Thanu backed Train on trust alone, no script needed

Kalaipuli S. Thanu has produced enough films to have earned the right to hear a script before he writes a cheque. For Train, he says, he never asked. The producer told the room at the film’s launch that his faith in Mysskin was total enough that he skipped the reading entirely and simply started the film, one of the very few times in a long career he has done that.

That trust ran to the set as well. Thanu revealed that Train was built around an elaborate eight-compartment train, the largest physical set ever constructed for one of his productions, a full replica assembled so Mysskin could stage his thriller inside a moving carriage rather than fake it in fragments. He called the evening a day he would remember, praised Vijay Sethupathi’s commitment and the wider ensemble, and settled the question everyone came to hear answered: Train opens in August.

The teaser that followed made the case for the set. In 43 high-octane seconds, a speeding train falls under the control of a group of vicious men while terrified passengers look on, and a lone figure played by Sethupathi begins to fight back. It went up to loud cheers.

Mysskin, who also composed the film’s score, gave the evening its most emotional stretch. He spoke about the long road he has travelled with Thanu and with Sethupathi, then made a confession about the writing: he had built the script for Sethupathi alone, and could not imagine another actor carrying the part the way this one did. He called him an extraordinary human being and a volcano of talent, said most of the scenes were finished in a single take, and turned back to Thanu to thank him for standing by the film through everything it took to get made.

Sethupathi returned the warmth. Working with Mysskin, he said, had been a dream he had carried for years, one he has told the full story of before, from a wary first impression to an eight-hour first conversation. He described a director who runs his set on kindness and encouragement rather than pressure, and promised audiences a thriller that carries a genuinely emotional core underneath the tension. He thanked the filmmakers, technicians and well-wishers who had filled the hall.

The film’s heroines took the stage together to thank Mysskin and Thanu for the roles and to trade shoot memories. Among them was Ira Dayanand, making her Tamil debut as the female lead, who called Train her dream project and thanked Sethupathi and the team for keeping her at ease through the shoot. Shruti Haasan, Preethi Karan, Diya Sharma and Malavika Sundar rounded out the ensemble of leads.

Veterans Nassar and K.S. Ravikumar spoke to the craft behind the film, both circling the same point: Mysskin’s professionalism and his knack for pulling performances out of actors that they did not know they had in them. Narain, Ganesh Venkatraman, Ajay Rathnam, Yugi Sethu, Singampuli, Suresh Menon and cinematographer Fowzia Fathima were among the others who took the mic, each backing the sense that the film has something unusual in it.

The guest list of directors read like a cross-section of the industry’s more distinctive voices. Vetrimaaran, Ameer, R. Parthiban, Vignesh Shivan, Arun Matheswaran, Madonne Ashwin, P.S. Vinothraj, Sasi and Ram all turned up to speak for the film. Ram used his slot for a blunt tribute to Mysskin’s hardest years; the rest praised the director’s voice, Sethupathi’s range in work like Maharaja, and Thanu’s willingness to bankroll a film this ambitious.

For a film that spent six years fighting its way to a release date, the launch did its job: the set is real, the teaser is out, and the August window is now on the record. What remains is the eight-compartment gamble itself, and whether the thing Thanu trusted without reading survives contact with a full house.