Thenali

K. S. Ravikumar's 2000 Tamil film follows a man afraid of everything. Thenali came to India after the violence he lived through in Sri Lanka, and his fears now restrict his daily life entirely. When the psychiatrist Kailash refuses to take him on as a patient, Thenali follows him as far as his holiday. The film works as comedy, but the source of the character's fear is serious: a massacre during the Sri Lankan civil war. That information is given at the start and continues to sit beneath the humour. The balance was debated; making trauma the material of comedy troubled some viewers. Kamal Haasan leads and the physical comedy rests entirely on him. Jayaram plays the doctor. A. R. Rahman's music is among the most remembered elements. Who it's for: those who like Kamal Haasan's comedies. Who it's not for: viewers troubled by trauma used in a comic frame; the film does it throughout.