After finding a method to madness in his impressive debut, Rocky, filmmaker Arun Matheswaran has been struggling to find fresher ways to explore human depravity and celebrate cinematic violence. After Rocky, every successive film has felt less grounded and more emotionally contrived, as if even the slightest scope for lyricism in writing exists only to propel the oncoming action set piece. This is once again the case with his latest film, DC, whose title denotes the two central characters, Devadas (played by filmmaker Lokesh Kanagaraj in his debut lead role) and Chandra (Wamiqa Gabbi).Arun’s leading men have come across as emotionally stunted, and this is the case with Lokesh’s Devadas as well. He has the same thirst for violence, but the emotional core feels eroded. Chandra, however, refrains from becoming Saani Kaayidham’s Ponni, who appeared manufactured for revenge and cinematic violence. Chandra here, thankfully, is the soul of the story. Her feminine rage often promises to satisfyingly thwart the bloated egos of the men who populate her world, but Arun gives us enough to show us the girl child who has been imprisoned for life.On one hand, Das is a gangster who is aware of how big his world is, but is fed up with the disparity and injustice in human society. Chandra, meanwhile, is a sex worker who was sold off to pimps at the age of six and has remained in her room for over 18 years. If Das is a beast who grew up in war and mayhem, Chandra is a caged spirit brutalised all day — Arun keeps asserting this primal difference to give us the satisfaction of when they eventually meet and change each other’s lives.But neither Das nor Chandra are saints; these are morally grey characters who don’t hesitate to kill to survive. And in DC, their daggers and guns taste more blood than in any recent Tamil film. In fact, much of the story of DC feels spring-loaded for this mad, mad mayhem. On paper, the story all feels time-worn; but in effect, it works ... almost. After hitting a consignment of the police department’s ammunition in Gobichettipalayam and exacting revenge upon a cop, Das and other henchmen in his team — all working under cop-turned-gangster Arasu (Thalaivasal Vijay) — take refuge in a lodge in Chennai to escape from Inspector Bhojraj (Krish Dayal) and his team of cops. There, Das meets a bar singer, Parvathy (Sanjana Krishnamoorthy), but this Ilaiyaraaja-assisted meet-cute ends tragically. Simultaneously, we begin to see the story of a sex worker called Chandra.