India's southern state of Tamil Nadu has a long, peculiar political tradition: here, cinema doesn't merely entertain, it also governs.
From extremely successful political stints of MG Ramachandran - popularly known as MGR - and Jayalalithaa to the more ambivalent experiments of Rajnikanth, Kamal Haasan, Khushbu and Vijayakanth, the state has repeatedly seen cinema icons turn into full-time politicians. MGR and Jayalalithaa even became chief ministers.
Now Tamil superstar C Joseph Vijay, known as 'Thalapathy' Vijay (General Vijay), is the latest to join the list. He launched his political party, Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam (TVK), in 2024 and soon after announced that he would retire from films to pursue politics full-time. His upcoming film this month, Jana Nayagan (The People's Hero), would be his farewell release.
Vijay's reasoning was explicit: politics, he argued, is not something one can dabble in. Tamil Nadu's voters, he said, deserved nothing less than full commitment. And the state's political history supports that calculation.
MGR and Jayalalithaa withdrew from active stardom before consolidating power. But Kamal Haasan's hybrid approach, which involves being active in cinema and politics both, has yielded limited electoral results. Tamil politics has little patience for half-measures.
It is against this unforgiving backdrop that Jana Nayagan arrives.
Steeped in political imagery and rhetoric, Vijay's new film will open in nearly 5,000 cinemas across India and overseas this month. At 51, the star is stepping away from a career most actors would be reluctant to leave. He remains among Indian cinema's most bankable stars, driving festival releases and revenues across the global Tamil diaspora.
Chennai-based film critic Aditya Shrikrishna noted that Vijay's appeal has not rested on acting prowess alone. He's not a Kamal Haasan or Rajinikanth in terms of filmography, he said. But his box office pull and fandom are huge and undeniably influential. Dancing, comedy and a keen understanding of populist cinema are his strengths.
Vijay's stardom, however, has never been accidental. He began as a child actor in the 1980s and was launched as a lead actor in 1992. Over the next three decades, he appeared in nearly 70 films, charting a carefully calibrated rise from a romantic hero to a socially conscious vigilante in his later works.
Now, as he takes the political plunge, he has promised broad themes including anti-corruption, social justice, and Tamil pride. Yet analysts caution that his party is untested electorally and that it lacks credible policies on pressing issues.
As Tamil Nadu goes to the polls, the actor's transition from cinema to politics remains closely watched. With a deadly crowd crush at a rally earlier highlighting the challenges ahead, it is uncertain whether Vijay's star power will translate into political success.
From extremely successful political stints of MG Ramachandran - popularly known as MGR - and Jayalalithaa to the more ambivalent experiments of Rajnikanth, Kamal Haasan, Khushbu and Vijayakanth, the state has repeatedly seen cinema icons turn into full-time politicians. MGR and Jayalalithaa even became chief ministers.
Now Tamil superstar C Joseph Vijay, known as 'Thalapathy' Vijay (General Vijay), is the latest to join the list. He launched his political party, Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam (TVK), in 2024 and soon after announced that he would retire from films to pursue politics full-time. His upcoming film this month, Jana Nayagan (The People's Hero), would be his farewell release.
Vijay's reasoning was explicit: politics, he argued, is not something one can dabble in. Tamil Nadu's voters, he said, deserved nothing less than full commitment. And the state's political history supports that calculation.
MGR and Jayalalithaa withdrew from active stardom before consolidating power. But Kamal Haasan's hybrid approach, which involves being active in cinema and politics both, has yielded limited electoral results. Tamil politics has little patience for half-measures.
It is against this unforgiving backdrop that Jana Nayagan arrives.
Steeped in political imagery and rhetoric, Vijay's new film will open in nearly 5,000 cinemas across India and overseas this month. At 51, the star is stepping away from a career most actors would be reluctant to leave. He remains among Indian cinema's most bankable stars, driving festival releases and revenues across the global Tamil diaspora.
Chennai-based film critic Aditya Shrikrishna noted that Vijay's appeal has not rested on acting prowess alone. He's not a Kamal Haasan or Rajinikanth in terms of filmography, he said. But his box office pull and fandom are huge and undeniably influential. Dancing, comedy and a keen understanding of populist cinema are his strengths.
Vijay's stardom, however, has never been accidental. He began as a child actor in the 1980s and was launched as a lead actor in 1992. Over the next three decades, he appeared in nearly 70 films, charting a carefully calibrated rise from a romantic hero to a socially conscious vigilante in his later works.
Now, as he takes the political plunge, he has promised broad themes including anti-corruption, social justice, and Tamil pride. Yet analysts caution that his party is untested electorally and that it lacks credible policies on pressing issues.
As Tamil Nadu goes to the polls, the actor's transition from cinema to politics remains closely watched. With a deadly crowd crush at a rally earlier highlighting the challenges ahead, it is uncertain whether Vijay's star power will translate into political success.
