Karmic Deconstruction of The Man: A Study on The Male Ego in Samy's Mirugam (2007)

This study examines the 2007 Tamil film, Mirugam through the lens of Biopolitics and Stigma by Michel Foucault and Erving Goffman. The protagonist, Ayyanar, is portrayed as a hyper-masculine character instilling fear among the villagers with his body and sexual desires but soon loses it by being affected by HIV/AIDS. It studies the trajectory of the protagonist from being a ‘predator’ to ‘pariah’. The plot structure uses Ayyanar’s ‘diseased body’ as a site of Poetic Justice. Ultimately, this research argues that the male ego represented in the beginning of the movie is deconstructed by the climax, symbolizing the full circle of life, breaking the male ego, shifting the image and power dynamic of the protagonist from being an ‘oppressor’ to ‘oppressed’.