Sarkar

 

Sarkar is a 2018 Indian Tamil-language political action film written and directed by AR Murugadoss, and produced by Kalanithi Maran under the banner of Sun Pictures. The dialogues were co-written by Murugadoss and B. Jeyamohan. The film stars Vijay, Keerthy Suresh and Varalaxmi Sarathkumar while Yogi Babu, Radha Ravi, and Pala. Karuppiah plays supporting roles. The film follows Sundar Ramaswamy, a non-resident Indian (NRI) who arrives in India from the United States to cast his vote in the election, only to find that his vote has already been recorded as cast. Sundar raises awareness against electoral fraud among the masses and decides to contest as a nonpartisan politician in the elections amidst several attempts made on his life and reputation.

Principal photography for Sarkar began in January 2018. Murugadoss collaborated with Vijay for a third time with Sarkar, which was the latter's 62nd film and given the tentative title of Thalapathy 62. In early December 2017, Sun Pictures agreed to produce the film. While Girish Gangadharan handled the cinematography, A. Sreekar Prasad served as the editor. In August, a few scenes were shot at Las Vegas. Filming was completed by September 2018. The film's soundtrack was composed by A. R. Rahman with lyrics written by Vivek.

After various complications, including protests and allegations of plagiarism, Sarkar was released on 6 November 2018, during the week of Diwali, along with the Telugu dubbed version.^[7] It received mixed reviews; while Vijay's performance, concept and cinematography was praised, both the screenplay and sequences were criticised. Post-release, the film involved in controversies with reference to Jayalalithaa in the film's audio track and other sequences from the film led to protests by members of the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam. After lawsuits were registered against the makers, the said allusions were muted. Sarkar has grossed ₹250 crore (US$36 million) worldwide, and has emerged as a commercial success.

Sarkar became Vijay's third film to collect $1 million at the US box office, following Theri and Mersal.^[8] As a result of the film's success, the Election Commission of India created awareness regarding Section 49P of the Conduct of Elections Rules, 1961 that allows a voter to have the right to get back his/her ballot back and vote if someone else voted in that individual's name. Sarkar was screened at Grand Rex, France.^[9] It was also screened in Japan.

Plot

Sundar Ramaswamy is a highly successful non-resident Indian businessman based in the United States, referred to as a "corporate monster" due to his ruthless business dealings. He arrives in Chennai to cast his vote in the Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly election. However, he finds out that someone else had already voted in his name. Sundar approaches the Tamil Nadu State Election Commission and demands a stay on the election result for his constituency, an annulment of the fraud elector's vote, and the ability to legitimately cast his vote, to which they agree. He raises awareness among the public regarding fraud voting and finds that many people too faced a similar problem to his when trying to vote. In parallel, he rekindles his romance with Nila, who is his brother's estranged sister-in-law.

Sundar's actions bring him into conflict with two influential and corrupt politicians: M. Masilamani, who is the Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu; and his brother Malarvannan "Rendu". Although Masilamani's party wins the elections, the Election Commission annuls the result based on Sundar's plea, and fresh elections are scheduled to take place within the next 15 days. After attempts are made on his life by Rendu's henchmen, Sundar decides to contest the election against Masilamani as an Independent and resigns from his company to avoid any conflict-of-interest.

Initially unpopular among the masses due to his corporate background, Sundar delivers a speech detailing his rise from a humble fisherman background to a businessman, and he gains popular support. He and his supporters gatecrash an event involving the merger of Masilamani's party with the opposition. After Sundar confronts Masilamani regarding his silence on district-related issues, the police brutally beats up Sundar and his supporters. At this juncture, he realises that the entire political system in the state and country needs reform, so he decides to contest in all constituencies in Tamil Nadu along with his supporters. Sundar acquires video evidence wherein people who had attempted to expose Masilamani's corruption were killed under mysterious circumstances, and he plans to reveal it to the media to discredit Masilamani and have him arrested.

Meanwhile, Masilamani's daughter Komalavalli "Pappa", based in Canada, arrives in Chennai after finding out that her father and uncle have lost support due to Sundar. She decides to spoil Sundar's reputation and frame him as a corrupt and power-hungry person. She orchestrates a car accident and frames Sundar for it, which causes him to lose considerable public support. She furthers her agenda by killing her father with an overdose of diabetic tablets so that her party will gain sympathy votes. These crimes ensure that Pappa, the new Chief Ministerial candidate for her party, would likely win the election.

On Election Day, Twitter messages generated from one "Muthukumar" allege that Sundar has stashed black money in various locations, which further degrades Sundar's reputation. However, unknown to anyone, the tweets were sent by Sundar himself, as Muthukumar was one of those activists killed by Masilamani. Further messages lead to Muthukumar's decomposed body being found, exposing Pappa's lies. Meanwhile, Pappa finds out that her mother has decided to expose Pappa's role in Masilamani's death at the latter's memorial in front of the media later in the day. She arrives at the memorial with her henchmen to stop the expose, but Sundar subdues Pappa's henchmen, and her mother's confession is live-streamed, which ensures that the public support is back with Sundar.

Sundar and his supporters win the election, while Pappa and Rendu are arrested for their various crimes. However, Sundar decides against becoming the Chief Minister, and instead chooses one of his supporters, an honest collector, to be the next Chief Minister.

 

Ca

st

·         Vijay as Sundar Ramaswamy, a businessman-turned-politician

·         Keerthy Suresh as Nila, Sundar's love interest

·         Varalaxmi Sarathkumar as Komalavalli "Pappa", a politician

·         Radha Ravi as Malarvannan "Rendu", Pappa's paternal uncle

·         Pala. Karuppiah as M. Masilamani, Pappa's father, the former Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu

·         Yogi Babu as Kaushik, a fraudulent voter

·         Rajesh as T. N. Chari, the Election Commissioner

·         Livingston as Venkatesan, Nila's father

·         Tulasi as Masilamani's wife

·         Kalyani Natarajan as Sundar's mother

·         Prem as Sundar's brother

·         Papri Ghosh as Sundar's sister-in-law

·         Ranjini Hariharan as Sundar's sister

·         Yuvina Parthavi as Sundar's niece

·         Arumugam Bala as Sundar's driver

·         M. J. Shriram as Sundar's uncle

·         Janaki as Sundar's grandmother

·         Jayaditya Kang as Kaushal, Sundar and Nila's nephew

·         Kanishk as Sundar's nephew

·         Manya as Sundar's niece

·         K. Sivasankar as Election Officer

·         S. S. Stanley as Merged Party Candidate

·         Ashwanth Thilak as Reporter

·         Raneesh as Muthukumar, an activist who was killed by Masilamani

·         Ravi as Rathnasamy

·         Meenu as Victim

·         Alok Nath as Jethmalani

·         ECR Saravanan as Ayodhyakuppam Resident

·         Selva as Ayodhyakuppam Resident

·         Anitha Sampath as Newsreader

·         Balasubramani as Police Commissioner

·         Lallu as IIT student

·         Elyssa Erhardt as Sundar's PA

·         Raja Rani Pandian as Voting Poll Worker

·         Vinod as Governor's PA

·         A. R. Murugadoss in a special appearance as common man in "Oru Viral Puratchi" song

·         Simran Gupta in a special appearance as dancer in "Simtaangaran" song

Real-life activists such as Kalki Subramaniam, Piyush Manush and Fatima Babu made cameo appearances as themselves in the song "Oru Viral Puratchi