Ghajini

After an attack, Sanjay Ramasamy lives with anterograde amnesia: he cannot hold anything new for longer than fifteen minutes. He wants to find the man who killed the woman he loved. So he tattoos himself, collects Polaroids, and relearns who he is every morning. The subject is not revenge but how someone without memory carries an intention. Sanjay does not remember his rage; he leaves the rage to himself as a note and reads it every day to become angry again. The form runs in two times: the pursuit now, and the past with Kalpana. The past sections are warm and funny, the present hard, and that contrast is what works. The structure has an open kinship with Memento, which was discussed in Indian cinema at the time. Suriya undertook a serious physical transformation for the role, and it is counted among the examples that changed how much weight Tamil actors give to physical preparation. A. R. Murugadoss remade the same story in Hindi in 2008 with Aamir Khan, and that version took far more at the box office. Asin Thottumkal plays Kalpana, with Nayanthara also in the cast. Who it is for: viewers who like thrillers built on memory and Tamil action cinema. Who it is not for: anyone troubled by violence; the final section is bloody and never questions the revenge.