intern with the hotel, surviving on the generous tips that guests at the hotel care to give.

Velu has a problem. He desperately needs money to arrange for papers to go abroad and work but then, there is no way he can generate that money.

At the same point in time, in another part of town is the small video parlour of Muni Shekhar(Saravanan), a game shop owner by profession and a gambler by nature.

Muni Shekhar is so passionate about gambling that he is into all forms of betting. From cricket matches to underground fights, Muni Shekhar is a known face in all the gambling circuits. And like most gamblers, Muni Shekhar too isn’t smart. His love for gambling makes him vulnerable to exploitation by people like Natwar Dada, a don who runs an underground fight club in which spectators bet big on the fighters.

Dada, who has a keen eye for people like Muni Shekhar, cons them by giving them reason to believe that a match is fixed and draws them into betting big on someone who they believe will definitely win. However, when the team or the fighter on whom these people bet big loses, the gambler too loses all his money.

On one particular occasion, Dada uses a cop in his services to con Muni Shekhar. The cop tells Shekhar that he has confidential information from the CBI that a particular cricket match between India and England has been fixed and that India will win the match. He gives Shekhar Rs Two lakhs and asks him to place a bet on India, on his behalf, saying that being a police officer, he cannot afford to be seen in the betting circuit.

He urges Shekhar too to bet big on India, saying he will need to give 10 per cent of the winnings as his commission for the secret information he provided on the fixed match. Shekhar, blinded by his greed, agrees. He goes home, pledges his home to a ruthless financier, who charges an exhorbitant rate of interest, to generate funds and places the entire amount as a bet. India loses and with it, Muni Shekhar loses his home as well. His pregnant wife, on getting to learn that they have lost their home, chooses to walk out on him and says that she will come back only when he has reclaimed their home.

Muni Shekhar, like Velu, is desperate for money.

As fate would have it, both people get to meet each other for the first time in a bar. Velu ends up having a fight in the bar and is promptly noticed by everybody there. Muni Shekhar is impressed by Velu’s fighting skills and gets an idea. He makes an offer to Velu, who initially refuses to take it up.

But with desperation setting in, he takes up the offer of fighting in the fight club, which is referred to as Pandigai. Initially, Velu makes money fighting in the underground club and with him, Muni Shekhar too begins to make money. But then, both require a huge sum to take care of their needs and the money they make by winning fights isn’t enough.

So, Muni Shekhar comes up with a bold plan to make it big. He decides to fix the last fight of the season. This time, however, Shekhar isn’t looking to bet on Velu but rather his opponent. He explains to Velu that only ensuring victory in a match is difficult. Ensuring defeats are well within the control of the fighter in the bout. He says that he will bet big on his opponent and that Velu should lose the fight. Velu agrees. This time, confident that he is going to recover all that he has lost, Muni Shekhar pledges his shop too to generate a huge sum and places them as a bet in the fight. But then, something totally unexpected happens stunning them all and putting them in an even more desperate situation…

The film is finely crafted, right from start to finish. Actors Krishna, and Anandhi, who play the lead, excel. Two other actors who have delivered outstanding performances and have made a strong comeback with this film are Saravanan as Muni Shekhar and Nithin Sathya as Munthiri Sait. Both these people transform themselves into their characters and thereby transport us into the murky, dangerous and dark underworld of gambling.

Arul Dass as Feeling Suresh and Madhusudhanan as Natwar Dada too impress.

Prabhakar’s editing is just about right, with no sequence or scene coming across as boring,dull or repetative.

On the whole, Feroz has made a film that is bound to get your attention right from the minute it starts till the time it finishes.