But as a modern-day iteration of Bonny And Clyde is where DC allows us to have some of the coolest type of fun we’ve had in a really long time. It’s no longer a film about people who want to live well as it is about people who just want to not die. As the film falls into an infinite loop of chases with the cops right on the gang’s tale, their survival becomes important to us, especially because Chandra and Das begin to matter to us. Das, who has lost everyone he’s loved so far, fears that he will lose Chandra too. In a shot that feels surprisingly tender, we see Das’ fingers searching for Chandra sitting next to him, but not because he craves intimacy. He just wants the gentle touch, to make sure that she’s still there right next to him.
It’s moments such as these that work so hard to make DC more than just a cool gangster drama. Their morality is spelt out so clearly that their violent ways stop being a bother. We buy into their poetic justice, hoping for both Das and Chandra to find their moment of peace. Anirudh lifts so many scenes to such heights that it easily becomes his most accomplished work in many months. Wamiqa expertly mixes up the wide-eyed innocence of a little girl with that of the cold brutality of a woman who has been defeated by the world, without it ever feeling like two different characters.
But what makes the biggest impact is the performance of Lokesh Kanagaraj. In what may have easily been interpreted as emotionless, he finds a precious balance with which he’s able to convey everything without doing anything. The film’s dialogues speak of Das being a hothead, but Lokesh doesn’t need any scenes of him exploding to make us feel his anger. There are no emotional monologues or outbursts to make us believe that he’s the broken Devdas; he just is, finding a level of comfort in front of the camera that takes lesser actors years to cultivate. As all of their efforts meld together, we’re just not left with a film with loads of whistle-worthy moments, but also an ultra-cool gangster drama in Tamil, just when you thought you had sworn off them.
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