Principal photography commenced in April 2021 and took place in locations across Chennai, Mumbai, Mysore, Azerbaijan and Georgia. Sardar was released by theatrically on 21 October 2022, prior to the Diwali week, with received highly positive reviews from critics and audience, and critically and commercially successful, Sardar has a worldwide gross of over ₹103.50 crore (US$12 million) worldwide, making it one of the top-grossing Tamil films of 2022.[9][10] A sequel is in development.
Plot
Inspector Vijay Prakash is obsessed with building his reputation that was tarnished because of his absconding father Chandra Bose, a former spy of RAW who was branded as a national traitor 32 years ago resulting in his entire extended family except for Vijay committing suicide out of shame and disgrace. Raised by a generous police officer Paavadaisaami, Vijay tries hard to woo his childhood friend Adv. Shalini. Shalini represents a social activist Sameera Thomas in court, petitioning against One India One Pipeline, a project operated by a private water packaging company of former NSA officer Maharaj Rathore.
The project is expected to unify and control the supply of potable water across India. The court refuses to accept their petition while Sameera chances upon a wheelchair-bound Victor, who happens to share her objectives. Sameera organises a protest at Rajaji Bhavan while Vijay discovers that a highly classified file containing information about the RAW agents of 1980s is stolen from Rajaji Bhavan. Deducing that Sameera has stolen the file, Vijay heads to her residence only to find her son Timothy aka Timmy alone receiving an order from a bakery. Vijay takes Timmy to find Sameera, whose location is traced to the bakery but realises that he was misled as Sameera has thrown her smartwatch in the dustbin of the bakery.
Vijay meets Dr. Kuppusami, Sameera's acquaintance from whom he perceives that Sameera was not harbouring ill-intentions and that Timmy is diagnosed with sarcoidoisis. The police discovers Sameera's corpse and her death is ruled as suicide and she is declared as a national traitor for stealing the file and is suspected to have sold it. Vijay refuses to believe it and proceeds with his investigation and perceives that Sameera was abducted and drown into death in chlorination tank as she refused to disclose about Sardar. Vijay helps Timmy post a letter and accesses Sameera's laptop, finding a video of her explaining that the water in plastic bottles sold by private companies produce toxic water as a result of being exposed to sunlight and that the intention behind One India One Pipeline is to monopolise water supply in India.
Vijay and Shalini discover that Sameera is supposed to meet Agent Karapanpoochi, who divulged to her about the secret location at Rajaji Bhavan and had given her a key to access it, at a railway platform the next day. They head to the platform and find the agent, who tries to escape misinterpreting the situation but Vijay chases him. However, an unknown person ultimately causes him to be killed in an accident. Vijay secures his belongings and finds an address to which Timmy posted the letter as instructed by Sameera before her death. The letter reaches the prison in Chittagong, Bangladesh that holds a mysterious elderly man, who was captured by Bangladesh Coast Guard 32 years ago and his identity has been unknown.
The prison guards contact RAW upon interpreting a code through the letter which is named CODE RED causing the RAW to realise that Sardar has been in Bangladesh. RAW Chief Chandra Mohan heads to Bangladesh and requests the prison's guards to keep the letter hidden from Sardar. Rathore perceives this and contacts the NIA, instructing them to have Sardar killed by the prison warden. However, a prison guard lets Sardar know about the letter resulting in him escaping from the prison. Vijay arrives at a ruined petrol bunk, about whom he perceives through Karapanpoochi's belongings and finds a secret tunnel, which leads him to a file. An assassin attacks Vijay with an intent to retrieve the file, but he manages to defeat the assassin and secures the file. Vijay and Shalini go through the file and learn about Sardar's story.
Past: in 1985, Chandra Bose is a RAW agent codenamed as Sardar, who lives with his joint family performing stage plays. His cousin Indhrani harbours a crush on him and perceives his occupation, but decides to keep it hidden and marries him. After a lake is poisoned at the border, Sardar is assigned by his trainer Rathore and Agent Victor on a mission to interpret the rival's conspiracies by infiltrating a camp of Pakistani Army at India-Pakistan Border. Sardar disguises himself as a native, injured due to a blast and the army officials take him to the camp for treatment where he defeats the officials and disguises himself as one of them.
Sardar escapes the camp with a photograph and a type-written copy of a file written in Chinese language. Sardar meets an agent code-named Cockroach that China conspires to control the water supply in India through One India One Pipeline and as a part of his machination, has the water poisoned through Pakistan pushing the people to buy packaged water and accept the pipeline project. Sardar deciphers that a person dubbed as Laughing Buddha is helping China with their mission; Rathore and Victor deploy Sardar to trace the Laughing Buddha. While Sardar and Indhra have a son Vijay, Sardar discovers that the NSA Chief P.K. Abraham is the Laughing Buddha and notifies Rathore, offering to eliminate Abraham and framed as a traitor until Rathore proves Abraham's intentions.
Rathore, consumed by greed, agrees to eliminate Abraham and conspires to permanently brand Sardar as the traitor and join China in its mission for money. Sardar abducts Abraham and assassinates him. On a phone call, Sardar requests Rathore to reveal the truth to his father as the latter couldn't endure being called as the father of a traitor. Sardar deliberately has himself arrested by the Bangladesh Coast Guard by exposing his multiple passports. Rathore destroys all the evidence proving China's intentions and doesn't inform Sardar's family as requested by him, resigning from his post. The family gets embarrassed of Sardar being a traitor and hangs themselves to death leaving Vijay, while Rathore joins hands with China in their project.
Present: Sardar visits a secret place and gets infuriated after he perceives Rathore's treachery, his family's mass suicide and the implementation of One India One Pipeline. Paavadaisaami obliges to his duty by helping the RAW apprehend Vijay for luring Sardar while Shalini heads to Victor who has been housing Timmy. Chandra Mohan orders Victor and Timmy to be secured and brought to the headquarters and his orders are implemented; However, they discover that Sardar disguised himself as Victor while Shalini finds Victor dead and an assassin tied and captivated in the cupboard. Sardar defeats the other agents and infiltrates the vault with Timmy to access the vault through his fingerprints.
The RAW agents unsuccessfully attempts to apprehend Sardar while the latter has a confrontation with Rathore, who divulges that he killed Sardar's entire family by strangling them to death as Indhra overheard their conversation about eliminating Abraham through a radio, having accessed the frequency and tried to reveal the truth to Sardar's father. He later staged it as a suicide and left Vijay for the latter to endure the social stigma of being a traitor's son. Vijay hears this and grows enraged. Sardar takes a truck filled with sodium and escapes with Timmy intending to blast the pipelines at the water plant. Discerning Sardar's plan, Rathore heads to the water plant to desist him and unleashes guards to kill Sardar, but the latter defeats them and intrudes the plant with the truck, asking Timmy to be out of the plant for rescuing him from the blast.
Vijay reaches the plant and from Timmy, discovers Sardar's plan and helps him orchestrate it successfully. Sardar throws the truck of sodium into water, successfully blasting the pipelines and killing Rathore and ultimately meets Vijay, who intends to expose his virtue, but Sardar desists as the public shall lose their trust in the government if Rathore's conspiracies are exposed, and leaves. Sameera is proven innocent and the government scraps One India One Pipeline. Vijay is suspended from the police force for not being able to nab Sardar alive. Chandra Mohan discloses to Vijay that he was the one who orchestrated his suspension from the police force and recruits Vijay as a RAW agent and assigns him on a mission in Cambodia, giving him an unrevealed code name.
Myna Nandhini as Valli, playing the role as goddess Valli during a drama act
Production
Development
In early January 2020, it was reported that Karthi, who was filming for Ponniyin Selvan: I (2022) and Ponniyin Selvan: II (2023) at the time, would collaborate with P. S. Mithran for new film. It was reported to commence after the former finishes filming for the mentioned.[13] The film officially announced on 14 November 2020 (on Diwali), coinciding puja at the Prince Pictures.[4]
Casting
In April 2021, Raashii Khanna was announced as a lead actress to star opposite Karthi, with Simran being signed to play a major role in the film.[14] The makers announced that Chunky Panday was cast as the main antagonist in the film, which marks his debut in Tamil cinema.[15] In May, Rajisha Vijayan was announced as second female lead.[16] In March, Simran opt out the project due to her sitting schedule conflicts. Instead, actress Laila signed the project in same month,[8] marking her returning to cinema industry after 16 years break.[12]
Filming
Then, the first day shooting was started on 26 April 2021.[17] Due to the second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic, the shooting halted on 29 April 2021 after two days' shoot at Chennai.[18] The shoots resumed on 9 January 2022.[19] The makers constructed a set worth of 2 crores, planning to shoot major portions of the film on the sets in the meantime.[20][21][22]Raashii Khanna joins the sets on 5 February 2022.[23] And second schedule begins on 19 March 2022.[24] her portions filmed for 12 days in Chennai, Mumbai and Mysore.[25][26]Chunky Panday's major portions were filmed in Parliament building, Azerbaijan and Georgia[27] so far the makers spend more 4 crore for the sets.[28][29] Filming was complete by July 2022.[30]
The music of the film is composed by G. V. Prakash Kumar, replacing Mithran's norm composer Yuvan Shankar Raja and working with Karthi for the third time. The first single of the film titled "Yaerumayileri" sung by Karthi himself was released on 3 October 2022.[31]
Sardar was released on 21 October 2022 on the eve of Diwali along with Sivakarthikeyan's Prince, with official announcement made on Karthi's birthday.[32]
The post-theatrical streaming rights of the film were bought by Aha (India) and Sun Nxt[35](Overseas). The satellite rights of the film were sold to Kalaignar TV, even before filming was completed.[36] The film began streaming on Aha from 18 November 2022.[37]
Reception
Sardar received positive reviews from critics.[38]
Kirubhakar Purushothaman of The Indian Express gave 3.5/5 stars and wrote "However, with the speed at which things proceed in the film, you forget and forgive those shortcomings".[39] Tanmayi Sharma of Pinkvilla gave the film's rating 3.5/5 and wrote "On the whole, Sardar is definitely a hit this festive season and something every audience would love to watch on the big screen."[40] Avinash Ramachandran of Cinema Express rated 3.5 out of 5 stars and wrote that "Mithran's propensity for promising us a franchise of sorts is known, and with Sardar, he has definitely delivered a film with the potential to finally fulfill that promise".[41] M. Suganth of The Times of India gave 3/5 rating for this film and wrote "Sardar is a solid spy movie, nothing more nothing less".[42] Krishna Selvaseelan of Tamil Guardian gave the film 3 out of 5 stars, writing, “The film emotionally connects through well done parallels in the story and properly realised characters and their respective arcs.”[43]
Priyanka Sundar of Firstpost rated the film 3 out of 5 and wrote "A spy film has to be stylish, sharp and slick if it is set in the present. Since Sardar is partly set in the 80s, the stunts in the film are more brutal and physically intimate".[44] Srivatsan S of The Hindu wrote that "Karthi is enjoyable in this generic and message-heavy thriller”.[45] Janani K of India Today rated 2.5 out of 5 stars and called it "A solid film with a strong core idea. With a few misses here and there, the film makes for a compelling watch."[46]Sowmya Rajendran of The News Minute rated 1.5/5 stars and wrote that "The film moves across time periods, shifts from one country to another, and never tires of its ambition to drill information into our brains".[47]
Sequel
A sequel, tentatively titled Sardar 2, was officially announced by the production house on 26 October 2022.[48]
