| Madrasi | |
| Director: | Arjun |
| Producer: | Subha Sandeep |
| Starring: | Arjun Jagapathi Babu Vedhika Gajala |
| Music: | D. Imman |
| Cinematography: | K. S. Selvaraj |
| Editing: | P. Saisuresh |
| Distributor: | Sree Ram Films International |
| Studio: | Inspired Movies Spice Team Entertainments |
| Runtime: | 157 minutes |
| Country: | India |
| Language: | Tamil |
Madrasi is a 2006 Indian Tamil-language action film written and directed by Arjun. The film stars Arjun, Jagapathi Babu (in his Tamil debut), Vedhika (in her film debut) and Gajala with music composed by D. Imman. It was released in 17 February 2006.[1] The film was partially reshot into Telugu as Sivakasi with Sunil and M. S. Narayana replacing Vivek and Vennira Aadai Moorthy respectively.[2]
Kaasi travels to Mumbai to track down his parents' killers, where he successfully finds and kills the first two, but the third manages to escape. In Dharavi, Ravi Bhai and Mani Bhai are the brothers and leading goons, but soon they became enemies and constantly try to kill each other. To locate the third killer, Kaasi joins Ravi Bhai's gang. However, Ravi is at odds with his brother Mani Bhai, who runs another gang, and the top goon is Siva. During an election, Siva rescues Mani Bhai from some goons while voting at a booth. Siva has a younger brother named Raghu, whom he takes to see a girl getting married. After a small complication, Siva ends up marrying the girl himself.
Kaasi falls in love with Anjali after fighting for her father, who was being harassed by goons. One day, Kaasi and Anjali go to a restaurant, where Siva and his wife are also present. Siva and Kaasi recognise each other from a previous meeting in prison, but they now work for rival gangs and become enemies. A builder approaches Ravi Bhai, claiming that his brother is threatening him for his share of a property. The builder asks for protection until he can leave for Singapore. Kaasi sees an opportunity to prove himself and arranges for protection, but to no avail and Mani Bhai kills the builder with Siva's help. Siva knew that the flight was delayed by an hour.Kaasi becomes upset, but Ravi Bhai comforts him.
After a scuffle in the restaurant, Kaasi and Siva's phones get swapped, and they both escape. Siva receives a call from Ravi Bhai on Kaasi's phone, asking him to store some weapons that they received from a party. Siva decides to use this opportunity to get revenge on Ravi Bhai and arranges for a man to steal the weapons and run from the police. The man leads the police to Ravi Bhai's godown, and they seize the weapons, but Kaasi makes the police to leave after telling that the godown belongs to someone else. Siva’s wife calls and informs him of his brother’s disappearance, where he looks for him. Siva beats the goons and Mani Bhai’s son after finding out they were responsible for his brother’s disappearance.
After an argument with Mani Bhai, Siva leaves his gang and meets Kaasi, asking him to protect his brother despite their differences. Kaasi agrees, but Ravi Bhai finds out and asks for the brother. Kaasi refuses, where he gets into an argument with Ravi Bhai and leaves his gang. Siva leaves his brother in Kaasi's custody. Now unite and wanting to separate Siva and Kaasi, Ravi and Mani plan to kill Siva's brother by killing Anjali and diverting Kaasi. Siva's brother is killed, where Siva gets mad at Kaasi. After this, Siva and Kaasi become realises Ravi and Mani's plan, where they kill all the gangsters, including Ravi's son, Raja. However, Kaasi demands not to kill Raja and agrees to help him. Every gangster gets killed in the train engine. However, Kaasi gets fired by Mani, where Siva tries to kill Raja, but Kaasi shows a pistol to Siva. By seeing that Kaasi is injured by a bullet, Siva changes his mind and Kaasi dies.
Newcomer Vedhika was selected to make her debut as a lead actress after she was approached by Arjun's manager.[3] The film also marked the debut of Telugu actor Jagapathi Babu in Tamil cinema.[4]
The soundtrack is composed by D. Imman. It contains a remixed version of "Adho Andha Paravai" from Aayirathil Oruvan (1965).[5]
Malathi Rangarajan of The Hindu wrote, "You do understand Arjun's sincerity in trying out a different storyline within the restricted ambit of action, sentiment, romance and comedy. Yet after a point you can't help feeling that you've seen most of it many times before. However, Arjun's target audience may help the 'Madrasi' cruise comfortably."[6] P. V. Sathish Kumar of Nowrunning wrote, "As many other films essayed by Arjun before, Madrasi is also plagued by predictability. Once you see few opening scenes, you can immediately expect what is to come.There is no element of surprises or complexities in the plot".[7]