Joe - good post Jai - IMO Tamil cinema is slowly moving towards story centric movies with such 'independent' films as u say, are seeing a good run. Though movies like Onbadhu roobai nottu etc are not recognized still movies without the usual 'template' are accepted wholeheartedly by the audience, at the same time rejecting rehashed movies. As for fanatics, its prevelant not only in movies/tamil - its there in sports/politics and most areas and again not limited to tamil. education also aint gonna change it IMO