Sivaji - First Day, First Show

To no one’s surprise, Sivaji will be screened at the same 2 theaters in the Bay Area this weekend also. Rajni may be the BOSS(Box Office Super Star) onscreen but since there is another BOSS(Balaji’s Own Strict Spouse) at home, it seems unlikely that I will be able (read allowed!) to see it again this weekend. So I decided to simply relive the experience of watching the 8pm preview show, which was the first screening in the Bay Area, last Thursday.

We’ve long crossed the state where a Rajnikanth movie is just another movie and its release, just another release. With the actor cutting down drastically on his films and his box-office power and aura increasing with each film, his movie releases have become mega-events, each bigger than the one before. Proof of that was seen at the show last week. I have caught the first day shows of Padaiyappa, Baba and Chandramukhi here in the Bay Area and the Sivaji preview was easily the biggest of ‘em all.

I don’t think I have seen the FDFS of a Rajni movie back home in Chennai. Not knowing any theater managers and not counting any Rajni rasigar manram members among my friends, I was forced to stand in line at the ticket counters the first weekend after advance booking opened. With tickets for the first couple of days being blocked en masse by the fan clubs, I would usually get tickets for only the 3rd day or later. The crowds and the celebrations and the torn lottery tickets were all there but I always longingly imagined the scenes inside the theater on the first day.

The FDFS dream came true once I moved to the Bay Area. Knowing the distributor helped me get tickets easily for our full group for Padaiyappa while tickets for Baba and Chandramukhi were sold online and by keeping constant vigil on the website, I was able to snap them up as soon they were announced. Getting tickets for Sivaji turned out to be more complicated. Registration for the tickets was announced a long time back but in a case of procrastination never before seen when it came to Rajni movies, I let it pass by and did not register until I received the 4th email. I was heartbroken when I got an email from them saying that the 8pm show was sold out and that I was in line only for tickets for the 11.15pm show. But salvation came in the form of my wife’s cousin, who had registered for 2 tickets early enough to be get those tickets for the 8pm show and offered me one of them. With the cousin offering me the 2nd ticket and the home BOSS generously agreeing to me going to the show, I was all set (considering the earlier sadness and subsequent turnaround, all I could think was Aandavan nallavangalai sodhippaan, aanaa kai vida maattaan :-).

We arrived at the theater around 7.45pm and the place was already milling with Rajni fans (in a great idea, the distributors assigned row numbers for the tickets. So there were no lines and no mad rush when the doors opened later). Quite a few fans were wearing BOSS t-shirts and a few had on blonde wigs. A roar went around as one fan brought in a Sivaji poster and a short aarthi was performed in front of it, complete with agarbathis and coconuts. Since this was done in a courtyard with a Starbucks and a gym around, there were quite a few curious American onlookers for the activities, as you can imagine. It was almost 9 by the time the movie started but nobody really cared. Chants of thalaivaa or Sivaji went up at regular intervals as the long line snaked through the lobby and up the stairs to the theater door.

Adding to the festive feeling was the number of familiar faces I ran into. I met an old roommate and his friends, a friend who I hadn’t seen in more than 5 years and Shwetha, a regular reader/commenter here, was also nice enough to stop by and say “Hi”.

Mysore paakkus were distributed to viewers as they entered the theater and the atmosphere was electric as we settled in our seats. The Sultan(that's the animation film starring Rajni, directed by Soundarya Rajnikanth) trailer served as an appetizer to the main course and seeing Rajni’s face in graphics was awesome. Loud cheers and cries drowned out everything else as the censor certificate was shown, before stars lined up on screen for Rajni’s name(both the graphics and the background music have been changed from the earlier style that started with Annamalai). Thalaivar’s first appearance was ofcourse treated with thunderous applause as was the Ballelakka… song soon after.

Even in Rajni’s previous films, the noise usually ebbed after the first 10 minutes or so and popped up only occasionally after that during specific styles or punchlines. But the cheers lasted right to the end in Sivaji and I think that by itself is solid testimony to the way Shankar has presented Rajni. Off the top of my head, some specific moments that got the loudest cheers – Vivek’s comment about other actors doing the finger swish and uttering punchlines, the teakadai scene, the glass flip in the Style… song, the Panninga dhaandaa… line, the bullet backtrack in the Adhiradee… song and mottai boss’ arrival.

As we came out of the theater completely hoarse but thoroughly elated, the one thought in everyone’s mind undoubtedly was RAJNI RULES!!