Kaantha (2025) [Movie Review] — Dulquer Salmaan in a fiery period mystery

Kaantha drops you onto a turbulent 1950s film set where creative control is less a matter of taste and more a matter of survival. When superstar KT Mahadevan (Dulquer Salmaan) attempts to reshape a project to fit his image, veteran director Ayya (Samuthirakani) finds his authority eroding shot by shot. The result is a claustrophobic collision of ambition, manipulation, and romance centred on Kumari (Bhagyashri Borse), a Burmese refugee caught between mentor and protégé. That deceptively simple premise—art as arena—gives Selvamani Selvaraj scope to stage a period thriller that feels operatic and immediate.

Performances

Dulquer’s magnetic restraint and a powerful ensemble lift the film

Dulquer Salmaan is magnetic: he balances old-school star swagger with small, revealing fractures that make Mahadevan both enviable and morally ambiguous. Bhagyashri Borse holds her own as Kumari, giving the role vulnerability and agency rather than reducing her to a trophy or plot device. Samuthirakani’s Ayya is statuesque and wounded, a mentor who resorts to psychological barbs and theatrical gambits to reclaim control. Rana Daggubati’s Inspector Devaraj brings thunderous energy to the investigation scenes, while the supporting cast—from Bijesh Nagesh to Vaiyapuri and Gayathrie Shankar—add texture and credibility. The ensemble’s commitment keeps the film’s heightened tone feeling deliberate, not accidental.

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Direction & Screenplay

Selvaraj crafts a Shakespearean tragedy in cinematic clothes

Selvamani Selvaraj and co-writers Tamizh Prabha and Sri Harsha Rameshwaram lean into melodrama as a stylistic choice rather than a crutch. The screenplay delights in the slipperiness of acting versus feeling, so that every scene can be read as performance within performance. Selvaraj stages confrontations like set pieces—each shot measured, each line a volley—and he resists the temptation to modernise the dialogue beyond period sensibility. This bold fidelity to theatricality occasionally makes outcomes predictable, but it also heightens the stakes: when the film decides to explode, it does so with operatic force.

Cinematography & Sound

Desaturated palettes and a score that fuels the mounting dread

The film’s visual language favours a brownish, desaturated palette that evokes celluloid age without draining vitality. Confined sets and tight framing create the stage-play pressure the story demands; wider, rarer shots open only to remind us there is a world beyond the studio. Jakes Bejoy’s score is admirably muscular—injecting tension into otherwise talky sequences and elevating the film’s mystery beats. Editor Anthony keeps the ambitious 163-minute runtime moving, trimming excess and letting pivotal moments land with the force they need.

Themes & Tone

Ego, performance and the moral cost of fame

At its heart, Kaantha interrogates performance—on screen and off—and how ambition can camouflage cruelty. The film asks whether art sanctifies its creators’ excesses or magnifies their moral failures. It’s also a commentary on gender and power: Kumari’s agency is contested at every turn, and the film’s willingness to let her emotional arc retain complexity is one of its more impressive choices. The tonal commitment to theatricality means realism is sometimes sacrificed for drama, but that tradeoff largely serves the movie’s thematic ambitions.

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Verdict

A confident, well-acted period mystery that rewards patient viewing

Kaantha isn’t subtle about its lineage—its archetypes and foreshadowing make some revelations feel inevitable—but the craftsmanship and performances more than compensate. Dulquer Salmaan gives one of his finest, most nuanced turns; Selvaraj stages a crowd-pleasing yet thought-provoking thriller that revels in the mechanics of classic cinema. For viewers who enjoy period pieces that fuse dramatic intensity with a meta-cinematic heartbeat, Kaantha is a richly satisfying, occasionally flawed triumph.

Rating: 8.5 / 10