Madharaasi (2025), SK shines in a weak script

Madharaasi (2025), directed by A R Murugadoss and starring Sivakarthikeyan, is an all-out action film. The plot touches on an important public issue of rising gun culture, but the screenplay makes no use of it to build an emotional connection with the audience. Mangoidiots gives the film a Raw rating.

Sivakarthikeyan has handled the action sequences very well. In fact, the theatre was full of claps and cheers for every hit and shootout. He plays Raghu, a young man working in a car factory, who falls in love with Malathy, a girl of his dreams, played by Rukmini Vasanth. At the same time, a team of NIA officers are trying to stop a large shipment of guns into Tamil Nadu. They fail and rope in Raghu to help. Till here, the setup was perfect for an action film, but the screenplay falters from the start. Characters are not developed, and motivations are not explained. Raghu gets a backstory, but that is placed only to justify his style in the fights. The antagonists fare even worse – we don’t know who they are, or what their real motivation is, apart from a 10-second TV interview that throws up all possible causes.

Raghu’s character itself feels muddled. Is he brave, tragic, funny, smart, or simple? He seems to be all and none at the same time. The romance between Raghu and Malathy begins nicely, but collapses once she discovers his true side. Her reason for breaking up is amateurish, more of a prop to move the stuck screenplay. Even when she explains her sad past, it fails to convince. Yes, this is a mass hero film, I understand. I, too, grew up watching Rajinikanth beat up all-powerful villains. But there was no need to show a professional agency like the NIA in such a clownish light. Every officer behaves recklessly, without any knowledge of operations or spycraft. Why would an NIA officer reveal a key operational secret to everyone standing around – including the heroine and even the front gate guards?

Guns blaze throughout the film, though I am not sure why. By the end, it felt like I had spent cartridges and discarded guns in my own pocket. Beyond that, I was at a loss to figure out what the story was and why it had to run for 165 minutes.

I forgot to add, the so-called syndicate is shown only to reduce the dreaded world of powerful people into a bunch of midwits. And who exactly was the lady don who appears in two scenes with some build-up, only to vanish without a trace?

Overall, watch Madharaasi only if you are a fan of SK and non-stop action. Do not expect any story depth or emotional connection with the characters.