Jailer director revealed how Thalapathy Vijay made the Rs 600-crore Rajinikanth hit materialise after Beast flop: ‘He told me you need not…’

Nelson Dilipkumar emerged as one of Tamil cinema’s biggest directors with the stupendous success of the 2023 Rajinikanth-starrer Jailer. However, before he found his breakthrough as a director with the action comedy, Nelson faced a huge failure with the 2022 film Beast, which starred the current Tamil Nadu Prime Minister, superstar Thalapathy Vijay. However, this did not affect their warm equation in the least bit. At the audio launch of Jailer, Nelson revealed how he was nervous to narrate the story of Jailer to megastar Rajinikanth, and it was Vijay who encouraged him to drop his hesitation and do it. Vijay told him not to worry and just do a casual narration to the senior star.

Rajinikanth was impressed by the one-line story pitched to him and asked the filmmaker to expand it into a full-fledged script. The director, however, was dealing with considerable pressure following the disappointing performance of Beast. Despite the setback, Rajinikanth’s unwavering encouragement and support helped him regain his confidence and move forward from the film’s failure.

Nelson revealed he was shocked when Rajinikanth referred to him as a 'sir' and also liked his narration and asked him to work on the story.


Jailer hit the big screens in 2023 and became the highest-grossing Tamil film that year, crossing more than Rs 600 crore globally. It is also considered the second highest-grossing Tamil-language film of all time. The movie stars Rajinikanth as "Tiger" Muthuvel Pandian, a retired jailer who sets out to investigate the truth behind his son’s disappearance and catch a dangerous idol smuggler who was threatening his family.