Cinema was an entertainment medium after World War I and a truth-telling art-form after World War II. It has now metamorphosed to build nationalism, sustain the culture of an ethnic group, and be an explicator for an individual. In India, films were made not only for entertainment, but to promote nationalism, and to protect the rights of ethnic groups. Even before the World Wars and the arrival of talkies in India, EVR Periyar in 1929, demanded that cinema should be used for social change and must reflect Self-Respect thoughts. After his demand, many intellectuals produced various films (Dravidian Cinema) for social change.
Parasakthi (1952) is one of the most iconic films of Dravidian Cinema narrated by Kalaignar M Karunanidhi. At the beginning of the movie, the title card states that the film portrays the suffering of the Tamil people during World War II in the year 1942. But the author M.S.S. Pandian (1999, Life and Times of a DMK Film) argues that Parasakthi is a film that indicates Arignar Anna as a symbol of the narration, since the dialogue of the film begins with the word ‘Our Arignar’ and it is absolutely a film of the DMK. Thus, at the very beginning itself, Parasakthi dramatically informs the audience about its politics. (Note: 'Arignar' - meaning 'a learned one' in Tamil language, is an honorific title of C N Annadurai, the founder of the DMK).
With such a view of M.S.S. Pandian, this study analyzes the verses and visuals of Parasakthi (1952) with structuralism in the perspective of Gilles Deleuze’s Time-Image, and tries to understand whether the film emphasizes Arignar Anna or describes the hardships faced by Tamil people or it upholds the principles of the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK).