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Score: ★★★☆☆ (3/5)
I’ve sat via my justifiable share of crime dramas that mistake “gradual burn” for “no fireplace.” So once I inform you Muthu Alias Kaattaan truly has one thing smoldering beneath all that rural ambiance, you possibly can belief me—simply know you’ll must deliver loads of persistence to the desk.
The setup is genuinely arresting. A severed head perched on a rock outdoors a sleepy Tamil Nadu village. No physique. A bag of money. A word. The native police station, weeks away from being shuttered for sheer lack of crime, abruptly has the case of a lifetime. It’s the form of hook that makes you lean ahead.
What follows is a ten-episode investigation that peels again the layers of the lifeless man, Muthu (Vijay Sethupathi), via the recollections of everybody who crossed his path. And what a path it was—bouncer for a dance troupe, orphanage supervisor, watch repairman, goat dung vendor, mahout. The person wore extra hats than a milliner’s dummy.
That is the place the sequence both grabs you or loses you. Director M. Manikandan, working with B. Ajith Kumar, has crafted one thing that prioritizes temper and character over momentum. The non-linear construction jumps throughout timelines and geographies, from Tamil Nadu villages to Kerala’s backwaters. The result’s immersive when it really works, meandering when it doesn’t.
And actually, it doesn’t at all times work. There’s a home subplot involving constable Kalai Pandiyan’s spouse and mom that provides exactly nothing to the investigation. Total episodes really feel just like the narrative is circling slightly than advancing. I discovered myself checking how a lot runtime was left greater than as soon as.
However right here’s the factor—when Kaattaan hits, it hits exhausting. The center stretch, the place Muthu’s relationship with the enigmatic Sivettan (Milind Soman) takes middle stage, crackles with real rigidity. The ethical ambiguity is refreshing; Muthu isn’t a hero, and the present is aware of it. He’s a person formed by circumstance, able to nice kindness and quiet brutality in equal measure.
Vijay Sethupathi delivers precisely what you’d anticipate from one in every of Tamil cinema’s most dependable performers. His Muthu is internalized, understated, carrying a long time of weariness in a single look. It’s not flashy work, nevertheless it’s actual. The supporting solid—notably Muthukumar and Singampuli because the investigating officers—floor the procedural components with quiet competence.
The technical craft is strong. Madhu Neelakandan’s cinematography captures the dusty fantastic thing about rural Tamil Nadu with out romanticizing it. Rajesh Murugesan’s rating is aware of when to sit down again and let silence do the speaking. Silence, in actual fact, is likely one of the present’s secret weapons.
So the place does that go away us? Muthu Alias Kaattaan is a present that might have been distinctive at eight episodes. At ten, it’s good however irritating. It calls for your consideration, then generally squanders it. It rewards persistence, however not at all times generously.
In the event you’re the kind who wants a hook each fifteen minutes, this isn’t for you. However when you recognize character-driven crime dramas that belief their viewers to sit down with ambiguity, there’s one thing worthwhile right here. Simply hold your expectations calibrated and your distant helpful for the gradual components.
The thriller of Muthu’s severed head is price unraveling. I simply want the journey there had been rather less scenic.
