Pokkiri

The city of Chennai is rife with the nefarious activities of land mafia. There are two rival gangs: one under Ali Bhai, who resides in Dubai and controls his India operations through his brothers Guru and Korattur Logu as well as his girlfriend Mona; and another operated by a local goon named Narasimhan. They threaten builders and landowners into giving them protection money or property through force, extortion, or murder. Mohammed Mohideen Khan IPS takes charge as the new Police Commissioner of Chennai and starts cracking down on crime.

Tamizh, a thug, is abducted by Logu and his henchmen. Tamizh has taken a contract from Narasimhan to beat up Logu, which he does. However, Guru and Mona invite Tamizh to join their gang. Tamizh declines stating that he does not work for any gang, but is ready to do anything for money. Meanwhile, Tamizh falls in love with Shruthi, a aerobic teacher, when he visits his friend Saravanan's aerobics class, but she mistakes him for a pervert. Shruthi lives with her widowed mother Lakshmi and younger brother Pappu. Body Soda, a bogus kung fu master, lives above Shruthi's house and frequently, albeit comically and unsuccessfully, tries to convince her to marry him. Govindan is a corrupt police inspector in the colony where Tamizh and Shruthi live and is on Ali Bhai's payroll. He lusts for Shruthi and decides to make her his mistress, even after she rejects him multiple times.

Tamizh's first assignment with Ali Bhai's gang is to kill a member of Narasimhan's gang. However, police show up at the spot where Tamizh and the other gangsters are waiting. Tamizh engages the cops long enough for the others to finish the task and flee. He also helps Shruthi escape from Govindan. She is impressed by his kindness, and a friendship soon blossoms between the two, leading to the development of unspoken romantic feelings for each other. When Shruthi tries to express her feelings to Tamizh, they are attacked by members of Narasimhan's gang, whom Tamizh finishes off. Shruthi is shocked to learn that Tamizh is a gangster with no qualms about killing people. Later, Govindan arranges for some thugs to pretend to rape Shruthi so that no decent family will want to take her as their daughter-in-law, as a result of which with no other option, Shruthi and Lakshmi will accept his demands. Tamizh learns of this and thrashes Govindan incognito. After much ado and mental anguish, Shruthi accepts Tamizh's love.

Soon, Guru is found dead, presumably killed by Narasimhan in retaliation against the death of his gang members at the hands of Tamizh earlier, which forces Ali Bhai to come to Chennai from Dubai and kill Narasimhan. He also meets Tamizh to discuss the killing of a minister by blowing up a school. Tamizh disagrees with Ali Bhai's method as it would involve killing innocents including women and children. In the middle of their argument, the police raids the club and arrests Ali Bhai. His gang members retaliate by kidnapping Mohammed's daughter, drugging her, and creating a lewd video of her which they threaten to release to the media if Ali Bhai is not released, forcing the embattled commissioner to release Ali Bhai. However, in her drugged state, Mohammed's daughter reveals that her father had placed an undercover officer as a mole in Ali Bhai's gang.

The gang members find out that an IPS police officer by the name of Satyamoorthy, the son of a retired police inspector Shanmugavel, has gone undercover to finish off the underworld mafia gangs and is now a part of their gang. Ali Bhai kills Saravanan, believing he is Satyamoorthy. However, it is revealed that Saravanan was actually Shanmugavel's adopted son. Ali Bhai then kills Shanmugavel to lure the real Satyamoorthy. When Satyamoorthy actually turns up, everyone, especially Shruthi and Govindan, are shocked to see that he is Tamizh. Satyamoorthy had gone undercover by posing himself as a criminal. It is further revealed that Satyamoorthy was the one who killed Guru and not Narasimhan. He killed Guru under the Commissioner's direction.

After Shanmugavel and Saravanan's funerals, Satyamoorthy forces Govindan to call Ali Bhai to find out his location, which is Binny Mills. He goes there and starts to eliminate Ali Bhai's gang members one by one, rescuing the commissioner's daughter in the process. In a final confrontation, Satyamoorthy kills Ali Bhai by slashing his throat with a broken glass window, following which he kills Govindan as well.

After his film Aathi in January 2006, for nearly six months Vijay was listening to stories, but none had appealed; he was supposed to do a Tamil Remake of Dharani's Bangaram, until that film's failure made him look at other options.[6] That's when he got to watch the Telugu Pokiri – he felt that it would work.[7] After difficulty in finding directors, Prabhudeva was selected as director, directing his first film in Tamil after the failure of his Telugu film Pournami.[8][9] The movie was launched on 6 July 2006.[10] Vijay's father SAC conducted special puja at the Sri Arunachaleswarar Temple in Tiruvannamalai. On Saturday night, which was the full moon day, an auspicious occasion for the presiding deity there, he spent a full hour before the Lord seeking his blessings. He also prayed at the Sacred Church at Velankanni.[11] Asin was selected, pairing with Vijay for the second time after Sivakasi.[12]

The first day of shoot for the film was held at the new Pillayar Kovil at AVM studios, with various dignitaries gracing the occasion. Vijay's mother Shobha Chandrasekhar gave the clap for the first shot. The first scene shot was with Asin and Vijay, the lead pair in the film, in an elevator that was specially designed for the film.[13]

The soundtrack has 8 songs composed by Mani Sharma. Two of the songs from the original Telugu version were retained and remade in Tamil. The soundtrack also features a remix of the song "Vasantha Mullai" from Sarangadhara (1958).[14][15]

The satellite rights of the film were sold to Sun TV. The film was given a "U/A" certificate by the Indian Censor Board and released on 2007 at the festival of Pongal, alongside Ajith's Aalwar and Vishal's Thaamirabharani.[16] The film grossed ₹6.1 crore in Tamil Nadu in opening week from 142 screens.[17][18]

The original Telugu film Pokiri, directed by Puri Jagannadh, was remade in several other languages and still found success in the respective regional cinemas. Pokkiri is the first remake. The second one was Wanted, the Hindi version in 2009. Both Pokkiri and Wanted were directed by Prabhu Deva. Prakash Raj reprises his role as the villain in both the remakes.[28][29] After that, a Kannada version, Porki, directed by M. D. Sridhar, was released on 14 January 2010.[30]

Despite the Hindi remake, the original Telugu film Pokiri, its Tamil remake Pokkiri and Kannada remake Porki were dubbed in Hindi as Tapori Wanted, Wanted Baghi (2013) and Main Hoon Wanted (2012) respectively.

A dialogue spoken by Vadivelu in the film, "Vada Poche" became very popular.[31] The dialogue inspired a comedy show in Sun Music with same name. The dialogue also inspired a song sung by Velmurugan and Powerstar Srinivasan in Arya Surya (2013).[32] Vijay's dialogue "Oru Vaati Mudivu Panta, Yen Pecha Naane Kekka Maaten" (transl. Once I have made a decision, I won't listen to my own voice) became popular.[33] Vadivelu's dialogue "Plan Panni Pannanum" (transl. Make a plan and execute it) inspired a film of the same name.[34] The scenes from the film were parodied in Thamizh Padam as hero being an undercover cop.[35]

• Pokkiri at IMDb