#Kannathil muthamittal how to#
#Kannathil muthamittal archive#

Madhavan is a likable presence and I think he plays the role well. So far, so glamorous and the father is played by Madhavan, Mani RatnamРІР‚в„ўs discovery from TV who has become both a Tamil and Hindi star. She is a morning newscaster on a Chennai TV station. But his wife is no stay at home housewife. Father is a production line engineer who conveniently has plenty of spare time to write short stories (using his wifeРІР‚в„ўs name, РІР‚ВIndiraРІР‚в„ў, as a pseudonym). The adoptive couple are middle class with the resources to do things. How does he do it? First, it is important to recognise that he has a conventional popular narrative approach.

#Kannathil muthamittal how to#

But Mani Ratnam knows how to handle it, as he had already demonstrated with Bombay (1995), set amidst communal violence. The combination of an emotional struggle within a family and an attempted reunion literally in the midst of guerilla war is potentially overwhelming. The trip from Chennai to Northern Sri Lanka is much shorter, but much more dangerous. Mani Ratnam reportedly based the story on the experience of American parents taking their adopted daughter back to the Philippines to meet her mother. The couple then decide to tell the child about the adoption on her ninth birthday. Kannathil Muthamittal tells the story of a child born in a refugee camp for Sri Lankan Tamils in India and subsequently adopted by an engineer/writer who marries the girl next door in order to qualify as an adoptive father. I use the scare quotes to emphasise that RatnamРІР‚в„ўs world is not a simple reflection of reality (which we all know is impossible on film) but that his construction of reality does draw on the experiences of families living in a recognisable world. By contrast, Mani RatnamРІР‚в„ўs Tamil films deal with real social issues set in РІР‚ВrealРІР‚в„ў environments. The clichР“В© is that Bollywood represents a fantasy India constructed just for the vicarious entertainment of the cinema audience. When I watch the Tamil films, I really do wonder why anyone bothers to watch the majority of Bollywood films. Although my experience of Mani RatnamРІР‚в„ўs work is limited, IРІР‚в„ўm reasonably confident in asserting that his films shot in the South are better than those made elsewhere in India.

The other was Alai Payuthey (2000), one of my favourite films that I have watched several times.

Kannathil Muthamittal ( A Peck on the Cheek) is one of two films made back in Tamil Nadu by Mani Ratnam after his Hindi experience with Dil Se.

#Kannathil muthamittal archive#

The summer is a chance to watch some of my archive of videotapes and transfer those worth using to DVD. Keerthana and Simran as adopted daughter and her legal mother