K. Balachander’s Ivargal 2 | Video Essay Script
Hi, my name is Kishor and this is MOVING IMAGES. K Balachander was called “Iyakunar Sigaram”, and he more than lived up to the title in his 50+ year career. KB brought an array of impressive and complex characters to life in his many films. While he had a well-known penchant for his strong female protagonists, his sensitive male leads, and the obsessive antagonists, KB was never afraid to push the envelope further when it came to his characters and themes. By the time the 80s rolled in, KB broke away from the middle-class household problems within four walls and took the issues to the streets. His films started dealing with problems with society such as unemployment, poverty, scarcity, and corruption. But the bigger issues and larger scale wasn’t where KB was actually experimenting. It was again his characters that KB started introducing subtle changes to.
To see how KB’s characters evolved through the 80s, let’s do an experiment. Let’s actually try to write the characters like KB would. We need a scenario first… How about an unfaithful lover? KB loved his convoluted relationships! We have three main characters now, the couple and the other woman. Now let’s set the story against a music background, another thing KB loved. And we get… oh classic but no (Silapathikaram)… no not that either (Kalai Koil)… ok, interesting (Gully Boy)… but let’s take an actual KB film which had these elements, Sindhu Bhairavi. I feel KB experimented the most with his characters in this film and you’ll see the reason why shortly.
JKB
To begin with, the male lead with his lust for the other woman in KB’s world would be an obsessive antagonist. JKB, however, is the protagonist here, so how does KB make him someone we want to root for? Simple, by turning his obsession not towards another woman but with himself. JKB is obsessed with his craft and his image as a successful musician. He is gifted yet flawed. With this one simple trick, KB has laid out the arc for JKB. His obsession leading to his downfall and his eventual rise forms the rest of the plot. This serves to prove that when a character with defined characteristics and motives is placed in a scenario, the rest of the story writes itself by just having the character react to the scenario. JKB is one such character, with the first 20 minutes of the film spent on setting him up. Everything he does and says here comes back in one form or the other to haunt him.
Sindhu
Now that the main lead has been written, KB adopts a different strategy to write the supporting roles. He takes various facets of JKB and builds each supporting cast as the opposite of him. Let me explain. JKB’s obsession with himself and his art makes him lust not for a woman but rather an intellectual equal. Someone who would understand his greatness and his music. That’s where Sindhu comes in. Taking JKB and Sindhu side by side it is easy to see how they are opposites of each other. JKB is older, obsessed with his art and his public image, and orthodox. Sindhu, on the other hand, is young, does what makes her happy rather than being worried about her image, and is a non-conformist seen from how she suggests JKB break away from his traditional singing. She is the other woman, the one that breaks a marriage. Sindhu isn’t the strong female lead here, but rather a gender-swapped version of the sensitive male. The character we want our protagonist to end up with, but that almost never happens in KB’s films. By taking JKB and making Sindhu everything he isn’t, KB sets her up as the perfect foil and the opposite that attracts JKB.
Bhairavi
Finally, Bhairavi. In any other KB film Bhairavi would be the main lead. The story would be from her perspective. However, this is where KB deviates by making her a supporting character. And with JKB and Sindhu being the two leads, Bhairavi could have easily been the antagonist too. The one that makes JKB’s life miserable and drives him towards Sindhu. But KB surprises us once again here by building her as the opposite of another facet of JKB. To see how let’s compare them side by side again. JKB is talented, proud to the point of seeing his fellow musicians as below him, and his obsession makes him think only about himself. Bhairavi is not talented in music which serves as a major point of contention for JKB and drives him towards Sindhu, she is humble, and she is self-sacrificing as she is ready to sacrifice her marriage to JKB so that he could marry Sindhu. In many ways, Bhairavi is the strong female lead here more so than Sindhu. She faces every hardship JKB and the society throws at her and still endures it all. But does so in her own passive and silent way.
With Sindhu Bhairavi, KB managed to break down and rebuild his three main characters. This also showed how the auteur kept reinventing himself and his craft. The video was by no means the definitive way KB worked, but rather a way for me to reverse engineer his process. The techniques discussed here are certainly a masterclass for me in writing characters and are quite relevant even today. I see a glimpse of KB and his characters in every film I see. Until next time, this is Kishor signing off saying…
