Vaathi
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''Vaathi'' () is a 2023 Indian
period Period may refer to: Common uses * Period (punctuation) * Era, a length or span of time *Menstruation, commonly referred to as a "period" Arts, entertainment, and media * Period (music), a concept in musical composition * Periodic sentence (o ...
action drama film The action film is a film genre that predominantly features chase sequences, fights, shootouts, explosions, and stunt work. The specifics of what constitutes an action film has been in scholarly debate since the 1980s. While some scholars such as ...
written and directed by
Venky Atluri Venky Atluri (born 6 April 1984) is an Indian film director, screenwriter, and actor who works predominantly in Telugu cinema Telugu cinema, also known as Tollywood, is the segment of Cinema of India, Indian cinema dedicated to the produc ...
and produced by S. Naga Vamsi. The film was simultaneously shot in Tamil and Telugu with the latter version titled ''Sir''. The film stars
Dhanush Venkatesh Prabhu Kasthuri Raja (born 28 July 1983), known professionally as Dhanush, is an Indian actor, filmmaker, lyricist and playback singer who primarily works in Tamil cinema. Having starred in Dhanush filmography, 50 films over his car ...
, who plays the titular role of a school teacher, and
Samyuktha ''Samyuktha'' is a 1988 Indian Kannada-language thriller film directed by K. N. Chandrashekar Sharma. The story is based on a novel of same name by Kakolu Saroja Rao. The film stars Shiva Rajkumar, Balaraj, Chi Guru Dutt and debutant actress V ...
. The music was composed by G. V. Prakash Kumar with cinematography by J. Yuvaraj and editing by
Naveen Nooli Naveen Nooli (also credited as Navin Nooli) is an Indian film editor who works primarily in Telugu cinema. He won the National Film Award for Best Editing for ''Jersey'' (2019). Career Navin made his film debut with ''Login'' (2012), a Hindi ...
. The film released on 17 February 2023 to mixed reviews and became one of the highest-grossing Tamil films of 2023, earning 105 crore worldwide.


Plot

Abhiram and his friends, studying at an educational institute run by Srinivas, are preparing for an engineering entrance examination. They come across an old box of cassette tapes containing mathematics classes with a receipt accompanying it in the name of Kumar from Sozhavaram, dating back to 2000. After inquiry, they discover that Kumar is the
district magistrate The district magistrate, also known as the district collector or deputy commissioner, is a career civil servant who serves as the executive head of a district's administration in India. The specific name depends on the state or union territo ...
of
Kadapa Kadapa is a city in the southern part of Andhra Pradesh, India. It is located in the Rayalaseema region, and is the district headquarters of YSR Kadapa district. It is located south of the Penna River. The city is surrounded on three sides by ...
, and later, Kumar discloses that the man in the video is Balamurugan 'Bala'. The plot moves back to 1993, when many private institutions sprang up and the government was finding it difficult to sustain interest in public institutions. Five years later, with government colleges shutting down due to a shortage of lecturers, the poor who cannot afford private institutions are left with little access to higher education. Srinivas, the president of the private colleges association, hatches a plan to adopt all the government colleges and send junior lecturers to those colleges, while obtaining support from the government to stop the regularization of fees by the government. Bala is one such lecturer, who is sent to a government junior college in Sozhavaram to teach mathematics. Bala finds that the college is lacking in attendance, and due to this, the college may be shut down soon. Bala organizes a meeting with all the villagers and their children and explains the necessity of education, thus making the children and parents realize its importance. The students then start to come back to classes with Bala handling additional classes and engaging an ex-student, Muthu, to teach him as well. Meanwhile, Bala falls in love with Meenakshi, the biology teacher at the institution. Bala notices that there are
caste A caste is a Essentialism, fixed social group into which an individual is born within a particular system of social stratification: a caste system. Within such a system, individuals are expected to marry exclusively within the same caste (en ...
differences among students and comes up with a plan to eliminate it. The final board exams take place, with all the students passing with first class distinction. Srinivas tries to lure Bala away with a lucrative job offer to stop students from moving back to government institutions rather than private institutions. Bala refuses, and Srinivas acts via the education minister to take back the positions offered to lecturers at government junior colleges and recruit new ones, leaving Bala without a job. Later, Bala takes private classes in an open field in the village, prompting outbursts from Thirupathi, who instigates the villagers to drive him away from the village. Bala fights back but gets arrested and tortured in custody. He is dropped back into the village soon afterward, where the villagers are asked not to help him, indicating that he misused government funds. Bala's ex-students help him get back to his hometown, where he becomes dependent on his father, Narayanan, who works as a driver. After recovering, he takes up tutoring at his home on the insistence of Ansari, his former colleague, after many failed job interviews at private junior colleges. Meenakshi arrives and decides to marry him. They see a young boy who is willing to study but is unable to do so due to poverty. His father is constantly pressuring him to earn money. Bala gets an idea and records his lectures using cassette tapes and sends them to Bhupathi, Abhiram's grandfather, a photographer in Sozhavaram. Bhupathi runs special shows for students at 6 p.m. every day in a nearby
theater Theatre or theater is a collaborative form of performing art that uses live performers, usually actors to present experiences of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place, often a stage. The performers may communi ...
, where Bala's lectures are played. To clear doubts and interact with students, Bala visits the village, under the guise of a drama artist, each Sunday. Thirupathi tries to stop the students on the day of the exam. Bala fights them off and the students perform well, clearing the exams with Muthu scoring the first rank and revealing himself as Kumar. Thirupathi offers money to all the students, promising them sponsorship for their further studies on the condition that they endorse his institution. Bala asks the students to agree to it and asks them to help needy students in the future after they climb the socio-economic ladder. In the present, Kumar continues his story, saying that the theater where they studied is now a coaching center for the underprivileged, developed by the old students, who take turns by teaching each year. While Kumar does not know the current whereabouts of Bala, it is shown that Bala and Meenakshi have opened a school, Ansari School of Knowledge, to provide free education for the underprivileged at
Ooty Ooty (; officially Udagamandalam (), Anglicisation, anglicized: Ootacamund , abbreviated as Udagai, ) is a town and municipality in the Nilgiris district of the Indian States and territories of India, state of Tamil Nadu. It is located north ...
. In the end, Abhiram and his friends achieved ranks within the Top 100 in the JEE Mains examination, with Abhiram securing the first rank, guided by Kumar, the old students, and Bala's recorded tapes. At their felicitation ceremony, despite being coerced by Thirupathi, Abhi credits Bala for his achievement. In addition, he unveils Bala's tapes publicly, thus exposing Thirupathi.


Cast


Production


Development

In late July 2021, it was reported that
Dhanush Venkatesh Prabhu Kasthuri Raja (born 28 July 1983), known professionally as Dhanush, is an Indian actor, filmmaker, lyricist and playback singer who primarily works in Tamil cinema. Having starred in Dhanush filmography, 50 films over his car ...
would collaborate with
Venky Atluri Venky Atluri (born 6 April 1984) is an Indian film director, screenwriter, and actor who works predominantly in Telugu cinema Telugu cinema, also known as Tollywood, is the segment of Cinema of India, Indian cinema dedicated to the produc ...
for the latter's next directional before his project with
Sekhar Kammula Sekhar Kammula (born 4 February 1972) is an Indian film director, screenwriter and producer who works in Telugu cinema. He has garnered two Filmfare Awards South, and six state Nandi Awards for his directional works. Sekhar Kammula was among the ...
; the film marks Dhanush foraying into Telugu cinema for the first time. Sithara Entertainments were reported to fund the project. The company made a public announcement on 22 December confirming the project, while the title ''Vaathi'' and ''Sir'' was announced the day after. Atluri had recruited music composer G. V. Prakash Kumar, cinematographer Dinesh Krishnan and editor Navin Nooli.
Samyuktha ''Samyuktha'' is a 1988 Indian Kannada-language thriller film directed by K. N. Chandrashekar Sharma. The story is based on a novel of same name by Kakolu Saroja Rao. The film stars Shiva Rajkumar, Balaraj, Chi Guru Dutt and debutant actress V ...
was announced as the lead actress the same day.


Filming

Principal photography Principal photography is the phase of producing a film or television show in which the bulk of shooting takes place, as distinct from the phases of pre-production and post-production. Personnel Besides the main film personnel, such as the ...
began on 5 January 2022. The second schedule of the shoot began in April 2022 when Dhanush had joined the sets after he had finished the shoot of ''
Naane Varuvean ''Naane Varuvean'' () is a 2022 Indian Tamil-language horror thriller film directed by Selvaraghavan and produced by Kalaipuli S. Thanu under V Creations. The film stars Dhanush in dual roles as the hero and villain, alongside Indhuja Ravichan ...
''. The filming was completed in October 2022.


Music

The music of the film is composed by G. V. Prakash Kumar. The first single titled "Vaa Vaathi" in Tamil and "Mastaaru Mastaaru" in Telugu was released on 10 November 2022. The second single titled "Naadodi Mannan" in Tamil and "Banjara" in Telugu was released on 17 January 2023.


Release


Theatrical

The film was scheduled for a theatrical release on 2 December 2022 in Tamil and Telugu, but was postponed. In November 2022, it was announced that the film will release on 17 February 2023. It was announced that
Seven Screen Studio Seven Screen Studio is an Indian film production and distribution company headed by S. S. Lalit Kumar. History S. S. Lalit Kumar set up Chennai-based film production house Seven Screen Studio in 2017, before moving on to produce the Sasikumar- ...
has acquired the distribution rights of the film in
Tamil Nadu Tamil Nadu (; , TN) is the southernmost States and union territories of India, state of India. The List of states and union territories of India by area, tenth largest Indian state by area and the List of states and union territories of Indi ...
.


Home media

Initially, there were reports suggesting that the film's streaming rights were acquired by Aha, but were later acquired by
Netflix Netflix is an American subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming service. The service primarily distributes original and acquired films and television shows from various genres, and it is available internationally in multiple lang ...
, while the satellite rights were acquired by
Sun TV Network Sun TV Network Limited is a Indian media company, headquartered in Chennai. It is a part of Sun Group and was established on 14 April 1993 by Kalanithi Maran. It owns a variety of television channels and radio stations in multiple languages ...
. It began streaming on Netflix from 17 March 2023 in Tamil, Telugu, and Hindi.


Reception

''Vaathi'' received mixed reviews from critics. Logesh Balachandran of ''
The Times of India ''The Times of India'' (''TOI'') is an Indian English-language daily newspaper and digital news media owned and managed by the Times Group. It is the List of newspapers in India by circulation, third-largest newspaper in India by circulation an ...
'' rated the film 3 out of 5 stars and wrote "''Vaathi'' is a film that's mounted on no-nonsense writing though it could have been even better". Latha Srinivasan of ''
India Today ''India Today'' is a weekly Indian English-language news magazine published by Living Media, Living Media India Limited. It is the most widely circulated magazine in India, with a readership of close to 8 million. In 2014, ''India Today'' laun ...
'' rated the film 2.5 out of 5 and said that the film has a "noble mission" but Venky Atluri's story and narration are a big let-down. Avinash Ramachandran of ''
The New Indian Express ''The New Indian Express'' is an Indian English-language broadsheet daily newspaper published by the Chennai-based Express Publications. It was founded in 1932 as ''The Indian Express'', under the ownership of Chennai-based P. Varadarajulu Naidu ...
'' rated the film 2.5 out of 5 stars and wrote "Despite using a 140-minute runtime to teach us a bunch of subjects, but the film teaches us are "Films don't have to be preachy to drive home a point" and "Dhanush can make anything look easy". Anandu Suresh of ''
The Indian Express ''The Indian Express'' is an English-language Indian daily newspaper founded in 1932 by P. Varadarajulu Naidu. It is headquartered in Noida, owned by the ''Indian Express Group''. It was later taken over by Ramnath Goenka. In 1999, eight y ...
'' rated the film 1.5 out of 5 stars and termed the film as Dhanush starrer about right to education fares poorly. Bharathy Singaravel of ''
The News Minute ''The News Minute'' is an Indian digital news platform based in Bangalore, Karnataka. It was founded by Vignesh Vellore who is also the current CEO in 2014. Apart from Karnataka, it also has bureaus in the states of Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, ...
'' rated the film 1 out of 5 stars and wrote "A film of such mediocrity and confused politics".


References


External links

* {{IMDb title 2020s Indian films 2020s Tamil-language films 2020s Telugu-language films 2023 action drama films 2023 films Films about academic scandals Films about corruption in India Films about examinations and testing Films about higher education Films about mathematics Films about teacher–student relationships Films about the education system in India Films directed by Venky Atluri Films set in 1993 Films set in Andhra Pradesh Films set in Tamil Nadu Films shot in Telangana Indian action drama films Indian multilingual films Tamil-language action drama films Tamil-language Indian films