Kabadadaari - bone collector

 

Kabadadaari

(Clever One)

2021, Tamil

Now showing - Einthusan.ca

Director - Pradeep Krishnamoorthy

Stars - Sibi Sathyaraj, Nassar, Nandita Swetha, Jayaprakash, Sampath Maitreya

Mohan's Measure ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐

A remake of the Kannada film, Kavaladaari, Kabadadaari shows how if they put their mind to it, Kollywood directors can make good film noir.

Sibi Satyaraj is quite impressive as an no nonsense traffic cop who stumbles upon a 40-year old murder mystery, and enters a dark world to find the killer.  His willingness and commitment to doing so honestly, purely for the sake of justice, is quite unusual for Indian cinema, and it is quite refreshing.

This honesty impresses a disillusioned ex-cop, played with usual sophistication by Mr. Nassar.  The role cop and mentor is expected of the actor.  But, we are introduced to him as a drunken old man with a scraggly beard and ragged clothing.  This is out of step with Nassar's character acting, and, albeit subtly, it shows.

Much like Kevin Costner and Sean Connery in the Untouchables, however, this movie is about the guru-sishya relationship between these two heroic men. The rest of the characters, even the villain himself, are there to show us how this relationship brings meaning to both their lives. But, these other characters represent what justice is up against - corruption, power, and most certainly, revenge.

The stuff of true noir is served, however, because none of the cops have anything personal at stake in the crime.  Film noir is about justice, a justice which is eked by people who are instruments to serving it. Because, as the genre suggests, and as my own experience seems to confirm, there is something or someone higher at work in all of this, to which/whom we are obligated and eternally indebted.  Normally such notions are Catholic ones; but much to the audience's tastes, the higher power is revealed as a goddess.