Mysskin says he must bow to Karthik Subbaraj after Dorothy

Mysskin’s devotion to Ilaiyaraaja is no secret. Now he has added Karthik Subbaraj to the list. “After Ilaiyaraaja, it is Karthi’s feet I must fall at,” he said as the Dorothy team gathered to thank audiences in the film’s second week. Through Dorothy, he said, Karthik Subbaraj had lifted the trans community to the highest place, and made a film that would stand for all time, beyond whatever it collects. “Our ears are for listening to Ilaiyaraaja. Our eyes are for watching films like Dorothy.”

Mysskin went further than anyone in the room. He called Dorothy a hundred times better than Kadaisi Vivasayi and Kottukkaali, said trans people understand life better than any of us, and said the film teaches tolerance. Rishikanth and Sananth, he said, had broken the mass hero template and become big heroes in the process, which also gave them a big responsibility. “Keerthy is the soul of this film.”

Karthik Subbaraj kept his own speech short, and it carried the evening’s sharpest idea. “Cinema is a powerful weapon. It has the power to change people’s minds.” Many people had told him the film would change the way society has looked at the trans community, he said, and he considered that the film’s real success, and a personal one too. He called Ilaiyaraaja’s music the team’s blessing and described cinematographer Tirru as the film’s other hero.

The fellow filmmakers who turned up spoke like fans. Lingusamy said only someone with great love and courage could make a film like Dorothy, and that Karthik Subbaraj had both. He had watched it twice. “We can celebrate Karthi for a lifetime for making this film with such love,” he said, before offering the comparison of the night: “Rishi and Sananth are like Rajini and Kamal.” Vasanthabalan said cinema had been stuffing patriarchy and wrong ideas into films in the name of mass appeal, and that Dorothy had landed like a sledgehammer on all of it. He called it a love story on the level of Romeo and Juliet, said it deserved a National Award, and praised its cinematography and Ilaiyaraaja’s score. Sasi said Dorothy made him proud to be a Tamil filmmaker, and that it was a big thing for a director of Karthik Subbaraj’s standing to step forward and make a film about the trans community.

The most moving words came from speakers from the trans community. Shabitha, who said she has worked for trans and transgender people for 16 years, admitted she broke down sobbing when the film ended. Many films had been made and much awareness built over the years, she said, but Dorothy would always be special. It speaks as the voice of the community, and it struck her personally: in her own life, it was her sister-in-law who accepted her first. Responding to criticism of the film’s ending, she pointed out that the law now allows trans women to marry. “So what is the problem with the climax? The trans community will go to many more heights, and this film is the proof.”

Malavika had the evening’s best line, built on the names of the film’s leads. “Karthi is the hero, Subbu is the heroine, and Raj is Ilaiyaraaja sir. Put them together and you get Karthik Subbaraj.” Every frame, she said, was worth pressing to your eyes in reverence, and the director had brought out two wonderful actors in Rishikanth and Sananth. “Even if you don’t respect us, don’t humiliate us.” She said a bitter memory left by Oororam Puliyamaram, a Yuvan Shankar Raja song, had been wiped away by the Meenakshi Kamakshi song his father Ilaiyaraaja gave Dorothy. She called the film this year’s gift and said it deserves an Oscar.

Subha called Dorothy a revolution for the community. Bombay, Kanchana and Aruvi had portrayed trans people well, she said, but what Dorothy says in the Gen Z era matters especially, and it will keep people thinking until 2050. She said the director had made it with a social purpose rather than a commercial one, and predicted a bright future for Sananth and Rishikanth.

Distributor Sakthivelan said that before Dorothy was even seen, a great deal of verbal violence had been unleashed on it in the name of free expression. It had won anyway, he said, both commercially and critically, and he predicted it would top the box office this weekend. He was glad, he said, to have a share in a film that had given Tamil cinema two talents in Rishi and Sananth. Producer Achin Jain of Sikhya Entertainment thanked audiences and the crew for turning the film into a wonderful experience.

Our Dorothy review called it Karthik Subbaraj’s boldest leap yet, with extraordinary turns from Sananth and Rishikanth and an Ilaiyaraaja score to match. A week and a half after release, the room full of filmmakers and the people the film is about were saying much the same thing.