Natpe Thunai
Natpe Thunai is a 2019 Indian Tamil-language sports drama film directed by D. Parthiban Desingu in his directorial debut, while Sreekanth Vasrp and Devesh Jeyachandran wrote the story, screenplay and dialogues. Produced by Sundar C and Khushbu under the banner Avni Movies, the film stars Hiphop Tamizha, Harish Uthaman, newcomer Anagha and Karu Pazhaniappan alongside actors Shah Ra, Pandiarajan and Kausalya. It is based on the sport of field hockey.
This is the second film of Adhi as a lead male actor, after Meesaya Murukku. Apart from acting he also scored the music, while Aravinnd Singh and Fenny Oliver handled the cinematography and editing respectively. The film released on 4 April 2019 and became a box office success. In 2021, it was remade in Telugu as A1 Express.
Plot
Prabhakaran is a happy-go-lucky youngster in Pondicherry whose only ambition is to move to France. To that end, he goes to Karaikal, where he falls in love with Deepa, a hockey player. Through her, he comes in contact with Shanmugam, a kindhearted retired military man who is the coach of the local hockey team.A corporate is after the ground where Shanmugam's players practice, and they are aided by the local politician Harichandran. By filing a RTI petition about the company, Shanmugam learns about the corporation's plan to build a factory in the ground which will pollute the nearby rivers and harm the nearby villagers. Now to save the ground from the corporate and Harichandran, Shanmugam's students should play with the Pondicherry hockey team and win the match. While selecting the hockey players for his team, he learns that Prabha was the 2012 Junior World Cup Indian hockey team captain who was banned for three years. When Shanmugam asks Prabha to join their hockey team and help them win the match, he refuses and narrates his past and his reasons for leaving hockey.
Prabha and Azhar, his childhood friend, are both hockey players. Prabha is an attacker in his team, while Azhar plays in defense in the same team. Prabha, after being selected by national selectors, joins the Indian hockey team and later becomes the captain of the 2012 Junior World Cup competition's Indian hockey team, but Azhar is rejected in the Indian hockey team and asks about this to his coach, who mocks his desire to play hockey as well as his financial status and instead tells him to help his father in his fishing business. Because of this, Azhar commits suicide in grief, and one of Prabha's friends loses his leg to an oncoming train when he tries to save him. When Prabha learns of this, he gets furious and beats up his coach, because of which he is banned for three years.
Later, Shanmugam decides to protest against the corporate company's unit being set up there with the help of his students and the local people, but Harichandran uses his dirty tricks and prevents Shanmugam from becoming successful in his protest. Harichandran later acquaints with Prabha's former coach to thwart Shanmugam's team from winning the hockey tournament.
After seeing the local people suffering, Prabha decides to join the hockey team and get back the ground. Shanmugam and Prabha train the players, and later, after facing so many difficulties, they win the match and get their ground back. When they come back to the ground, they see Harichandran, who has lost his position now, giving a speech to the press as feeling happy for Shanmugam team's victory. He comes to Prabha and blames the common people for voting leaders monetary benefits and questions Prabha if the people will elect a person who is doing good for them without any money, for which Prabha is unable to find an answer.