Billed as the swan song of actor-turned-politician Vijay, who currently serves as the Tamil Nadu Chief Minister, the Jana Nayagan certification controversy, which delayed its release by seven months, is well-documented; so, no recap needed.

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But a close look at the timeline of the movie’s development — starting from the initial stages when it was launched under the working title Thalapathy 69 — and the Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam’s (TVK) political journey exemplifies that the intention of Vijay and the movie’s makers was for the film and the party to play a key role in the shaping of one another.

While his announcement that Thalapathy 69 would be his last film and that he was “throwing it (his cinematic journey) away at the absolute height of my career” helped the TVK gather momentum, one cannot say that the actor showed the same spirit towards the movie. Watching Jana Nayagan would prove that gifting the fans who made him who he is one last memorable ride was not even a consideration for him, as neither he nor the makers have even tried to create a decent watch.

Sura, Villu, and Jana Nayagan: Why Vijay’s older flops may deserve an apology

You might have thought that I resorted to rage-baiting with the headline, but in all honesty, I did feel that director SP Rajkumar’s Sura (2010) and Prabhu Deva’s Villu (2009) — which, in my opinion, are the worst Vijay films ever (though since he has done quite a few abominations, your choices might differ from mine) — no longer deserve so much hate.

Sura and Villu aren’t just bad films; they are unapologetically bad. They don’t try to prove points, make elaborate statements, or pretend to be cinematic extravaganzas. They are simply brain-rot star vehicles. And also, let’s not forget that they came out in the late 2000s when Indian commercial cinema’s overall quality was at an all-time low.

Jana Nayagan marks Vijay’s swansong as an actor. (Screenshot: YouTube/kvnproductionsofficial; enhanced using AI)

But in 2026, when Indian cinema has improved significantly and we have such cutting-edge technological support at our fingertips, if all that these people could make is Jana Nayagan — where everything is a statement claiming that Vijay is better than every other person alive in this country, and artistic and aesthetic value are nil in the film — then please, I would rather watch Sura and Villu again.

A remake wrapped in political propaganda

From the very beginning, the shoddiness of Jana Nayagan is very apparent, even though the visuals are familiar since it is a partial remake of director Anil Ravipudi’s Nandamuri Balakrishna-starrer Bhagavanth Kesari (2023).

While H Vinoth has simply recreated Bhagavanth Kesari’s uninspired hero intro, his additions are merely a few symbolic moments with political references that are anything but subtle. For instance, before we see Vijay’s face, we see him catch a book titled “Indian Democracy,” which has been flung into the air by some goons. In other words, Vijay saves “Indian Democracy.”

Where Jana Nayagan fails

In the next few minutes, we see a mural of MG Ramachandran (MGR) with fire burning right next to it, and that’s when Jana Nayagan reveals Vijay’s face. While the makers may have felt that these symbolisms carried deeper meaning, the portrayals are quite outdated and juvenile.

Unfortunately, there are far too many such purported “director brilliances” throughout the movie. In some places, images of Babasaheb Dr BR Ambedkar and Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose are placed alongside Vijay; in one scene, a statue of Kannagi (from Cilappatikaram) points her finger towards Vijay’s character as if he’s the answer to people’s woes; and at another juncture, a portrait of MGR interacts with him.

Given the political ambitions the actor had during the film’s production, these elements underscore that Jana Nayagan is a propaganda film. However, the movie’s issues don’t end there. To make everyone around him refer to Vijay’s character as Thalapathy (the actor’s sobriquet) from time to time, Vinoth has shamelessly named him Thalapathy Vetri Kondan (yep, TVK), kicking subtlety out the front door.

Lack of chemistry between Vijay and Mamitha Baiju

Another major shortcoming of the film is the lack of chemistry between Vijay and Mamitha Baiju, who plays Viji, a young woman Thalapathy has been raising since her childhood after her parents’ deaths. Since the emotional core of Jana Nayagan hinges entirely on their bond, it was important for their equation to resonate with the audience. However, this rarely happens.

Vijay and Mamitha Baiju in Jana Nayagan. (Screenshot: YouTube/kvnproductionsofficial; enhanced using AI)

Also, what on earth is “fear phobia” that Viji is said to be grappling with? Would it have hurt the movie’s team to do some basic research on mental health and use a term that at least made sense? But sure, when the plan is to divide scenes and acts based on bullet points from Vijay’s political manifesto, why even waste time using brains?

Jana Nayagan also suffers from a curious case of not knowing what it wishes to be — a father-daughter tale or a political thriller. In other words, the movie desperately tries to satisfy both Vijay’s ‘Thalapathy’ image and his political ambitions; however, the lack of substance leaves it neither one nor the other.

While the Thalapathy-Viji track is progressing, a random supervillain named John Himmler alias Amrish Poojari (Bobby Deol) enters the scene with motivations similar to those of MCU’s Thanos. Suddenly, Jana Nayagan takes a random diversion, and all of a sudden, the entire country is at stake. The government has failed, and so have the defence forces. So, is India done and dusted? Absolutely not! Because Thalapathy can save the country — single-handedly!

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Towards the end, Jana Nayagan even introduces us to a remote-controlled (RC) war, and for a moment, I was genuinely scared that I would have to sit through Thalapathy fighting off killer robots with his bare hands. Phew, that didn’t happen!

Subpar VFX and goldmine of memes

And not to mention, Jana Nayagan deserves just as much criticism as director Om Raut’s Prabhas-led Adipurush (2023) for its disastrous visual effects, with the most ridiculous being an stunt sequence set on a ship.

Adding to its woes are the stale action choreography by Anl Arasu and uninspired music by Anirudh Ravichander that gives an adrenaline rush only occasionally.

Also, a humble request to filmmakers: please stop portraying rivals as being utterly terrified by every glance or sound from the hero. It may seem impressive and massy on paper or in the makers’ heads, but on screen, it comes across as amateurish and lazy, especially when this gimmick is repeated throughout the entire film.

In all honesty, had Jana Nayagan not been Vijay’s so-called final film, the trolling would have begun already. But let’s not lose hope. I am certain that post the film’s OTT release, it will be a goldmine of memes for content creators.

Even though the movie pretends to be about women’s empowerment, Jana Nayagan is also extremely fake, like Atlee’s Bigil (2019) in that domain, where the strength of women only comes out when they are with Thalapathy and under his mentorship. “Without Thalapathy by their side, women stand no chance in this society” is a narrative that Vijay’s films have been propagating for the past few years — almost as if compensating for the many misogynistic portrayals in his earlier movies — and Jana Nayagan is no different. Whether it’s Viji or Thalapathy’s girlfriend, Kayal (Pooja Hegde), their identities hinge entirely on him.

Jana Nayagan also suffers from a curious case of not knowing what it wishes to be. (Screenshot: YouTube/kvnproductionsofficial; enhanced using AI)

From a random scene showing Thalapathy giving sex education to little children to long speeches on democracy, there are far too many preachy elements in the movie that appear unapologetically forced into the narrative simply to give Vijay a certain political image and thus boost his popularity. Even if the content of these scenes is occasionally good, the shoddy way they’ve been crafted — dialogue-wise and visually — makes Jana Nayagan a tiring watch.

Nevertheless, one of the positive aspects of Jana Nayagan is that it has fortunately avoided the stereotypical portrayal of introducing a Pakistani as the main antagonist in such political dramas. Instead, Himmler/Poojari is an Indian and, for that matter, a former police officer.

However, the character is so poorly developed that it’s almost impossible to take him seriously. Even the character of politician Roja Rangaswamy (Prakash Raj), a secondary villain, is crafted solely to show what kind of leader Vijay will never be in real life. In fact, Roja Rangaswamy embodies everything Vijay paints his political opponents as, making the character little more than a puppet in the larger narrative.

Nevertheless, even now, it’s endearing to see Vijay playing a father/fatherly figure to a little girl or a young woman — underscoring his brilliant on-screen chemistry with his female co-stars — as he once again embraces his “Ilam Thendral” image from the late 1990s. In fact, had Jana Nayagan not been a propaganda movie, it could have been a heartwarming father-daughter tale, like parts of Gautham Vasudev Menon’s Ajith-starrer Yennai Arindhaal (2015). Unfortunately, both Vijay and Vinoth have totally overlooked such possibilities, resulting in a subpar film.

A disservice to the fans who built ‘Thalapathy’

The fact that Vijay chose an already unbearable film to remake as his swansong underscores just how limited his cinematic vision and understanding are, even after spending over three decades in the industry.

Had Vijay even the slightest regard for his fans, as he claims he does, he would have given them a better film as his swansong to cherish forever. (Screenshot: YouTube/kvnproductionsofficial; enhanced using AI)

At the same time, the catastrophic downfall of director H Vinoth needs to be studied, as he went from movies such as Sathuranga Vettai (2014) and Theeran Adhigaaram Ondru (2017), which earned widespread acclaim for his craft, to Thunivu (2023) and now Jana Nayagan, where filmmaking is pretty much non-existent. Following the missteps of Valimai (2022) and Thunivu, one would have expected him to choose wisely and not simply remake a movie that was already poorly received. While Vijay had nothing to lose here, Vinoth has basically taken his career several steps backwards.

Had Vijay even the slightest regard for his fans, as he claims he does, he would have given them a better film as his swansong to cherish forever. Instead, Jana Nayagan makes one realise that after a point, winning the Tamil Nadu polls became his sole objective, and he was ready to in/directly arm-twist a bunch of his colleagues into creating for him what can only be described as one of the most generic three-hour-long political speeches one could come up with.

Cinema cannot exist in a vacuum; it’s all about the discussions that follow. In the Cinema Anatomy column, we delve into the diverse layers and dimensions of films, aiming to uncover deeper meanings and foster continuous discourses.