Dude review and what its takes to be a hero in 2K25

 

Dude is unconventional; this movie deals with subjects that may offend the larger audience. But here is the highlight: it's not a ‘cuckhold movie’ or any other derogatory term could not be tagged to this movie. After its initial release, this movie got bashed left and right for portraying a love triangle most unconventionally; this initial response made me reluctant to go watch it. But after its OTT release, I thought I could give it a try, and not going to lie, I enjoyed every bit of this movie. Although the first 10 minutes of the movie were too chaotic for me to handle, and with the unpleasant mix of oorum blood song, the chaos was unbearable. I almost went to switch it off, as there was a predetermined opinion about this movie that exists within me from all the online responses. But I am very much glad that I watched it, and I loved it.

I loved it, but..

Dude is not a great movie; it has its own flaws for a movie from a debutant director. This is the kind of movie that we watch on a Saturday evening with a beer in hand and have a good laugh, and sleep it off. Pradeep Ranganathan’s slapstick humour was on point, neither overdone nor underdone. His heroism was the regular old self-sacrificing one with slo-mo walks and great build-up music, which worked out perfectly. I found a few dialogues in this movie a little demeaning, especially the one where Agan (PR) says to Kural (Mamitha) when she was about to propose to him. I never understood what was the need for that dialogue, but I consider this an issue that is far from what the general opinion of this movie was about. 

The Cuckhold shenanigans.

The general opinion was mostly about how this movie is normalising an abnormal relationship, but nowhere in this movie do I find that it tries to normalise such an unconventional love triangle. In fact, it tried to make every possible humorous situation out of it to establish how abnormal and absurd this relationship is. The director was brave enough to dial it up a little higher to focus on how this absurdity is actually the best satirical approach to tell a story with a moral message. The so-called ‘cuck hold relationship’ that this movie was being criticized for failed to open up to the audience the real reason why such an unconventional relationship exists in the first place. It's not the director’s fault for the misrepresentation, nor is it the fault of the audience. I think that the fault lies in a different spectrum altogether.  It is the fast-paced internet culture that forces everyone to take a stand immediately after the release of a movie, although this extends far beyond just movies. Let us, for now, stay in this context.

Who wants a mediocre movie?

Dude needed some time, for it was a movie with a different, unique, and very young voice. The moment it got stuck among the audience, that this movie was trying to be too progressive by normalising this relationship, it lost track of the real issue the movie tried to speak, and this added spice when the movie itself had flaws for a debutant director. If only it were not bashed for just being a mediocre film, which it is, the audience would have had time to look past the absurdity. But nobody can accept mediocracy. Everyone is obsessed with a movie being either a masterpiece or full-on BS. When a movie is slightly under mediocracy, it gets trashed like Dude, or if it's slightly above mediocracy, it gets praised to no extent. A recent example of that is Dies Irae, which is a good movie but definitely not worthy of all the praise that it is getting. This creates a rumble among creators and audience on how to find or create a great movie, which is the reason in recent times, for the lack of any movie that has the potential to transcend decades to become a classic.

Agan redefines masculinity.

Agan (Pradeep Ranganathan) is desperate to know the reason why his ex left him to marry someone else, and he goes to the extent of accidentally snatching the thalli. But in the next dialogue, after asking for the reason, he says that he knows a girl's lack of interest could be enough reason for her rejection. This duality of taking a double stand was uncomfortable for many movie reviewers. They posed questions like Why does he do that? Is it to please the audience by trying to establish that he is politically correct?

 Agan’s character is someone who says out loud the first thing that comes to his mind and tries to retract it, saying the exact opposite of what he said before. Just like in the very first sequence of this movie, he knows that there is no point in screaming at the girl for leaving him, but still, he is desperate enough to know the reason. This is not the only incident in the movie that tries to establish this side of his character. He walks out of the kalayana mandapam when Kural comes with the plan to stay married, but then he reacts the opposite, as he decides to go with the plan; although initially he acts out of his first emotion, he controls that emotion to act reasonably. In another instance, when the baby starts to cry, he screams at the baby to stop crying, but instantly he switches to singing Baby Shark, to make it stop crying. Many instances like this actually served as the most comically hilarious scenes in the movie.  So this duality of moral value is not something to please the audience, but a deliberate choice of crafting a character.

This aspect of Pradeep Ranganathan is a major upgrade from what he did in ‘Love Today’, where he played a character whose incel mode and slut shamming misogynist mode were always on. And this is also way, way better than the famous character who slapped the shit out of his girlfriend for her father being a casteist (mentioning of Kabir Singh/ Arjun Reddy was intentional)

In a way, I find Agan’s character as the embodiment of modern men (both in movies and real life), who is trying to be reasonable. Men who find fault with misogyny and try to notch down the meter of macho masculinity way down, and to be more of an understanding person who can see from different perspectives.  Yes, Agan is not the ideal modern man. He trolls his best friend in a demeaning way, but he tries to make the right decision every time, and that goes against all the preconceived notions of what a man is supposed to be. This character is maybe the bridge towards the male characters that are more manly than Kabir Singh, but in a different context. Agan has swag for a hero material. As the story progresses, the hero material slightly shifts to a mere joker in the film, which enhances the comical scenes. Even with all this, PR was able to convincingly pull off the traditional self-sacrificing hero that we have seen in almost every romcom of the Tamil movie industry, which included stars like Vijay and Rajini. So Agan, without a doubt, redefined masculinity without losing the essence of what a hero means in Tamil movies.

What did the Dude try to say?

Now, let's get to the part that I'm most excited for. The way caste pride and honour killing were dealt with was so fresh and unique. The whole point of this movie was how far three youngsters would go in fear of one of their fathers, who is not only a highly influential politician but also a remorseless casteist who won't step down from even killing his own daughter for caste pride. And to use humour and satire as the mode to convey this was so unique from what we are usually watching in the Mari Selvarajske movies. To talk about caste, it doesn’t necessarily have to be brutal and dark. To tell these stories is most truly important, but when a movie is trying a different language to show how brutal and pointless this caste pride is, it feels refreshing. It doesn’t walk away from the truth; it confronts it with a satirical tone. This movie has the ability to create a conversation, just like how Mari Selvaraj and PA Ranjith's movie is influential enough to create that atmosphere. But because of all the initial hatred of this movie, it never got to reach that place. It got stuck in all this cuckhold BS.

Sarath Kumar’s character is the one with whom I had the most laugh-out-loud moments in this movie. Just like how Agan was different in how a hero can be redefined, Sarath Kumar’s character was also successful in attempting something similar. Even if that character was so funny, it did not mask away from the fact that he is a ruthless castiest who can go far beyond his moral code to kill his own sister and daughter. It was pulled off very effortlessly for a debut director to convey this contrast of humour and villainism.

 It doesn’t need any special mention on how relevant this topic, honour killing, is. So, to create an art form that deals with this, with maturity and a unique voice, is something to be appreciated. Even if this movie is mediocre, it is very much evident that it was genuine in finding its own language to talk about something so essential to be talked about.