#Thegidi, A Tamil Film: "The Verger" and his franchises

For those who are not familiar with Somerset Maugham's short Story of Verger. Verger is a functionary in a church. The verger in Maugham's short story has been with a church for several decades until a new priest(for want of a better word. Cannot recollect the exact word) is assigned to the church. The new boss decides to axe the verger.  On his dismissal the verger sets out of the church into the street. The verger seeks his fix of smoke to neutralize his anxiety. Lo and Behold!!! he does not find any shop that sells tobacco in any form!!!. What does the Verger do? He sets up a shop that sells Tobacco. The shop is successful. He then goes on to locate streets in London which does not have Tobacco shops and goes on to become a millionaire.

C.V.Kumar, has been quietly going about with a "verger" like approach to create franchises out of rarely visited Genres in Tamil and Indian Cinema. The admiration quotient increases since he has the guts to invest with debutant’s in all spheres of film making. A definite efficiency in cost, quick turnaround times, smart marketing and definite feel for the audience sensibilities.

Pizza has been unmistakably a successful franchise with second portion better than the first.

Rarely do we have Perry Mason or a Sherlock Holmes straddling Indian Cinema. Kumar expands his forays into the other genres. And the game is certainly afoot!!! There are clear indications of the second helping in the offing.

Much as your admire the Kumar's approach to the market, the film itself leaves you with mixed feelings.

Characters like Sherlock, Perry Mason or Sujatha's Ganesh, were very well defined and had tremendous experience to dabble in what they went to do.

I am not sure if it was a great idea to consider a protagonist, fresh out of college. Readers of Sherlock Holmes, must be familiar with some stories where Sherlock could distinguish the flavour of excess of 100 different types of tobacco. While you require flair, detection, also requires knowledge and it takes experience to convert flair into skill.

I think there was also confusion in the writing, with the lack of clarity if it wanted to treated like a detective story or narrate it like a thriller. Kumar now has the added pressure of articulating this genre.

I had hoped the suspense in the film had not been be so obvious and was kind of disappointed that the fourth constraint of the story was eliminated rather quickly.

There is no mistaking the potential of the crew. As Ashok Selvan gazes the vast expanse of the river, waiting to communicate with the man performing the obsequies, and as his gaze anxiously wanders to catch the action happening around, and as the man gets into the water to complete his obsequies, you certainly have few minutes of unadulterated film viewing ecstasy.

About a few years back there was a film called Vande mataram, it was not a badly made thriller, the movie suffered I thought due to a very bad background score. Imman had scored the music. Imman has redeemed himself several times over since Mynaa.

Maybe the music in Thegidi(Some of the songs were good)is not as bad as Vande Matram, but the background score was gross and insensitive. You had half a mind to jump up and scream, To shut the…..!!!