With nearly a year to go for the release of Thalapathy 69, the hype around the film is only increasing day by day. With a paramount of pressure on director H Vinoth who will be collaborating with Vijay for the first time, and Thalapathy 69 touted to be the final film of Vijay before quitting cinema, and the hype merely cannot be put into words.

Thalapathy 69 features an ensemble star cast, including Kanguva star Bobby Deol, Prakash Raj, Pooja Hedge, Priya Mani, Mamitha Baiju and Gautham Menon, among the many others. It will also mark Bobby’s second outing in Tamil after Kanguva. While Tamil cinema has been trying to cash on to the pan-India bandwagon and ape the Baahubali-type of cinema, including the recently released Kanguva, one really hopes for Thalapathy 69 to satisfy the star’s fanbase and also become a talking point for its quality.

Thalapathy 69 goes pan India with Bobby Deol, Shivarajkumar?

In the recent times, two steps are supposedly deciding if a film is pan-Indian or not. One, if the makers rope in actors with known body of work in other language to represent the industry they come from, and two, market the film before its release in form of all-India tour. The latest example would be Kanguva, a film which roped in Bollywood actors like Bobby Deol and Disha Patani, and also had an elaborate tour in the northern belt. However, the film soon became a wasted opportunity of sorts, for various reasons.

On the topic of Bobby Deol, we also have the Hindi actor play a crucial role in Thalapathy 69. While it is still too early for us guess the plot of the film, and if Bobby will indeed play the bad guy opposite Vijay, one really hopes that H Vinoth will go back to his golden days of Sathuranga Vettai and Theeran Adhigaaram Ondru, to make a film with a strong antagonist, enough to make the film stronger.

Apart from Bobby Deol, Thalapathy 69 has names that will quickly register on the minds of people. Pooja Hegde who shook a leg with Vijay in Halamathi Habibo in Beast, is pairing up for her sophomore collaboration, Mamitha Baiju whose Premalu became the first blockbuster this year’s Indian cinema saw, and tentatively even Shivrajkumar, whose presence in Jailer was enough to set the screens on fire. Now, only time can tell if H Vinoth’s film will tap the right potential of each star to make a good film that will eventually convert into a pan-Indian success, or will it be a promotional strategy to make the film work at the box office.

Can Vijay's final film break the pan-Indian curse?

For long, it has been hard for Tamil cinema to break the pan-Indian concept. While industry hits like KGF, Kantara (Kannada), Baahubali, RRR (Telugu), Aavesham and Manjummel Boys (Malayalam) have become films that made the rest of the country turn their heads, soaring the box office collections, Tamil cinema, despite having made some gem of films, lacked the pan-Indian race.

Thalapathy 69, which rides huge on Vijay’s personal choice to quit cinema to focus on politics, already made scores of fans to but ticket for the film and be seated. Now, the question is, will the film be the success it has to be, beyond the fanfare and stardom Vijay pulls and transcend to a venture that is hailed and celebrated beyond the box office numbers? Tamil cinema for long has been trying to give its all out, make a film that is huge, both in terms of budget and visuals. However, its trials have turned drastic, and we hope Thalapathy 69 is not just one of them.

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