Madrasapattinam

A. L. Vijay's 2010 Tamil film runs on two time levels. In the present an elderly English woman arrives in Chennai; in the past, in the Madras of 1945, a relationship develops between a governor's daughter and a village washerman. The years approaching Indian independence stand in the background. The film invested seriously in period design, rebuilding forties Madras with its streets, its trams and its clothing. It was counted among the works that raised the scale of period production in Tamil cinema. The romantic narrative moves between criticising the colonial period and idealising it. Some of the English characters stay at the level of types, and the independence struggle mostly functions as scenery. It was Amy Jackson's first film. Who it's for: those who like Tamil period romance and large-scale production. Who it's not for: viewers wanting a serious view of colonial history; the film uses that history as ground for a love story.