Oomai Vizhigal

aka The Dumb Eyes 1986 176’ col/scope Tamil d R. Aravindraj pc Thirai Chirpi s/p/lyr Aabavanan c A. Rameshkumar m Manoj Gyan lp Vijayakanth, Jaishankar, Karthik, Chandrasekhar, Arunpandian, Kokila, Saritha, Ilavarasi, Srividya

An exploitative expose film by a group of film students using hand-held camera, emphatic lighting and location sound techniques. A man with good political and criminal connections kills women who come and picnic near his mansion. After much bloodletting, the villains are eliminated by an honest cop and a fearless newspaper editor (Jaishankar) as the cop pumps his bullets, in slow motion, into the slasher’s body. The gory film is leavened with song and dance numbers and references to violent incidents of Tamil Nadu political life: e.g. the storming of the newspaper office. A song, sung by the editor, later became famous as it was used at political and trade union demonstrations, and later became the theme song for the Tamil Eelam. The film’s major impact however was to introduce alumni of the Madras Film Institute into the mainstream Tamil film industry.

Film