Playground) is a 2011 Indian Tamil-language action drama film[5] directed by Vetrimaran, produced by S. Kathiresan and distributed by Sun Pictures.

The film stars Dhanush in the lead role, alongside Taapsee Pannu (in her Tamil debut), Kishore, V. I. S. Jayapalan, Naren Narayanan, and Murugadoss.

Rathnasamy and Pettai were once protegees of grand veteran Doraisamy, who has retired from active competition but is considered as the honorary overlord of rooster fighting in South Tamil Nadu.

One day, during an informal match in rural field area, local police raid the spot and arrest most of the involved, except Rathnaswamy and Durai who escapes.

Having been defeated in all earlier bouts with Pettaikaran's roosters, Rathinasamy keeps insisting on having one last fight to win and satisfy his old mother's wish, but Pettai declines to have any more fights with him because he feels that Rathnaswamy has lost faith in his roosters and will be using nefarious methods to win, like the earlier raid.

He asks permission from Rathnasamy as the police have to permit it, but Rathnaswamy refuses, manhandles, and berates Pettai as a thief.

[10] Vetrimaaran spent a period of two years in Madurai to understand the local dialect and lifestyle of the people living there.

[12] Vetrimaaran revealed that the idea of the story was inspired from several international films such as, Caché, Amores perros, Babel, Tamil films Thevar Magan, Virumaandi, Paruthiveeran and novels Roots: The Saga of an American Family and Shantaram, which mentioned during the end credits.

[10][15] In April 2008, it was reported that Dhanush too had walked out of the project due to schedule issues, and that Silambarasan was set to replace him.

[10] Subsequently, in June 2009, Trisha Krishnan, who was selected to replace Saran for the role of Irene, was forced to opt out of the project after her schedule clashed with the allotted dates for her other films, Namo Venkatesa (2010) and Vinnaithaandi Varuvaayaa (2010).

[21] Murugadoss plays Karuppu's friend Oole while Naren appears as Rathnasamy who is also Pettaikaran's rival in cockfighting.

It featured a series of promotional posters depicting the characters played by Dhanush, Jayapalan and Kishore.

[22] During early stages of production, Dhanush revealed he would play the role of a local cockfighter named K. P. Karuppu, and described the venture as his "dream project".

[23] The cockfight sequences that take place before intermission was filmed for 26 days in a set created by art director Jacki.

[10] The voices for Kishore, Taapsee, and Jayapalan were dubbed by Samuthirakani, Andrea Jeremiah and Radha Ravi respectively.

[12] G. V. Prakash Kumar's soundtrack consists of seven tracks including two rap numbers performed by Malaysian Tamil rapper Yogi B.

It was released by Sony Music and the audio was launched at a small function at Lady Aandal School auditorium in Chennai on 1 December 2010.

[25] Behindwoods wrote "Aadukalam is an attempt that requires appreciation where the director has hacked his way through the path less trodden with aplomb".

[26] Karthik Subramanian of The Hindu praised the film stating that "The detailing of every characters in the story is intricate.

The narrative moves like a good novel where the first few chapters are all about etching and detailing the players, and the plot and the action unfold much later".

[28] Tamil magazine Ananda Vikatan rated the film with 44 marks and mentioned that "This arena is new for presenting cultural nuances of a region and changes in human emotions beautifully".