Vanangaan is a Tamil movie which written and directed by Bala, The movie features Arun Vijay, Ridha and Roshni Prakash as the lead characters. The cinematography of Vanangaan movie is done by R. B. Gurudev, the music is done by G. V. Prakash Kumar and Sam C. S. and the editing of the movie is handled by Sathish Suriya. The movie is made by Bala and Suresh Kamatchi under the banner of B Studios and V House Productions.
The official runtime of Vanangaan movie is 2 hours and 30 minutes and the reported box office collection of the movie is Rs 13 Crore. The movie was released as theatre-releases worldwide by 10 January 2025 in the middle of the Pongal week.
Contents
Reviews
The director Bala of Vanangaan is the celebrated but scandalous filmmaker whose comeback is after a series of turbulent life. Bala, with his uncivilized and unsparing portrayals of disadvantaged poverty, narrates a very visceral narrative that is thrilling and highly disturbing. The story of a speech and hearing-impaired man Koti (Arun Vijay) who lives with his sister, Devi (Ridha), in Kanniyakumari forms the plot. Koti, a few odd-job holder, becomes a vigilante when he is informed of some of the atrocities that are perpetrated against the visually impaired women in an orphanage.
Arun Vijay does a nice job, delivering the boiling anger and helplessness of Koti. He does not utter a word and his physicality makes the movie grounded. Roshini Prakash as Tina, offers a magnetic front woman, but the storyline of the character including a disturbing love affair that includes violence leaves questions of who is driving the script and whether it is working.
The technical mastery of Vanangaan is provided with the help of a successful background score by GV Prakash Kumar and gorgeous cinematography by S.R. Kathir, e.g., but the script is rooted. It is a swiftly moving story that is emotionally one-dimensional. The depictions of sexual violence are disturbing, not only due to its content, but also due to the exploiting depiction. This does so much work against the justice that this movie attempts to promulgate.
There are the signatures of Bala, such as a sense of sarcastic social criticism, bloody performances, and tragic climaxes. Vanangaan on the other hand cannot make peace with stylized violence and thematic sensitivity. The villains are flat, the supporting characters are not well developed and the moral compass of the movie is skewny.
You May Also Like to Read
In conclusion, Vanangaan is a contradictory film. It contains great acting and sharp remarks, yet due to its uncouth depiction of trauma and one-dimensional heroics, it fails. The voice of Bala is clear and Vanangaan does not manage to achieve the emotional impact and narrative unity that his previous films had in abundance.
Cast
In Vanangaan, the performances are supported by an intense and restrained performance by Arun Vijay as Koti, a deaf and mute man whose furious quietude and concept of justice boot the story forward. Stepping outside of his usual action hero persona, Arun is nuanced and physical; there’s more pathos in the shape of his body and the stretch of his face than in his lines, which is a deft demonstration of an actor whose versatility is in the state of evolution.
Ridha, who plays the role of Koti’s sister Devi, injects her character with a sincere feel. Her screen-time is short, but in any case her character is the emotional focus of Koti’s world and Ridha’s expressive performance evokes fear, affection, and pain, especially in dealing with the consequences of Koti’s behavior.
Tina, played by Roshni Prakash is a complex addition to the movie, as she’s a free-spirited woman, whose back and forth with Koti ranges from fun to somberly intense. Her character is conflicted emotionally, and Roshni is one of the characters who symbolizes that ambiguity, though the writing around her is problematic in some spots.
In shorter but significant roles, Samuthirakani as the righteous DSP Kathiravan and Mysskin as a no-nonsense judge lend solidity even though they don’t have a lot of time on screen. Both such veterans play the authoritarian types with conviction.
Also here, ground-level interpretations by Chhaya Devi, Bala Sivaji and Shanmugarajan add richness to the placed setting wire in their socio-religious texture. The courtroom and crime narrative of the movie is also sprinkled with a hint of realism due to Anitha Sampath who makes a brief yet impactful presence, playing herself on the media byline.
You May Also Like to Read
Vanangaan’s ensemble cast delivers committed acting, but lots of talented actors, including Mai Pa Narayanan, Aruldoss and Pondy Ravi hardly make an impact, since the story is concerned with Koti so much. The cast especially Arun Vijay share a lot of the weight of the movie even when the narration slips.
Critical Reviews
In the India Today, Janani K, Vanangaan is rated 2 out of 5 because of its repetitive themes of truth and justice by violence, this time, with Arun Vijay, an impotent man, who is hearing and speech impaired in pursuit of vigilante justice. Although it praises the acting of Arun and the courtroom scenes, the film is said to be insensitive concerning sexual violence, political incorrectness and moral contradictions, appealing to those who are lovers of hero-based saviour movies, but arousing ethical issues.
The movie has received two and a half out of five stars in the review by M Suganth of The Times of India who declared the movie to be a formulaic Bala movie, despite its old-fashioned story telling, uninspired action, and superficial characters and predictable plot. Arun Vijay does his part well, although it is flattened by the comforts of the pen, the voyeurism with which it handles sensitive material.
Avinash Ramachandran of Indian express rated the movie two out of five stars and criticized the movie as being gratuitous, insensitive in violence and poor writing though he does like the performance of Arun Vijay. The stakes are undermined by a flat plot, underdeveloped characters, and nonchalant racism and an invincible hero in what appears to be a sham of an attempt by the director Bala.
Giving the film one and a half stars in the rating of the movie by Cinema Express, Prashanth Vallavan describes it as a patchy compilation of the generic beauties of a decent Bala film that lacks a strong structure or a story to support it. Despite some witty moments and good acting, the attitude of the movie towards a rather sensitive topic seems to be exploitative, the humor is rather unsuccessful, and the disorganized ideas of the movie make the story weak.
You May Also Like to Read
Anusha Sundar of OTTplay rated it one and a half out of five and indicated that Vanangaan fatten on voyeurism and insensitivity in his approach to sexual assault and the hypocrisy of the treatment of women by Bala. The film commodifies women and makes its main character, Kote, a hero and an abuser. It is distasteful of sexual violence: the camera adores this; the attackers do not receive any authentic punishment, which does not match with the rest of the show and is disapproved by it, as it does not feel like it ever quite hits its intended mark.
Audiences Reviews
Vanangaan film received 6.1 stars out of 10 stars, rated by 1.3k individuals on IMDb which is a good and favorable score by the audience. I took a glance at the user reviews and noticed that Vanangaan has elicited both positive and negative responses in most cases. The movie is applauded by most of the users due to its daring themes and poignant emotional heart and more so the shattering performance of Arun Vijay as Koti, a deaf and mute man struggling with social injustice.
It was generally acclaimed as the hallmark of raw storytelling by Bala and his attempt to shed light on marginalized groups and abuse victims. The courtroom drama, real-life police business and strong cinematography have been even commended by many users who even described it as a must watch and one even went ahead to term it as the best work by Bala in the past five years.
However, a large number of the audience was disappointed. The contemporaries of the whole performance of that time had the sense that a good section of the audience thought that Bala was lip-reading his old story-templates, and Vanangaan was nothing but a lesser variant of his former cult performances such as Pithamagan, Naan Kadavul, etc. Other users have lamented the voyeuristic aspect of the sensitive scenes stating that the movie unintentionally downgrades to object what it purports to protect. Some considered the screenplay to be slow-moving and relaxed, especially in the first half, and others thought that the film was emotionally manipulative.
Although a substantial portion of the audience will perceive Vanangaan as a critical and intensely emotional film, a broad swab of the film flops on the predictability of the storyline, awkward visual vocabulary, and the inconsistency of the performance. The film breathes and dies by its actors, especially the vision of Arun Vijay and Bala.
Songs
Vanangaan movie can be loaded with pure emotions and melodrama which is mesmerizingly narrated through poetry lyrics and vocals. The five songs run through a landscape of themes of silence, longing, and devotion. That journey begins with “Irai Nooru“, a mellifluous and spiritually leaning number with lyrics from Karthik Netha that Madhu Balakrishnan sings beautifully. Its powerful melody sets a reflective cellular point for the reflective soundscape of the sounds the film has produced.
Some soft, ethereal mood is presented by “Mugilin Mele” sung by Saindhavi with lyrics of Selvamira. At just over 2 minutes, it’s a little short of a minute, gentle interlude to add some texture to the soundtrack. The central track on the album is in fact the two versions of “Mounam Pole.” For the much-anticipated male version, Sathya Prakash lends his voice, while the female one was sung by Rakshita Suresh; both have lyrics from Karthik Netha. These two powerful tracks are filled with emotion, lyrical complexity, and deliver a different wrinkle on the common theme of what goes unsaid.
The album closes with “Yaaro Nee Yaaro” (again emphasis Madhu Balakrishnan’s plaintive vocals with Karthik Netha’s reflective lyrics). The track has an eerie lightness to it which just sticks with you. Composed by the movie’s art director and former art musician, the music for Vanangaan develops an evocative musical journey spread over a total duration of slightly over 21 minutes, with its emotional depth and lyrical elegance.
You May Also Like to Read
How to Watch The Vanangaan Movie
Theatrical performance of Vanangaan has ended, the movie is released on Amazon Prime Video. The unlucky ones who happened to visit theatres when the movie was showing can watch it in the comfort of their homes. One can stream it on Amazon Prime Video and needs an active subscription to the streaming service to watch. Having a paid account, one will be able to stream or download the movie to watch it in the offline mode via the official application and the site of the platform.
Besides Vanangaan, the subscribers will be able to watch numerous movies, series, and original content of different genres. Always ensure that you only stream the content via legal sites to help the creators as well as have a safe viewing experience.