Review – Thupakki Munai

Film : Thupakki Munai
Director: Dinesh Selvaraj
Cast: Vikram Prabhu, Hansika Motwani, M S Baskar, Vela Ramamurthy and others
Music: L V Muthu Ganesh

Director Dinesh Selvaraj’s Thupakki Munai is a reasonably engaging film that moves at a fairly brisk pace.

Encounter specialist Birla Bose (Vikram Prabhu) is a nightmare for criminals. The man, who has no remorse or regrets about killing people, believes that if every grain of rice that is consumed by a person has his name written on it is true, then by the same logic, every one of the criminals he has killed have had their names written on his bullets.

While the cops love his cleaning up act, human rights activists loathe him for it. Eventually, he gets suspended for killing a criminal.

Unmindful of the Human Rights commission’s decision to suspend him, police officials and departments across the country use his services illegally.

One such assignment happens to be in Rameswaram. Bose is assigned the task of eliminating a dreaded criminal called Azad, who, the top brass of the police department says, is a former naxal who has raped a 15-year-old school girl.

Bose prepares to take him out. But then something strange happens, the father (M S Baskar) of the girl who was raped and killed comes to meet Bose in a church and tells him that Azad is innocent and that he was being made a scapegoat in the case.

He goes on to inform Bose that the real culprits are four boys including the son of a powerful benami of politicians (played by Vela Ramamurthy).

The information makes Bose wonder what he must do next…

The film is interesting and the manner in which the story is narrated keeps you hooked to the plot. The fact that there are no lengthy song and dance sequences is a big plus.

Hansika as Vikram Prabhu’s former girlfriend has a small but significant role. However, the manner in which they meet each other and fall in love is highly artificial. Thankfully though, this part is very brief and that helps the film big time.

The film has some serious problems in logic. For instance, how is it that the girl’s father gets to know that the cops have ordered an encounter specialist, especially one who has been suspended, to take out Azad?

But then, if you choose to ignore these issues, the story by itself is engaging enough.

Vikram Prabhu does a neat job of playing Birla Bose. His body language, dialogue delivery and expressions all seem to be perfect. In fact, one could say that this role is tailor-made for him.

Hansika looks pretty and plays her part convincingly. The only part that does not work is the romance bit. But that is primarily the director’s fault and it would be unfair to hold Hansika accountable for it.

The film’s background score is another department that works big time. Muthu Ganesh seems to have really lifted the film by a notch with his background score. His work in this film is reassuring and gives us enough reason to believe that yet another excellent music director has announced his arrival in Tamil cinema.

Thuppakki Munai’s biggest strength is M S Baskar who plays the girl’s father. Convincing as always, Baskar brings tears to your eyes when he delivers his lines.

The only thing that doesn’t appeal to you is the preachy lines that he is made to deliver in the climax. It really puts you off.

Other than that, this film is a pretty decent effort by director Dinesh selvaraj and is definitely worth watching once.