The Hero's Mass and the Ontological Politics of the Image
Constantine V. Nakassis The Hero’s Mass and the Ontological Politics of the Image ABSTRACT This article explores the ontological politics of the image in Tamil cinema. Its focus is a particular scene from the 2011 film Mankatha (Venkat Prabhu) in which the protagonist, played by the “mass hero” Ajith Kumar, is slapped by a character played by Vaibhav Reddy. Taking the image not simply as diegetic representation but as performative act, Ajith fans were enraged at Vaibhav. As I show, multiple ontological and political claims on what an image is intersect in and manifest as this performa- tive image-act. This multiplicity provokes rethinking of arguments by André Bazin and others about “the” ontology of the film image. In early September 2011, I went to a bar in southwest Chennai to meet up with Suresh, a middle-class friend in his early twenties.1 After a few rounds, we ended up back at his one-r oom apartment. We ate dinner and watched a television special, Mankatha Sirappuk Kaṇṇōṭṭam (Mankatha: A unique perspective, Sun TV, Septem- ber 11, 2011), dedicated to the recent release of Mankatha (Venkat Prabhu, 2011), the fiftieth film of Ajith Kumar, Suresh’s favorite actor and one of the preeminent hero-star s of the Tamil film industry. The show featured discussions with Mankatha’s director and writer Venkat Prabhu and its main actors, although not Ajith, who is known to avoid media appearances. Each of the guests were introduced by the host, the comedian- actor Shiva, and invited to the sound stage. When Shiva introduced the actor Vaibhav Reddy, however, he did so crypti- cally as the other guests smiled and laughed.
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