Aalwar

Plot

Aalwar (Ajith Kumar) is devoted to his mother (Geetha) and sister (Shwetha Bandekar). But the villainous elements Lal and Vincent Asokan kill the sister and mother due to an old dispute with Aalwar. Aalwar, with revenge ringing in his mind, ends up as a killer, even while working as a ward boy in a hospital. He rechristens himself as Shiva and is out to make a statement against the venal forces. He sees himself as some kind of avatar. In fact, he bumps off the baddies under the getup of Lord Rama and Lord Krishna. In the climax, Shiva turns up as Lord Narasimha and bumps off the last villain by placing him on his thighs and ripping apart his bowels and chest with his sharp claws. He successfully escapes from the police of Chennai and continues his process of "Dharma".

Production

Following the moderate success of his comeback films Paramasivan and Thirupathi,  Ajith teamed up with a debutant Chella for a film to be produced by Mohan Natarajan. Chella had previously worked as an associate to S. J. Suryah, who Ajith had worked with, in the 1999 film, Vaali. The film held its photo session on 20 July 2006 with Asin, Ajith's pair in the much delayed Varalaru, being selected once again while Ramesh G of Naalai was chosen as cinematographer. The film began at the Ramoji Rao Studios in Hyderabad in August 2006, with ajith putting on weight for the film. A couple of songs were filmed in Switzerland as the film geared up for a Pongal release alongside Vijay's Pokkiri. Shalini, Ajith's wife, was the costume designer for Ajith in the film.

Release

The film opened to negative with Sify.com labelling it a "built on a predictable premise" and described that Asin's looks were the only positive. Another critic described the film as "below average" citing that "the biggest drawback is that the story does not have a strong plot or surprising twists and that "there is also a palpable lack of chemistry between the characters and this gives the picture a poorly contrived feel." Rediff.com's review concluded that "Sella's directorial debut lacks originality and is a hotch potch of celebrated scripts of the past."
The producers later dubbed and released the film in Telugu as Avatharudu and Hindi as Mera Farz (2009), with both versions going unnoticed. A Kannada remake was planned by Rajkumar but then later dropped. The director of the film, Chella, has not directed a film since despite announcing two other films, Neruppu Kozhi with Sakthi and Por Vaal with Jeevan.