‘Vettaiyan’ review: Social justice drama can’t escape the Rajinikanth star image problem

TJ Gnanavel’s Vettaiyan wants you to believe that it isn’t a typical supercop film. The Tamil film has loaded lines about police harassment and systemic biases. Gnanavel’s screenplay carries an important message about police encounters, which Tamil filmmakers have glorified for far too long, and a twisted form of vigilantism that fans have lapped up.

You wouldn’t expect anything less from a director who made police brutality the subject of his powerful second film Jai Bhim (2021). However, any form of subversion in Vettaiyan is restricted to pieces of dialogue scattered across a Rajinikanth film that remains an excessive exercise in grandstanding.

Athiyan (Rajinikanth) is a so-called encounter specialist, the antithesis of Suriya’s law-abiding Chandru from Jai Bhim. Athiyan reduces criminals to dust, intrudes in cases that are not his, and bends the law to make his own form of justice.

Aiding Athiyan’s crusade are the police officer Roopa (Ritika Singh) and Battery, a self-indulgent thief (loveably played by Fahadh Faasil). A silent but overarching figure for Athiyan is human rights lawyer Satyadev (Amitabh Bachchan), who fights for a justice that is true and bereft of vigilantism.

A violent crime raises questions not just about the perpetrator but also about the dangers of bending the law. Intriguing portions about the implications of herd...

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