Sarkar (2018 film)
Sarkar (transl. Government) is a 2018 Indian Tamil-language political action film[5][6] written and directed by AR Murugadoss, and produced by Kalanithi Maran of Sun Pictures. The dialogues were co-written by Murugadoss and B. Jeyamohan. The film stars Vijay, Keerthy Suresh and Varalaxmi Sarathkumar while Yogi Babu, Radha Ravi, and Pala. Karuppiah play supporting roles. It follows Sundar Ramaswamy, a non-resident Indian who arrives in India from the United States to cast his vote in the election, only to find that his vote has already been recorded as cast. Sundar raises awareness against electoral fraud among the masses and decides to contest as a nonpartisan politician in the elections amidst several attempts made on his life and reputation.
Principal photography for Sarkar began in January 2018. Murugadoss collaborated with Vijay for a third time with Sarkar, which was the latter’s 62nd film and given the tentative title of Thalapathy 62. In early December 2017, Sun Pictures agreed to produce the film. While Girish Gangadharan handled the cinematography, A. Sreekar Prasad served as the editor. In August, a few scenes were shot at Las Vegas. Filming was completed by September 2018. The film’s soundtrack was composed by A. R. Rahman with lyrics written by Vivek.
After various complications, including protests and allegations of plagiarism, Sarkar was released on 6 November 2018, during the week of Diwali, along with the Telugu dubbed version.[7] It received mixed reviews; while Vijay’s performance, concept and cinematography was praised, both the screenplay and sequences were criticised. Post-release, the film involved in controversies with reference to J. Jayalalithaa in the audio track and other sequences from the film led to protests by members of the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam. After lawsuits were registered against the makers, the said allusions were muted. Sarkar has grossed ₹250 crore (US$36 million) worldwide, and emerged as a commercial success.
Sarkar became Vijay’s third film to collect $1 million at the US box office, following Theri and Mersal.[8] As a result of the film’s success, the Election Commission of India created awareness regarding Section 49P of the Conduct of Elections Rules, 1961 that allows a voter to have the right to get back his/her ballot back and vote if someone else voted in that individual’s name. Sarkar was screened at Grand Rex, France.[9] It was also screened in Japan.[10]
