Gentleman

Kicha is a respectable businessman by day and a thief by night, using what he steals to build schools for poor students. His aim is not charity but settling an old score: a life was destroyed by seats bought in the education system when he was a child. The film is not interested in outlaw romance. It is interested in money in education: it takes direct aim at the argument over donation-purchased university places that was live in India at the start of the nineties, and presents the crime as an extension of that argument. The form is large commercial production: heavily choreographed song sequences, crowded fights, unbroken pace. This is Shankar's first film as director. It ran for more than a hundred and seventy-five days in cinemas and was a major commercial success; the music is by A. R. Rahman and brought him his second Filmfare award for best music director that year. Shankar became one of the biggest-budget directors in Tamil cinema after it. Arjun Sarja plays Kicha, with Madhoo opposite him. Who it is for: viewers who like nineties Tamil cinema, Rahman's music and action with a social message. Who it is not for: anyone looking for realism. The hero's schemes ignore physics and the message is restated over and over.