Ignore a failed film, says High Court judge

Chennai: It is neither wise nor prudent to resurrect a failed movie by agitating against its objectionable content as that would only gift it undeserved publicity and even help a re-run, said Justice V. Ramasubramanian, while refusing to pull up actor-producer Dhanush for allegedly insulting the Ramakrishna Mission in his latest film,Vela Illa Pattadhari.

Dismissing a petition from four ‘devotees / disciples’ of Ramakrishna Mission Order, who sought deletion of a dialogue in that film which showed the educational institutions run by the Mission in poor light, the wise judge quoted from a beautiful anecdote in Swami Vivekanda’s illustrious life to point out that most often, even despicable ridicule could be confined to the dustbin by simply ignoring it, instead of elevating it to prominence by raising objections.

The petitioners had objected to hero Dhanush’s dialogue in the film that he failed in the job interview because he could not speak fluent English as he had studied in a Ramakrishna Mission school.
Justice Ramasubramanian said the fact that he was himself a student from RKM school demonstrated how abysmally flawed had the film dialogue been. “The question as to whether a person who studied in Tamil medium in a school run by Sri Ramakrishna Mission can be successful or not, need not be tested on the basis of the dialogue in question, but can be tested with reference, both to what I am and to what I do in this case”, he said while dismissing the petition. Obviously the judge rightly felt that it was the best punishment the film could get in the circumstances.