He cast his friends as the characters: a tea-seller as the brave general, a flower-vendor as the rogue hacker, an auto-driver as the alien ambassador. He recorded lines in the dead of night, using the ambient sounds of Chennai—the Cooum river’s flow, the Madras Central train whistle, the pongal sizzle from the street cart.

: Offers a dedicated section for Tamil-dubbed international movies and shows.

And in the new world that followed—when humans and Vethans finally spoke face to face—the first intergalactic treaty was written not in English or Sanskrit, but in Tamil. And at the bottom, it had a stamp from a little shop called M.I.A. Dubs .