Strength)[7] is a 2022 Indian Tamil-language action thriller film written and directed by H. Vinoth, and produced by Boney Kapoor under Bayview Projects LLP in collaboration with Zee Studios, as co-producer and distributor.

The film was in the news for a long time, due to the persuasion of fans to launch an update regarding the project, leading to a campaign named #ValimaiUpdate, that influenced sports, politics and other events as well.

[8] After being delayed multiple times, due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic restrictions being enforced in India, the film was released worldwide on 24 February 2022 to mixed reviews from critics.

In Chennai, an outlaw motorcycle gang called Satan's Slaves are involved in drug rackets, snatch theft and murders, which are headed by Naren aka Wolfranga.

Lakshmi refuses food and drink out of guilt of seeing Kutty going astray, prompting Arjun to take matters into his own hands and solve the case himself.

With Sophia's help alongside a few trusted aides in the cybercrime department, Arjun captures one of the mules and asks him about the gang and how Kutty got entangled into the dirty business.

After fishing out the abandoned, stolen motorcycles from a derelict quarry, Arjun is reassigned the case where he and Sophia plan to expose Rajangam and Arasu's involvement with Wolfranga to Vijayakumar.

At the station, Arjun convinces the bikers to work hard and solve the problems and mentions the importance of the parents' love for them and the pleasures they sacrificed for their children, releasing them.

However, Ajith declined the project and asked the director to work on the Tamil remake of the 2016 Hindi film Pink titled as Nerkonda Paarvai.

[27][28] On the release of the trailer glimpse on 23 September 2021,[30] many cinephiles noted about the storyline revolving around the Satan's Slaves Motorcycle Club, which was founded in Shipley in the mid-1960s, and later spread on to various countries including Germany, North America, Scotland and Australia.

[31] They were known for the heinous activities being involved such as drug peddling, trafficking in stolen goods, gunrunning, extortion, and prostitution; its film's plot has a resemblance to the documentary covered on the outlaw motorcycle club, titled Sons of Anarchy.

[32] Vinoth however revealed that the storyline will be loosely based on a group of outlaw motorcyclists involving in heinous crimes and how the protagonist tracks them down, hinting that the history behind Satan's Slaves Club gave its reference.

[34] In an interview with Gopinath Rajendran of Cinema Express, Vinoth had stated that Ajith's character is modelled on a real life racer-turned-police officer.

[36] The makers reportedly approached Janhvi Kapoor and Parineeti Chopra to play the female lead, thus marking their debuts in South Indian cinema,[37] and both actresses declined due to call sheet issues.

[60] Principal photography of Valimai was expected to begin on 13 December 2019,[61][62] but the shooting was launched two days earlier at the Ramoji Film City in Hyderabad.

[104] The team needed to edit the final cut of the film, due to the inclusion of that particular sequence,[105] and more work on the visual effects, eventually delaying the release.

[108] Sources reported that Vinoth and the production team were not impressed by the score that Yuvan had created for the film, which resulted him to opt out of the project, despite composing the songs.

[109][110] However, the film's sound engineer-audiographer M. R. Rajakrishnan, in an interview, claimed that Yuvan could not come to the final mixing of the score, in the last moment, which resulted in Ghibran's involvement to the project.

On 2 August 2021,[126][127] collaborating with Ajith's 30th anniversary in the film industry,[128] the makers released the first single "Naanga Vera Maari" on the same night,[129][130] and received response from critics.

[162] SIMCO, the Central Government's South Indian co-operative departmental store functioning in Vellore announced a bid for its share that consumers whom purchase grocery items worth ₹2,999, will receive complimentary tickets for the film amounted to ₹500 and might serve popcorn and cold drinks for free.

[170] In December 2021, theatre owners and exhibitors in Tamil Nadu, planned to open shows to begin at 1:00 am in order to get more screenings, thereby enhancing the box office collection.

[171] A week before the release, the film was postponed indefinitely due to the increasing number of COVID-19 cases, fuelled by the SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant,[172][173] and the sudden restrictions imposed by the government to control the pandemic.

[224] However, as Zee Enterprises decided to close down Zee Plex, as their films released through this model, did not fetch the required numbers expected resulting huge losses for the company;[225] the makers decided to sell the post-theatrical streaming rights to ZEE5 in Tamil, Hindi, Telugu, Malayalam and Kannada languages, in which the film might have a 50-day window, between the theatrical and digital release.

[229] Ashameera Aiyappan of Firstpost gave the film a rating of 2.5/5 and wrote "H Vinoth exchanges the grounded authenticity of his predecessor work for glitzy, gimmicky action which ends being a kitsch combination of sensibilities".

[230] Vivek M V of Deccan Herald gave the film a rating of 2.5/5 and wrote "Ajith is fine while Huma Qureshi has just one slick action scene to shine.

[235] Lakshmi Subramanian of The Week gave the film a rating of 2/5 and wrote "Every character in Valimai, including Huma and both the brothers feel like add-ons with no depth.

[236] Scroll.in gave the film a rating of 2/5 and wrote "Except for a handful of pulsating action sequences and a villain who is nearly equal in capabilities to the hero, Valimai has trouble kicking into gear".

[239] Haricharan Pudipeddi of Hindustan Times stated "Ajith Kumar-starrer would've been a cracker of a film if it solely focused on providing action thrills".

[247][250] Ravichandran Ashwin shared the same in an online interaction, when he experienced a fan asking Moeen Ali and him,[251] for an update regarding the film during the second test match, between India and England in Chennai.

[253] In February 2022, the film crossed more than 2 million interests on the online-ticketing portal BookMyShow,[254] beating records earlier set by Baahubali 2: The Conclusion (2017) and Avengers: Endgame (2019).