Why Marupadiyum is still relevant? | Balu Mahendra

Balu Mahendra Marupadiyum

A woman is betrayed by her husband. She is going through the hardships of betrayal in relationship and facing consequences.

A friendly male character helped this female lead in crucial times and expressed his views on remarriage, but she rejects it to take on independent path of her life. These lines seems pretty normal right? But how about making this line a movie that is splendid to watch with intense dialogues and expressions.

It’s only possible with the legend named ‘Balu Mahendra’ to make such marvels in the name of Marupadiyum (1993), which is a remake of Hindi film “Arth”.

It’s a women centric film that is power packed with many performances from leading artists like Revathi (who lived in the screen as Thulasi), Nizhalgal Ravi, Arvind swamy and Rohini. The running time of this movie is 2 hours 19 minutes.

Every ardent cinema lover will have this question, “why Balu Mahendra is celebrated much in Tamil cinema?” The answer lies in this remake film, be it a cinematography, artists’ selection, songs and background music by legendary Ilayaraja, it’s a power packed performance from this team.

Nalam Vaazha Ennalum

Camera Lens is the real hero in this film. Be it capturing the emotions of Revathi’s tear drops, Aravind Swamy’s kindness, Nizhalgal Ravi’s confusions and Rohini’s anxiety towards future. Every scene seems so close to your heart, as if it’s happening in our neighbouring vicinity.

As a lover of natural lightings, director sets up indoor day scenes with so much precision, that you may feel the ambience of hall, bedroom and living spaces with even minute differences. “Nalam Vaazha Ennalum” song is a visual treat, with “soul satisfying” lights in the set. One breezy outdoor song is shot in natural light too, which is missing in present day films.

It’s a rare phenomenon of seeing female leads without a makeup in Kollywood. But, every movie of this director possess “no makeup” trend, as he strives to be natural in every aspect of film making. In this movie, two female characters possess nil makeup and they appear to us like a girl next door.

Dialogues in this film are so neatly curated, so that every word is counted and narrated, to make intense scenes. For Instance, when Nizhalgal Ravi asks for a divorce signature from Revathi, her reply will be “Your new partner thinks marriage is a security for life, but she isn’t realising that a single signature can fade off all of those securities”. So powerful it sounds with simple words! No anecdotes, No examples and lengthy dialogues, but effective ones.

A life journey

Revathi’s portion of dialogues are so erudite. Her conversation with Nizhalgal ravi in a party after getting drunk, is a must watch one. No one in 1993 would have thought, such scenes can be penned! In climax, mixed emotions of Revathi are so beautifully written in screenplay. We can expect the unexpected with a shorter, yet sweeter conversations between Arvind swamy and Revathi.

We may feel a life journey in this magnum opus of Balu Mahendra. Though slower in screenplay, conveying the effective message of disturbed relationships makes this a worth to watch out.

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Vignesh SMK
An engineer turned writer, who loves to love different things that comes across his life.

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