Thoranai (2009)

Vishal plays a cheerful village youth who arrives in Chennai with one purpose: to trace the brother who left home as a boy and never came back. The search takes him through the city's rough neighbourhoods and into the orbit of a powerful gangster played by Prakash Raj, while a romance with Shriya Saran's character gives the film its lighter songs-and-comedy stretches. As the hunt narrows, family feeling and fists become equally important, and the hero finds that the people he is up against are closer to his own story than he expected. Thoranai is a straightforward late-2000s Tamil masala entertainer, built around Vishal's action-hero image of the period, with the familiar mix of fights, songs and sentiment. Mani Sharma's music and Prakash Raj's menacing presence are the main attractions beyond the lead.