Vaazhai

Story:

Mari Selvaraj is the writer, co-producer, and director of the 2024 Indian Tamil-language children’s drama film Vaazhai. Navvi Studios, Farmer’s Master Plan Production, and Disney+ Hotstar are producing it. Alongside J. Satish Kumar, Dhivya Duraisamy, Karnan Janaki, and Nivedita Rajappan, the film’s leading actors include debutantes Ponvel M., Raghul R., Kalaiyarasan, and Nikhila Vimal. In the movie, which is partially based on Selvaraj’s life, Sivanaindhan works on a banana plantation while attending school, despite the fact that he despises his job.

Since it is Navvi Studios’ first production, the movie was first announced in November 2022 under the provisional title Production No.1. A few days later, the official title was revealed. That same month, principal photography got underway. The majority of the filming took place in Thoothukudi and Tirunelveli, and it was finished by the middle of January 2023. Theni Eswar handled the film’s cinematography, Suriya Pradhaman edited it, and Santhosh Narayanan composed the soundtrack.

On August 23, 2024, Vaazhai was launched in theaters across the globe. It was well welcomed by critics when it was released, who praised the performances of the main actors and Mari Selvaraj’s direction.

Plot

Harvesting raw banana bunches and delivering them to lorries—for a pitiful Rs. 1 per bunch—is the main job in the southern Tamil Nadu village of Karungulam in the middle of 1998. Sivanaindhan and Sekar, two teenage pals, are huge admirers of Rajinikanth and Kamal Haasan, respectively. When Sivanaindhan gets caught stealing Poongodi’s handkerchief, he even makes a false vow because he has a crush on her. Sivanaindhan is an intelligent student, but poverty forces him to carry banana bunches on the weekends. Fearing the hard job, he and Sekar looked for ways to avoid it. Nevertheless, Sivanaindhan’s mother pledges her son’s labor and demands that he strive to pay back the advance credit she obtained.

Through their local broker, Muthuraj, Vembu, Sivanaindhan’s older sister, falls in love with Kani, a communist and socialistic thinker who, along with a few other villagers, wants a raise of Rs. 1 extra each bunch. Reluctantly, the trader consents to prevent a work stoppage. Sivanaindhan pretends to have a thorn injury one weekend to get out of work, leaving him to look after their cow. But he leaves the cow behind and follows Poonkodi to the rice mill. When he returns, he discovers that the cow has invaded Muthuraj’s land, which sparks an altercation. When Kani steps in, he loses his loadman job and is made to lug bunches like the other villagers.

After a few months, Sivanaindhan’s family finds it difficult to pay off their mounting debt. Sivanaindhan is even more devastated when his mother sells their cow. Sivanaindhan’s health deteriorates, forcing her to work. In the meantime, he is chosen to perform a dance during the next school’s annual day event. He is unable to face his mother, though, so he reluctantly goes out with his sister Vembu. Nevertheless, he persuades her and makes his way out of the packed truck to attend the dancing practice without eating. He tries to get bananas from a nearby field in quest of sustenance, but is apprehended by the field’s custodian and brutally beaten. Nevertheless, he manages to get away. When he gets home, his mother finds him and he flees to avoid being beaten, passing out next to Pond.

The entire community is in sorrow when he awakens, and there are about nineteen dead, including Vembu, Kani, Sekar, and Muthuraj, who perished in a truck accident while carrying bananas. Because he refused to provide adequate transportation and had the workers climb onto the overcrowded truck, the merchant is held accountable for the catastrophe. Weakened and hungry, Sivanaindhan enters his home to feed, but is apprehended by his mother, who sobs as she accuses her of causing his hunger and misery and mourns the death of her daughter. However, Sivanaindhan, who is famished, flees and collapses in the banana field. That’s it.

An old Dinathanthi newspaper article on the deaths of twenty plantain farm laborers near Srivaikundam who were buried alive beneath bananas in the truck when it flipped is shown on the screen. In the letter that follows, a survivor dedicates the film to those victims.