Naanum Rowdy Thaan (Eng: I, Too, am a Rowdy) is a 2015 Indian Tamil black comedy movie written and directed by Vignesh Shivan. Vijay Sethupathi and Nayanthara are in the lead roles. Produced by actor Dhanush under his banner Wunderbar Films, the film features music composed by Anirudh Ravichander. The film was shot in Puducherry and Chennai over 75 days. It was released on 21 October 2015, receiving positive reviews from critics and became a profitable venture at the box office.
Paandian aka “Pondy” Paandi (Vijay Sethupathi) is the son of a Puducherry-based police inspector P.Meena Kumari (Raadhika Sarathkumar). Despite being a police inspector’s son, he grew up being friendly with the criminals behind bars and on reaching adulthood, unknown to his mother, he becomes a rowdy, albeit an incompetent one.
Paandi comes across a deaf woman Kadhambari (Nayantara) and immediately falls in love with her. Kadhambari is the daughter of a sincere police officer Ravikumar (Azhagam Perumal), who is in pursuit of Killivallavan aka Killi (Parthiban), a dreaded gangster and politician who had killed Ravikumar’s wife and had caused Kadhambari to lose her hearing in her childhood. Kadhambari seeks Paandi’s help in finding her father, who has not spoken to her for the past two days, to which he agrees. Paandi soon finds out that Ravikumar had been killed by Killi, but hides the matter from Kadhambari as it would make her upset. But Kadhambari finds out about her father’s death anyway and is determined to avenge his death by going after Killi and killing him. Paandi agrees to help her in her mission, with the promise that “he will hold Killi’s shoulders while she stabs him”.
Paandi and his gang along with Kadhambari hatch a plan to kill Killi while he is travelling. However, this is foiled as their plan gets mixed up with that of Mansoor (Mansoor Ali Khan), the political rival of Killi who wants to contest the upcoming election in place of Killi’s wife Baby (Meenakshi). Paandi’s gang is enraged and despite Paandi’s reassurances, decide not to help Kadhambari further. Kadhambari decides to go ahead on her mission on her own as she doesn’t want Paandi and his friends to split up over her. She reaches Killi’s hideout, but on attempting to kill him, he slaps her, knocking her out. Paandi soon arrives at the hideout and he and Kadhambari, who has regained consciousness, try to kill Killi, but it fails as Kadhambari is unable to stab him. At this juncture, Mansoor arrives at the hideout and both Killi and Mansoor stab each other to death, with Paandi taking “credit” for their deaths in order to impress Kadhambari.
In the end, Paandi, disillusioned with the rowdy lifestyle, becomes a police officer as per his mother’s wishes, despite Kadhambari’s reservations.
Directed by Vignesh Shivan
Produced by Dhanush
Written by Vignesh Shivan
Starring Vijay Sethupathi, Nayantara, Parthiban, Raadhika, RJ Balaji
Music by Anirudh Ravichander
Cinematography George C. Williams
Edited by A. Sreekar Prasad
Production Wunderbar Films
Distributed by Lyca Productions
Release dates 21 October 2015
Running time 140 minutes
Country India
Language Tamil
