Red (2002 film)

Plot

Ajith Kumar is Red (it stands for Revolution, Education, Development), an orphan who has since grown up to be the local don in Madurai. Naturally he possesses a heart of gold and when not bashing up bad guys, he spends his time forcing schools to accept students without donations and taking care of orphans. Cheeni (Salim Ghouse) is his biggest enemy. Red falls for Gayatri (Priya Gill), the daughter of his friend and confidante Narayanan (Manivannan) and helps her without her knowledge. She too likes him but wants him to give up his life of violence. Meanwhile, a reporter (Rajesh) for Ananda Vikatan begins to serialise Red's story under the name Aadi and it becomes quite the rage among readers.

Cast

Production

NIC Arts, the producers of Ajith Kumar's previous films Vaali, Mugavaree and Citizen signed him to appear in a film titled Right directed by debutant Ram Sathya, an associate of Sundar C. The original plot point of Ajith's 1999 film Unnaithedi was recommended by Singampuli, and Ajith had mentioned that if the film became a success he would feature in a future film to be directed by Singampuli. Priya Gill was signed as heroine while the film has music by Deva and cinematography by Rajasekar. The shoot of the film started at Annapoorna Studios where art director Sabu Cyril erected a part of Madurai town for the film. Other members announced to a part of the cast included Salim Ghouse, Rajan P Dev, Raghuvaran, Manivannan and Srividya.

Release

The film was initially supposed to release in the Deepavali season of 2001 but was postponed to January 2002 to avoid competition with Kamal Haasan's Aalavandhan and Vijay's Shahjahan.

Made on a high budget of ₹5 crore, Red opened to mixed reviews and the critic from The Hindu cited that "Red fails to make even a very slight impression, it is because the story and emotions lack depth" citing that the film would become a failure. The critical failure of the film prompted S S Chakravarthy to halt and shelve his production Mahaa, featuring Ajith Kumar as a police officer and Kiran Rathod in the lead roles. Ajith revealed that his character in the film was "too glorified" and lamented his character for being a reason for the film's critical failure.

Soundtrack

The soundtrack features six songs composed by Deva. The film's soundtrack became a success prior to release, with critics praising the songs particularly "Thai Madiyae". All lyrics written by Vairamuthu.