A Disastrous Quarter!

If Tamil cinema was a publicly traded company and today was the day it reported results for the first quarter of 2005, its stock would have tanked! It has been a poor year for the cinemagoer so far with no single release truly standing out. Going purely by my reviews, I think this is the first year, in the 6 years I have been reviewing movies, that only two movies released in the first three months have earned 2 1/2 stars or more (and one of the two, Kaadhal, was technically released in 2004!). So far, Raam has been the only movie to even attempt to offer something different. All other movies have either been unoriginal, violent masala films, lacklustre romances or failed comedies.

Among the stars, only Vijay has something to be happy about with his Thiruppaachi making money at the box-office (though this is probably reflective of the lack of competition and his star power rather than the quality of the movie itself). All other actors, whether they are longstanding (Sarathkumar, Arjun), established (Ajith, Prashanth), up-and-coming (Dhanush) or over-the-hill (Satyaraj), have seen their films bite the dust.

Tamil cinema atleast can look forward to a better 2nd quarter. Films like Rajnikanth's Chandramukhi, Kamalhassan's Mumbai Express and Vijay's Sachin are slated to arrive early in the quarter while Anniyan, a combined offering from Vikram and Shankar, is not too far behind. Even Godfather, from the trio of Ajith-K.S.Ravikumar-A.R.Rehman, may make it to screens in this quarter if it resolves its issues. All these films, whatever their eventual fate at the box office, are sure to shake up things atleast for a little while. So, carrying the company metaphor a little further, this is probably the best time to buy Tamil cinema stock!