‘Vaa Vaathiyaar’ movie review: Karthi, Nalan Kumarasamy whip a stale ‘Anniyan’ redux

For over four decades, until his death in 1987, a multi-hyphenate actor, politician, and philanthropist had been a beacon of hope for the Tamils all around the world. Through his films, he became a vigilante of justice, a leader of liberation, and the voice of the voiceless. As the Chief Minister of the state, his legacy only grew exponentially. Even today, windshields of autorickshaws, mirrors on barbershops, radios at tea shops and photoframes on local food joints sing his praise, and even today, in the deepest corners of a million hearts, his name is etched as a symbol of hope. MG Ramachandran’s storied legacy is bigger than life itself. It’s an emotion that altered the fate of Tamil Nadu once and forever.

Now, picture this: what if, nearly 40 years after his death, MGR resurrects from the dead and possesses a cop to fight injustice? This wacky thought, with some tweaks, seems to be the seed of an idea that has driven Tamil filmmaker Nalan Kumarasamy to take a detour into the masala cinema genre. In his latest vigilante fantasy entertainer Vaa Vaathiyaar(named after MGR’s famous moniker, meaning ‘teacher’), actor Karthi plays Rameshwaran J a.k.a Ramu, the inspector of the Puliyur Kottam station in the fictional town of Maasila (we don’t know why they needed to fictionalise the city, but the interesting titbit is that ‘Puliyur Kottam’ is the name of the ancient town where Chennai now stands).

Karthi in a still from ‘Vaa Vaathiyaar’
| Photo Credit:
Special Arrangement

His grandfather Bhoomipichai (Rajkiran), an ardent fan of MGR, believes that his grandson is a reincarnation of his idol and nurtures him with the same principles and ideals that were professed by the superstar. But an incident that happens when he’s young tells Ramu that being MGR doesn’t offer you the pleasures of life — you have to be Nambiar (actor, famous for starring as the antagonist in many MGR films). And so, Ramu learns the subtle art of cheating cleanly — achieving the means to an end with dubious ways — a skill that makes him a one-of-a-kind corrupt cop.

He is tasked to investigate a hacktivist group called the Yellow Face that has leaked information about a conspiracy involving the Chief Minister of the state (Nizhalgal Ravi) and a business tycoon, Periyasaami (Sathyaraj, with eerie prosthetic teeth), who are conspiring to steal €142 million at the cost of several innocent lives. During this investigation comes the most anticipated part: Ramu inadvertently develops an alter-ego and unknowingly transforms into a whip-wielding, horse-riding MGR who vows to take down the corrupt enemies.

Firstly, for much of the first half, Vaa Vaathiyaar seems to be precisely the kind of masala film that Nalan Kumarasamy had promised during the pre-release interviews. It has a fantastic, quirky set-up, and it is always fun to see Karthi play a jolly-go-lucky and morally ambiguous character like Ramu. The pre-intermission reveal makes you wonder about how MGR’s style of fighting justice would hold against a new-world order where filth runs deep into politics and where any and all technology helps the corrupt more.

But then, everything goes awry for Vaa Vaathiyaar in the second half. As one feared from the promo material of the film, the MGR persona comes too close to becoming a laughing stock, especially when it veers into the romance zone in a scene featuring Vaathiyaar and Wu. After using the popular MGR songs ‘Unnai Arindhaal’ and ‘Naan Ungal Veettu Pillai’ in one of the best scenes of the film, Nalan chooses to remix ‘Raajavin Paarvai’ for a song sequence, but its awful placement tests your patience — it’s as if someone told Nalan that placing a song post intermission is a necessary ingredient in the masala formula.

There have been countless films like Anniyan and Tughlaq Durbar that follow an ordinary man who develops an alter-ego that fights against injustice, and it’s always fascinating to see the two identities collide or converse with each other. The same happens here, and Karthi shines as a performer in scenes that feature both personalities. However, the stakes aren’t as immediate as you would hope, and so these moments stick out like a sore thumb. Only an eye mask and make-up differentiate Vaathiyaar and Ramu, and even if you were to buy that it’s a disguise difficult to crack (not hard for Superman fans), that the antagonists hardly come any closer to figuring out Vaathiyaar’s identity is a bummer.

Krithi Shetty and Karthi in a still from ‘Vaa Vaathiyaar’
| Photo Credit:
Special Arrangement

Moreover, the high-concept needed a bigger canvas. After a point, all that the MGR persona does to take on the villains is… fistfighting or fighting with his whip. But what more can he do when he is put amidst such a stale evil-corporate-corrupt-politician backdrop? Of course, it’s courageous on Nalan’s part to speak about the Thoothukudi police firing incident, but how it’s all woven together feels contrived, as if it were all about following a tested screenwriting formula.

The thread about Krithi’s Wu, which promised a genre twist, ends up going nowhere. And so we get nothing about who she is or what her connection with the owl she finds in a tree is. That she falls in love, not with Ramu, but with a persona of a yesteryear actor, without digging into how this happened, raises questions in you, but all that the film seems to say is that she is a wackadoodle.

The climax, in particular, is a chaotic mess that leaves you with a brain-freezing aftertaste. In fact, the choppy second half and the hurried narration make one wonder why a film like Vaa Vaathiyaar had to be just 120-odd minutes. Perhaps Nalan could have salvaged the film with a scene or two more in the second half. Of course, we didn’t expect Vaa Vaathiyaar to be a standard Nalan Kumarasamy film, but this could still have become an interesting masala film.

In any case, Vaa Vaathiyaar isn’t a tribute worth reawakening the spirit of the puratchi thalaivar. If anything, what’s truly fascinating about this exercise is the idea that an actor, known for playing vigilantes in films, has, in a way, done the same after nearly 40 years since his death. The legacy lives on.

Vaa Vaathiyaar is currenly running in theatres

Published – January 14, 2026 06:29 pm IST