Thupparivaalan

Thupparivaalan (transl. Detective) 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 (in her Tamil debut), 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 nearly complete by August 2017. It was released on 14 September 2017.

Thupparivaalan
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Mysskin
Written by	Mysskin
Produced by	Vishal
Starring	Vishal Prasanna Vinay Rai Anu Emmanuel Andrea Jeremiah
Cinematography	V. I. Karthik
Edited by	N. Arunkumar
Music by	Arrol Corelli
Production company	Vishal Film Factory
Distributed by	Madras Enterprises
Release date	14 September 2017 (2017-09-14)
Country	India
Language	Tamil

Plot

The film starts with IT company owner, Dhivakar, and his family celebrating his birthday, when a sudden lightning strike hits him and his son and burns them to death. 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 detective Kaniyan Poongundran aka Kani, who lives with his associate Manohar aka Mano. They both come across Mallika through a pickpocketing incident. Later, she comes to work as a housekeeper at Kani's house.

One day, a schoolboy named Naveen visits Kani and Mano with the case that his pet German Spitz (inaccurately identified as a Pomeranian) Nemo was shot dead and asked them to find the killer. Naveen gives them the bullet from Nemo's body. Kaniyan finds that it is a 9 mm bullet which had been ricocheted from 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. Meanwhile, a shady man named Kamalesh visits a travel agency to deliver a sofa stashed with money to five people who run the agency and who are believed to be assassins: Devil, Muthu, Pritha, a stout man, and a bald man.

Kani recollects a news article about an incident that involves the deaths of Dhivakar and his son and goes to Mrs. Dhivakar's house and 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 to kill Dhivakar. When the assassins learn that Kani is on their tail, Devil disposes of the body of Swarnavel, who was killed earlier.

Kaniyan 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 the company that Dhivakar competed with. Before they could 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. Soon after, the bald man 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 Kaniyan with a poison dart, but Mano was caught in the crossfire and is 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, saying that his beloved ones are in danger. He ensures that Manohar is safe in the hospital but could not save Mallika in time as she was stabbed by Devil. It is later revealed that Madhivanan was an informer for Devil. Upon interrogating him, he discloses that Ram Prasad hired Devil and his team to assasinate Dhivakar to get the tender which went to him, for which they recruited Swarnavel to create the artificial lightning that killed Dhivakar and his son. Unforturnately Swarnavel felt guilt ridden upon seeing Dhivakar's son, who resembled like his late son and decided to expose their involvement in Dhivakar's death. Fearing their exposure, Devil and his team pursue and kill Swarnavel, who was planning to escape from India using fake passports. However, Nemo intervened and bit Devil, who attempted to kill it, with a bullet ricocheting on it, and they hid Swarnavel's body in their office refrigerator. On Paul's case, he was investigating a rape case committed by a hotelier on his driver's wife and was killed by Devil and his team (who were hired by the hotelier) since he was close to catching the culprit. Kani, Mano, and a police team go in search of Devil to a mangrove forest. All of them die except Kani, Mano, and Vijayakumar. Later, Kani and Vijayakumar are both caught by Devil, as he blackmails them using Naveen.

Tied by a rope, 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 (Cameo appearance)
• Simran as Dhivakar's wife (Cameo appearance)

Production

In February 2016, director Mysskin was reported to have begun working on a film starring Vishal.^[1] The film, titled Thupparivaalan, was formally launched at a ceremony in Chennai on 10 March 2016.^[2][3] 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.^[4][5] K. Bhagyaraj was also selected to portray a key antagonistic role.^[6]

The film began production in Chennai on 26 September 2016.^[7] Soon after the shoot began, Singh opted out of the film citing scheduling clashes,^[8] 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.^[9] 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 (2017).^[10] Haasan later opted out of the project and was replaced in the role by Andrea Jeremiah.^[11][12] 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.^[13]

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.^[14][15][16] 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.^[17]

Music

Unlike most Indian films, the makers avoided including multiple songs; the only song in the film is "Ivan Thupparivaalan", written by Mysskin (who sings along with Hemambiga) and composed by Arrol Corelli,^[18] who also composed the background music.^[19]

Release and reception

Thupparivaalan was released on 14 September 2017.^[20] M. Suganth of The Times of India wrote "[..] what sets Thupparivaalan apart from regular action thrillers is how it not only thrills us, but also makes us feel".^[21] Baradwaj Rangan wrote for Film Companion, "It was perhaps only a matter of time before Mysskin reached for Arthur Conan Doyle for what are his films, in essence, if not mysteries that involve a lot of detecting and end with big reveals?".^[22] Vishal Menon of The Hindu wrote, "After the disastrous 'Mugamoodi', 'Thupparivaalan' was always going to be Mysskin's trial-by-fire in the world of big budget commercial cinema. With 'Thupparivaalan', Myskkin has opened up his universe to the common man, reminding us that there's nothing as pleasurable as seeing someone sneak a bit of art into entertainment cinema".^[23] Srivatsan of India Today wrote, "It's difficult not to think about Benedict Cumberbatch's Sherlock Holmes, in which he asks Watson to think. But in Thupparivaalan, Mysskin asks the audience to observe, with a fair bit of Mysskin-ness".^[24]

Sequel

Directed by Vishal, a sequel titled Thupparivaalan 2 was announced in 2019, with Vishal and Prasanna reprising their roles.^[25] The rest of the cast included Rahman, Nassar, Jayaprakash, Gautami and Suresh Chakravarthi.^[26] The music of the film was to be composed by Ilaiyaraaja.^[27] Principal photography began in early November 2019 in Bristol,^[26] and the first schedule wrapped a month later.^[28] After Mysskin and Vishal drifted apart over budget issues,^[29] filming resumed in November 2020 with Vishal as the primary director of the film.^[30] The film was planned to resume shooting in 2023, but the shooting never took place.^[31] The same year, Vishal announced his plans to revive the project in 2024.^[32] Pre-production subsequently began in March 2024,^[33] and principal photography was expected to begin in May 2024,^[34] but was later pushed to that November.^[35]