Apoorva Sagodharargal

Singeetam Srinivasa Rao's 1989 Tamil film opens twenty years earlier, when a gang seeking revenge on a police officer poisons his pregnant wife. One of the twins born to her has dwarfism; the brothers are separated straight after birth and years later pursue the same revenge. The film's technical ambition is that Kamal Haasan plays both twins and their father, and that the scenes with the shorter brother were shot by methods uncommon in Indian cinema at the time. A circus provides the setting for those sequences. The tone shifts quickly between action and comedy. Dwarfism is presented as the character's strength on one hand and made comic material on the other; seen now, that is the film's most contentious aspect. Who it's for: those who like eighties Tamil cinema and Kamal Haasan's multi-role work. Who it's not for: viewers who will be uncomfortable seeing disability played for laughs.