Thupparivaalan
Thupparivaalan is a 2017 Indian Tamil-language action thriller film written and directed by Mysskin, and produced by Vishal, who also enacts the lead role with Prasanna. The film features Vinay Rai, Anu Emmanuel, Andrea Jeremiah and K. Bhagyaraj in supporting roles. Loosely inspired by British writer Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes stories, the film follows a private detective and his associate who investigate the death of a child's pet dog, which leads to them uncovering a bigger conspiracy. The film began production in 2016, and was released on 14 September 2017.
Plot
The film starts with IT company owner Dhivakar celebrating his birthday with his family, when a sudden lightning strike fatally electrocutes him and his son before burning their bodies in front of his horrified wife and daughter. At a cinema, a man gropes a woman and a small commotion ensues, which is stopped by ACP Paul Dhanarajan, who dies in the middle of a police conference three days later. The plot shifts to the brash yet brilliant private detective Kaniyan Poongundran aka Kani, who lives with his associate Manohar aka Mano. They both come across Mallika, who leads a pickpocketing scheme with her younger siblings. After Kani deals with her alcoholic, abusive uncle, she comes to work as his housekeeper.One day, a schoolboy named Naveen visits Kani and Mano with the case of his pet German Spitz Nemo, who was shot dead on a beach, and asks them to find the killer. Naveen gives them the bullet from Nemo's body. Kani finds that it is a 9 mm bullet which had ricocheted before hitting Nemo. At the crime scene, he finds a tooth, whose owner is traced to be Swarnavel, a former university physics professor who lives alone and is now a stockbroker. Swarnavel's ex-wife reveals they divorced after their son's accidental death two years prior, which he blamed her for. Meanwhile, a shady man named Kamalesh visits a travel agency to deliver a sofa stashed with money to five people who run the agency as a cover for contract assassinations: Devil, Muthu, Pritha, a stout man, and a bald man.
Kani recollects a news article about the deaths of Dhivakar and his son and visits Mrs. Dhivakar's house, where he finds that Swarnavel was present at a nearby construction site on the day of the incident. He then concludes that it was artificial lightning devised by Swarnavel that killed Dhivakar. When the assassins learn that Kani is on their tail, Devil disposes of Swarnavel's body, who was killed earlier.
Kani and Manohar visit Dhivakar's office and learn that a tender which was to be awarded to Dhivakar is now with Ram Prasad, the head of a rival company. Before they can reach Ram Prasad, he is assassinated. Infuriated about assassinating their client, Kamalesh hires Chinese mercenaries to kill Kani, who defeats them and finds out about Kamalesh's involvement, but Kamalesh is killed by Pritha. A police chase occurs as Pritha and the bald man try to escape but are later cornered. The bald man then kills himself, allowing Pritha to escape. The next day in a shopping mall, Pritha makes a failed attempt to kill Kani, who is saved by Mallika.
Kani and Mano meet Police Inspector Madhivanan and ACP Vijayakumar in a hotel, where yet another failed assassin attempt is made. Muthu plans to inject Kani with a poison dart, but Mano is caught in the crossfire and rushed to the hospital. They learn that Mano was hit by the same dart as Paul. They raid the travel agency, and Devil kills Muthu to cover his tracks. They find some physics books related to lightning.
Kani receives a threat via SMS that his loved ones are in danger. He ensures that Manohar is safe in the hospital but cannot save Mallika, who is stabbed to death by Devil. It is later revealed that Madhivanan was an informer for Devil. Upon interrogating him, Madhivanan discloses that Ram Prasad hired Devil and his team to assassinate Dhivakar to get the tender, for which they recruited Swarnavel to create the artificial lightning. However, Swarnavel was guilt-ridden due to the collateral death of Dhivakar's son, who reminded him of his own late son, and decided to expose their involvement. Devil and his team pursued and killed Swarnavel, who was planning to flee India using fake passports, at a beach to keep him quiet. Nemo tried to intervene and bit Devil, causing him to shoot at the dog, unknowingly killing it with the ricocheted bullet, before the assassins hid Swarnavel's body in their office refrigerator. As for Paul, he was investigating a rape case committed by a hotelier on his driver's wife and was killed by Devil and his team since he was close to catching the culprit. Kani, Mano, and a police team go to a mangrove forest in search of Devil. All of them die except Kani, Mano, and Vijayakumar. Later, Kani and Vijayakumar are both caught by Devil, who has kidnapped Naveen to use as a hostage.
Tied by a rope on a dock, Kani reveals how he managed to uncover Devil's backstory and tells him that the police have been informed of the same. Infuriated by this, Devil tries to stab Kani, but Mano manages to untie him. Eventually, Kani kills Devil. In his dying moments, Devil tells Naveen that he is sorry for killing Nemo. Later, as Naveen returns home from school one afternoon, he finds a Pomeranian puppy along with a note bearing Kani's name in a basket at his doorstep.
Cast
- Vishal as Kaniyan Poongundran, a detective who is called upon to find the killer of Naveen's dog Nemo
- Prasanna as Manohar, Kaniyan's associate
- Vinay Rai as John Richardson Holcha/Devil, the man responsible for killing Nemo
- Anu Emmanuel as Mallika, a pickpocket who befriends Kaniyan
- Andrea Jeremiah as Pritha, a woman who runs the travel agency
- K. Bhagyaraj as Muthu aka Uncle, a man who runs the travel agency
- Shaji Chen as ACP Vijayakumar
- John Vijay as Kamalesh, a shady man who tries to kill Kaniyan
- Master Nishesh as Naveen, a young schoolboy whose dog Nemo was killed by Devil
- Ashvatt as Swarnavel, a physics professor-turned-stockbroker
- Dheeraj Rathnam as a stout man who runs the travel agency
- Siddhanth Venkatesh as a bald man who runs the travel agency
- Abhishek Shankar as Inspector Madhivanan, an informer for Devil
- Jayaprakash as Ram Prasad, the head of Dhivakar's competitor company
- Ravi Mariya as Mallika's uncle
- Aadukalam Naren as ACP Paul Dhanarajan
- Ajay Rathnam as Police Chief
- Thalaivasal Vijay as Madhavan
- Vincent Asokan as Dhivakar, a man who dies due to a lightning strike
- Simran as Dhivakar's wife
Production
In February 2016, director Mysskin was reported to have begun working on a film starring Vishal. The film, titled Thupparivaalan, was formally launched at a ceremony in Chennai on 10 March 2016. Prior to the start of shoot, Mysskin cast several other leading actors and the film was dubbed by the media to be a "multi-starrer". Actress Rakul Preet Singh was cast in a leading role, making her comeback to Tamil films after becoming popular in the Telugu film industry. Likewise actors Vinay and Prasanna were signed to portray supporting roles. K. Bhagyaraj was also selected to portray a key antagonistic role. Vinay said he accepted the film to break out of the "chocolate boy" image he had been stereotyped in for years.The film began production in Chennai on 26 September 2016. Soon after the shoot began, Singh opted out of the film citing scheduling clashes, and was replaced by Malayalam actress Anu Emmanuel, who would make her debut in the Tamil film industry. Anu was signed following a test photo shoot in October 2016, where Mysskin asked her to sport a sari. Akshara Haasan was also signed on to portray another pivotal role during the same month and was expected to shoot for the film alongside her commitments in Vivegam. Haasan later opted out of the project and was replaced in the role by Andrea Jeremiah. Mysskin signed Ashvatt for the pivotal role of Swarnavel, after he was impressed by the actor's earlier performance in his film Pisaasu and Savarakathi.
In May 2017, Mysskin said there were only ten days more of the shoot required. Mysskin added that he was inspired by the tales of Sherlock Holmes when writing the film and stated Vishal's character would resemble the detective. Likewise, Prasanna's character would be along the lines of Dr. Watson from Arthur Conan Doyle's Holmes novels. In August 2017, near the end of filming, Vishal suffered a minor injury on his knee while Vinay hurt his shoulders while filming an action scene. The pair, however, chose to continue with the shoot to avoid delays.