Comali

Comali is a 2019 Indian Tamil-language comedy drama film produced by Ishari K. Ganesh and written and directed by Pradeep Ranganathan in his directorial debut. The film stars Jayam Ravi, Kajal Aggarwal, Yogi Babu, Samyuktha Hegde and K. S. Ravikumar. It revolves around a man who has missed 16 years of his life due to being in a coma, and struggles to adapt to the new improved world.

Comali was released on 15 August 2019 coinciding with Indian Independence Day. The film opened to mostly positive reviews from critics, and became commercially successful by grossing ₹50 crore at the box office.

Plot
In 2000, Ravi is a school student whose father raised him with morals like treating everyone fairly. He loves his classmate, Nikitha, and tries proposing to her. At that moment, a goon, Dharmaraj, while escaping after killing a rival gangster, Gaja, takes Nikitha as a human shield, and Ravi is hit by a truck while trying to save her and ends up comatose.

16 years later, in 2016, Ravi awakens. He sees his friend Mani and learns that his father died and his sister married Mani, who has taken care of him all these years and incurred significant debts. Thiyagesh, the doctor who treated Ravi, tells Mani to fulfil Ravi's wishes since he has missed 16 years of his life. Fulfilling Ravi's first wish, Mani takes Ravi to Nikitha's house, only to realise she is married to Thiyagesh. Nikitha, not wanting to embarrass her husband, lies that she never liked Ravi. Mani tries to cheer up Ravi by helping him find a woman on a matrimony website.

Ravi falls in love with Rithika, whom he saw on the website and during his nephew's birthday party. She is a friend of Ravi's sister. After some talking over the phone, Rithika takes a liking to Ravi. Still an innocent teenager at heart, Ravi mistakes Rithika's air kiss while taking a selfie as her consent to kiss and kisses her. Rithika, not expecting this, slaps him. This incident gets blown out of proportion by the public and media. Ravi's sister scolds him for causing them more problems, adding to their debt problem, and asks him to find a job.

Unable to obtain a well-paying job since he never graduated, Ravi becomes a security guard at the museum where Rithika works. She tells him that she has forgiven him. Ravi sees a statue at the museum and realises that it belongs to his royal ancestors. However, Dharmaraj, now a MLA, currently owns the statue and lies that he is the royal heir, using the statue as proof.

Meanwhile, Ravi also tries to familiarise himself with society and uses YouTube, where his reactions to modern society make him famous. As his fan following increases, Ravi devises a plan to prove that the statue belongs to him. With help from Rithika and Mani, he gets a button camera to livestream his conversation with Dharmaraj. Ravi's plan goes well until a sweat droplet short-circuits the camera. Ravi suddenly remembers a school photo with the statue taken by Nikitha and tries to retrieve it from Nikitha, but Thiyagesh accidentally destroys the photo negative.

Disappointed but determined, Ravi thinks of another plan. With the help of Nikitha, Thiyagesh, and the rest of his crew, Ravi decides to defeat Dharmaraj without using technology. He plans to get inside Dharmaraj's house, posing as a distant relative while using Thiyagesh as a scout. Ravi, Mani and Nikitha go to Dharmaraj's house and distract Dharmaraj's pregnant wife, Bhanu, while Ravi tries to steal the statue and replace it with a duplicate. However, Bhanu catches him and attempts to inform her husband, but goes into labour. Ravi helps her to get to the hospital.

En route, Ravi's auto gets stuck in a flood due to heavy downpours, so he carries Bhanu to the hospital with people on the street helping them. Ravi realises that humanity still exists despite all the changes in society. Dharmaraj hears about Bhanu and rushes to the hospital. After learning that Ravi helped his wife and their child was born safely, he thanks him and does not retaliate.

Ravi learns Rithika filmed his outburst at Nikitha's house, criticising modern society for over-dependence on technology, and has gone viral across social media, earning him money to clear Mani's debts. He does not sell the statue but retains it as a family heirloom and continues making YouTube videos on social issues. Finally, the money repays all debts, and Rithika and Ravi are together.

Production
Pradeep Ranganathan had initially signed up to direct the film for Ishari K. Ganesh under the Prabhu Deva Studios banner, before Ganesh switched over to Vels Films International. Prabhu Deva initially agreed to play the lead role before he later opted out of the project. Pradeep had also narrated the film to G. V. Prakash Kumar, though Jayam Ravi was subsequently signed on.

Ravi lost 20 kg for the film, which was shot in Chennai, Tamil Nadu, on a specially-built school set. In September 2018, Kavita Radheshyam was brought in to play a role. Hiphop Tamizha agreed to compose the film's music, while Richard M. Nathan and Pradeep E. Ragav were selected as cinematographer and editor respectively. Halfway through the production of Ganesh's venture Puppy, Varun signed on to play a supporting role in this film.

Soundtrack
The film's soundtrack is composed by Hiphop Tamizha, marking their second collaboration with Jayam Ravi after Thani Oruvan. Lyrics are written by Hiphop Tamizha, Kabilan Vairamuthu, Pradeep Ranganathan, Gana Kavi, and Mobin. Rahul Nambiar and Jayam Ravi, recorded one song for this film.

Controversies
Aspiring film director Pa Krishnamoorthy accused the film producers of plagiarising his script, 25+25=25, which, too, was about a man who wakes up from a coma. Krishnamoorthy had registered his script with the South Indian Film Writers Association (SIFWA) in 2014 and pitched the script to several sources, including script agents, whom he speculated might have caused its leak. SIFWA compared Krishnamoorthy's script with Comali and determined that it was the same story. Krishnamoorthy said, "A twelve-member body in the Writers' Union, headed by a renowned director like Bhagyaraj, would not have decided in my favour if they thought only the premise of both stories were the same." However, Pradeep denied plagiarising the script, saying, "We both could have come up with the same idea. The script of Comali is something I had conceptualised even during my short film days." To settle the matter, the Comali producers agreed to add a card before the film that would credit Krishnamoorthy as the source of the story. However, Pradeep said, "The story of a man waking up from coma after years has been used time and again...". He also included a succeeding card mocking the previous card.

The first trailer, released in early August 2019, features a scene near the end where Ravi is told the year is 2016, and is shown a real-life speech of actor Rajinikanth announcing his political entry as proof, but Ravi retorts that the speech is from 1996. This caused backlash among fans of Rajinikanth who accused the film of defaming him by implying he had been delaying his political entry since 1996. They also noted the year was anachronistic as Rajinikanth actually made his speech in 2017 and, in 1996, only supported the alliance of the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam and the Tamil Maanila Congress. The footage of Rajinkanth was later deleted from the theatrical cut and replaced with footage of Nanjil Sampath, although it remained in some overseas markets.

Release and reception
The film was released on 15 August 2019. S. Srivatsan of The Hindu wrote, "The lack of seriousness is evident, for, Comali looks like an assortment of convenient filmmaking. What starts as a rapturous comedy becomes an unintentional heist drama in the second half; traverses into Samuthirakani’s universe of stronger-the-messages-louder-the-applause, and ends up as a survival movie, that is painstakingly exhaustive". Thinkal Menon of The Times of India rated 2.5/5, stating that "An entertaining first half didn't have an equally engaging latter half because of some melodramatic scenes." Behindwoods rated 3/5, stating that "Jayam Ravi and Yogi Babu's chemistry bolsters Comali, an entertaining film with a good mix of fun and emotions."

Sify rated 3/5, stating that "The first half of Comali is super engaging, the second half goes in various directions and moves away from the core theme. The climax looks forced although the message on humanity stays relevant." Sreedhar Pillai, for Firstpost, rated 3/5, stating that "Comali is packaged as a jolly-feel-good entertainer, laced with emotions and nostalgia." Baradwaj Rangan wrote "It's hard to classify the severely underwhelming Comali because the director himself isn’t sure what he’s making".

Potential remake
In September 2019, Boney Kapoor announced a Hindi remake of the film would star his son Arjun Kapoor. Bayview Projects, Boney's production company, holds the remake rights for all languages including Hindi.