Moondram Kan - Murder mystery

Moondram Kan 

is a Tamil murder mystery film. The cast includes John Vijay, Kalaiyarasan, Vidaarth, KPY Sarath, Santhosh Prathap, Teju Ashwini, and Sundara Travels Radha. In reality, this is a whodunit film. But it is a slightly different one. Instead of clearly revealing the killer, the makers leave the whodunit aspect unsolved and let the audience decide for themselves who the murderer is. So let’s look at how the experience of watching such an unresolved mystery felt.

According to the story, there is a factory. In that factory works a brutally sadistic General Manager named Sadasivam. He never spares anyone, whether they are above him or below him in the hierarchy. He insults and humiliates everyone. If you think he only bullies the workers beneath him, you would be wrong. He even talks the same way to the Managing Director above him. If the MD says something, Sadasivam would respond with something along the lines of,  I’ll take care of all this. I’ve seen bigger people than you. Go sit in your air conditioned cabin and keep pressing buttons. And he says all this right in front of the workers. That felt like a major logic flaw to me. Then, whenever a woman comes for an interview, he goes all the way to her house and shamelessly asks for food to take away. A sadist and a pervert.

Then come four chapters. In other words, four episodes focusing on four different characters who each have a motive to kill Sadasivam. The one that affected me the most was the first episode, Dileepan’s episode. He suffers from a problem called sound sensitivity. I have struggled with this myself and have faced many difficulties in life because of it. But in this episode, it is exaggerated to an extreme level. People in the office play songs loudly on their phones. The General Manager himself does it. If the person listening happens to be vulnerable, it becomes unbearable. They could have simply portrayed Sadasivam as someone who speaks loudly. That would have been believable because I’ve met many people who naturally speak loudly enough for the whole town to hear. But here, the GM is blasting music from his phone while simultaneously talking to someone else on another phone call. That felt like another logic flaw because it is against company rules. Yet in this factory office, Sadasivam casually listens to loud music all the time. There is even an Ilaiyaraaja versus A.R. Rahman debate thrown in.

Then comes another chapter, Prakash’s chapter. Prakash has a problem too. A psychological one, but also a strangely heroic one. Whenever he sees a woman being beaten or mistreated, he becomes consumed by a violent urge to beat the offender to death. The doctor treating him once slapped his stenographer for spilling coffee in front of him. Prakash attacked the doctor, and later that doctor ended up hanging in a photograph with a garland around it. Similarly, Prakash is also the man who tried to attack Sadasivam for raising his hand against a woman working in the company. Honestly, these are qualities that could have been developed into a full fledged protagonist. With proper development, this character could have led a fantastic film similar to Anniyan.

Then comes Harini’s episode. Sadasivam harasses women who come for interviews, even following them home. Harini’s mother turns out to be Sadasivam’s former love interest. It seems his love was one sided in the past. Now she is a widow struggling to raise her daughter. I really wanted to ask her one question. If you already know this man enters your house without permission and behaves in a completely indecent manner, why don’t you simply open the door, go outside, and scream for help? You will probably feel the same while watching the movie. Are you really going to stand there helplessly wringing your hands until he comes close enough to press his nose against your cheek and sniff you? That felt like another major logic flaw.

Then comes Shanmugam’s episode. He has his own issue too. Shanmugam does not talk. He is not mute. He is simply an introvert. But his conscience constantly follows him around and provides running commentary on everything he does. Even when a neighboring woman has him lying on her bed and is touching him intimately, his conscience is still commenting away. It feels awkward for us as viewers. But of course, the woman cannot actually see his conscience. In fact, Shanmugam is a bigger pervert than Sadasivam.

Alright, this is a spoiler. If you do not want spoilers, stop reading here.

The one who kills Sadasivam is Shanmugam. It is understandable why the other three characters each believe they were responsible for his death because all of them have strong motives to kill him. But Shanmugam? His reason is that he was unable to get a woman. Seriously, is that even a reason? If that is supposed to be the reason, it is not convincing at all. And if there is some other reason, then that becomes the biggest logic flaw in the entire movie. Because would someone really kill another person without any meaningful motive?

Anyway, let all that be.

The one person who truly shines in this film is John Vijay, who plays Sadasivam. The reason is simple. Even while the other characters are contemplating killing Sadasivam, his performance is so effective that it makes the audience think, Would it really be so bad if someone killed this man? That impact comes entirely from his acting. If only the film had reduced some of those logical inconsistencies, it could have been excellent.

Alright then. We’ll meet again in the next post. See ya!