But rest assured folks, this one is not just an exception. When Indian films are "inspired", it is generally taken for granted that they have been copied from Hollywood. The film is said to be inspired from The Godfather (also the bulky cheek make up Marlon Brando wore in The Godfather was worn by Kamal Hassan in Nayagan) and based on the life of real life underworld don Varadaraja Mudaliar. Even the titular character was portrayed in what is called "shades of grey" i.e both the bad and the good side have been portrayed. It was probably for the first time that so violent a gangster film had no protagonist per se. Gangster movies in India had never been realistic in any way, be it the fights or the portrayal of the Gangsters themselves. It marked a paradigm shift in the trend of Tamil cinema. In addition to all of this, Nayagan was a box office smash. In 2005, Time Magazine's critics Richard Schickel and Richard Corliss came up with a list of the all time 100 best films in which there were only 3 Indian films - Satyajit Ray's Apu Trilogy (Counted as one), Guru Dutt's Pyaasa and the third one is the film I am writing about. The film also won 2 other National Awards (Cinematography and Art Direction) and was India's entry to the Academy awards where it was so unfortunately overlooked. Need I mention that I was referring to the evergreen Padmashri Kamal Hassan, who won his 3rd National Award for this film. On the 21st of October 1987, Mani Ratnam who had then recently won numerous accolades for Mouna Raagam, teamed up with the star who had then been just nearing 33 years of age but had been in the film industry for 27 years with 2 national awards already in his basket of accolades.
This year marks the completion of 25 years since one of the most acclaimed Indian movies released.
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