viii

Contents

Introduction 1

Chapter 1: Fractured Selves and Splintered Identities: The Dichotomy of Nair Modernity in P.
Padmarajan’s Thoovanathumbikal 28

Chapter 2: Dominion over the Marketspace and Contested Masculinities: The Figure of the
Themmadi in Kireedam 49

Chapter 3: Nair Masculinity as the Locus of Populist Transformation: Adhwaytham and

Malayalam Political Cinema of the 1990s 76

Chapter 4: Devasuram and the Enduring Image of the Nair “Feudal Themmadi” 106

Conclusion 139

Bibliography 150