PS-1: Chola Kingdom by Mani Ratnam has beautiful moments and interesting characters
Prologue:
I was in B.Tech when Mani’s previous theatrical release: CCV released. It got dubbed into Telugu as Nawab. Even though I didn’t like the movie, I praised the movie and suggested it to my friends and family so that they watch the movie. It was my sincere respect and love towards him.
As the days passed, my respect towards Mani Ratnam increased so much that I wouldn’t consider anyone to be in comparison to him at one point. He would be the greatest filmmaker for me (I even feel the same now). Last year, I enjoyed reading “Conversations with Mani Ratnam”, exploring most of his movies while reading the book.
From the time I started knowing him, I’ve known that Mani and Kamal tried to adapt the popular historical-fiction novel Ponniyin Selvan, written by Kalki Krishnamurthy. Due to budget limitations, they had to back off.
After hearing that Mani would direct PS during the lockdown, I was excited not because he made his dream project but also to see him as a director and not the story writer this time. He once mentioned in an interview that ‘he is looking forward to making a movie for which the script is written by someone else.’
Coming to the story, I’ve known it as the story of Cholas and their internal politics. In the latest interview, Vikram (who plays Aditya Karikalan) funnily mentioned that he got a response from Mani saying that his character doesn’t marry Aish’s character (who plays Nandini) this time, too, after Ravanan!
I read a couple of lines about the main characters, knowing that Jayam Ravi will play the titular character.
So, I had the dots, and soon after the movie started, I connected all of them to understand the context. I didn’t watch the movie trailer as I was sceptical about getting to know all the high moments in the film from the trailer itself.
I was accompanied by Sameera. We planned to watch this movie at AMB Hyderabad but watched it on a single screen in Gadwal.
Disclaimer: If you’ve not watched the movie yet, some context about the Chola kingdom might help.
Now, let’s get into what I felt while/after watching the movie.
When there’s a book adaptation, the characters would have depth and arcs, and they drive the story forward. There won’t be any half-baked characters without a tail or head. The strength of this movie is obviously the strong writing provided by Kalki, loooong back!
Kundavai doesn’t want Aditya to marry Nandini because Kundavai is jealous of Nandini’s beauty, as per Aditya. Kundavai’s reason for bringing an alliance to the eldest son of Sundara Chola shouldn’t be an orphan is equally justified.
With a broken heart after love failure, Aditya leaves the capital to ruthlessly win over other kingdoms and becomes a violent human.
The scene where Aditya narrates his love story to one of his aides is picturised so that the audience can understand the unstable and unsettling state of Aditya’s mind while he talks about Nandini. The music peaks when Aditya narrates what he sees when he finds Veerapandiyan.
While Kundavai knows about the planned mutiny against Sundara Chola, she smartly diverts the attention of Ministers of the Chola dynasty into becoming Sundara Chola’s relatives proposing alliances for both of her brothers!
Nandini wants to avenge the death of Veerapandiyan and uses her wits all the time. As Periya Pazhuvettaraiyar says, “Your intelligence is overshadowed by your beauty,” we can’t help but agree! I don’t think it’s possible to control ourselves to read about Nandini’s character after watching the movie. Perfect casting, indeed!
In the scene where Periya Pazhuvettarayar and Nandini send a troop to inform Ponniyin Selvan to return to Thanjavur, there’s a rising flame on the tower behind Nandini, and the Sun is covered by her. Framing reflects the emotions of the character’s internal desire to see the kingdom suffer, to avenge the death of Veerapandiyan.
Observe the costume of Nandini while she stands and stares at the throne of Chola when Periya Pazhuvettarayar comes to visit Sundara Chola.
Even though I watched the movie in Telugu, the dialogues in certain places are written well. There’s a scene where Nandini (Aishwarya Rai) welcomes Kundavai (Trisha) to Thanjavur, where they sarcastically praise each other’s beauty, enhanced by ARR’s stunning and goosebumps-worthy score.
While watching the scene, Sameera mentioned, “Pradyu, I’m getting goosebumps now!” Just two women staring and talking to each other with a solid background score can be as impactful as this! I hope they release the OST soon.
Karthi’s portrayal of Vanthiyathevan is the best, I believe. He flirts with the women with his words so sharp that there’s a dialogue about the sharpness of his sword too :)
He is charming throughout the movie, and I’ll be rooting for a spinoff web series on this role played by him! Even his horse, Simba, does these naughty things!
The only minor complaint I had was with the casting of Jayam Ravi as Ponniyin Selvan. For some reason, he wasn’t effective. He did his role well, but seeing him in the titular role wasn’t that high. Maybe Mani has something to offer in PS-2.
The placement of all songs is amazing, except we couldn’t see the playful Sol on screen. Years back, we saw Karthi and Parthiban in Aayirathil Oruvan dancing to their cultural song during the festivities. Here, we saw Ratchasa Maamaney and Devaralan Aattam with rich visuals and rooted music.
There is an external conflict with Pandyas and an internal conflict to dethrone Sundara Chola and his sons from the kingdom. All the women playing mind games win over the other, impacting the story to a greater extent.
I wasn’t expecting a mad rush of a war-time periodic movie and was looking forward to a drama set during the Chola period. I’m quite impressed by the way Mani mounted this magnum opus. I didn’t see the end card coming and was completely surprised to see the movie ending abruptly. It felt like a rush, and I’m even more excited for PS-2 now!
Mani made this movie by being faithful to the book, not adding unwanted songs/fights, and doesn’t forcefully give us a high adrenaline rush. It’s a period drama, and he aced it!
Thank you, Mani, for making an honest film and making me witness a theatrical blockbuster while watching your films.
We witnessed the comebacks of two legends this year — Kamal and Mani ❤
Epilogue:
On Twitter, I saw people comparing PS-1 with Bahubali, mostly because both are periodic movies. Bahubali is fiction and made on a bigger budget over a long time, starting from scratch. Both are completely different. It’s like comparing apples to oranges.
PS-1 had a script taken from a book, which is quite popular among Tamil-speaking people and is treated as one of the greatest books ever written in Tamil literature. Mani tried to stay true to the book without forcefully making it commercial.
Mani has popular writer Jeyamohan to help with writing, and an actor called Elango Kumaravel contributed to the screenplay.
I read that Elango Kumaravel directed a theatrical play version of Ponniyin Selvan. Impressed with it, Mani hired him as a writer for this film.
While I understand it’s difficult to identify each character and remember their names, it could’ve been better if we had known the Chola history.
I explained the character names and potential story to Sameera at the film’s beginning (with little knowledge). There were people shouting about “not understanding anything” in the middle of the film due to many characters getting introduced!
The theatre had the worst sound systems, so we couldn’t hear the dialogues clearly. The brightness was low, and the experience of watching the night scenes was even worse.
The audience surrounding you in the theatre impacts your experience too! There was a guy using WhatsApp, playing voice recordings. Another guy was constantly opening and closing the door, leaving a patch of light on the screen. Two guys were chatting so loudly that I couldn’t hear all the dialogues clearly.
I’ll try watching it in a good cinema hall soon, to have a better experience. By the way, I’ve been listening to this sweet song on loop now:
Before closing this, I’d like to share this funny speech and mimicry by Jayaram at the Pre-Release event of PS-1:
