Sunday, October 28, 2007

Tamil Cinema: Sathyaraj on the march

I seem to have got on to a cinema mode. What prompted this post is a piece by Arun Kaimal in the (Chennai) Metro Manorama of yesterday about Sathyaraj, one of the leading Tamil actors, handling the roles of father and son in a new picture. It has an interesting name ‘Nine Rupee Note’. This is being made by Thankar Bachan based on his own short story with the same title.

We have seen both Mammootty and Mohanlal doing such dual roles in Malayalam. The one that comes to mind readily is Mohanlal’s ‘Ravana Prabhu’ the sequel to ‘Devasuram’. But it seems that acting as elderly characters is nothing new to Sathyaraj.

I first saw him in a Tamil movie called ‘Kadalora Kavithakal’ may be twenty years back. He impressed me with his performance in that one. Subsequently I have seen some of his other pictures but can’t recall the names.

If I remember right, the girl who acted as ‘teacheramma’, the heroine in ‘Kadalora Kavithakal’, was Rekha from Kerala. I think her first Malayalam picture was ‘Ramji Rao Speaking’. A competent artiste. I haven’t seen her in cinema for sometime.

From Arun’s article I learned that Sathyaraj, 54, son of Dr. Subbiah, is from an affluent family of Coimbatore. When the family objected to him joining the film industry, he just ran away to Chennai. And once he was involved in the movies, it was a procession of success after success. The one who ran away from wealth making good – theme for a cinema?

Playing heroine in ‘Nine Rupee Note’ is Archana. Remember this darkish actress? Didn’t she play the lead role in ‘Veedu’? I think it was for her performance in this picture that she won the National Best Actress Award. Very good actress. She als acted in Shaji N. Karun’s internationally acclaimed Malayalam movie ‘Piravi’ with Premji. Hope I am not mixing up in assuming that it is the same Archana Arun Kaimal has mentioned.

Anyway, I am looking forward to seeing ‘Nine Rupee Note’.

Ends.

Also see:

Malayalam cinema: Random thoughts

A Malayalam cinema and its lyrics.


9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Since you are in the cinema mode and has fished out Sathyaraj’s family background any idea about the same with regard to the reigning leading Mallu actress of Kollywood, Asin Thottumkal. Does she belong to the ancient Thottumkal family of Palai, Kerala?

Maddy said...

yes u are right - Sathyaraj did a lot of wonderful movies. I think I have seen all of them barring the one that came a couple of months ago. He is married incidentally to the Bombay bred daughter of a Palakkadan iyer, Poornima jayram!!

rekha is still around - she appeared on the Idea star singer program as a celebrity judge a month back!!

Veedu was fantastic, but I liked Archana in Rettai vaal kuruvi! that was a good one!!

Viswanathan said...

Maddy,

A correction.

Poornima Jayaram (Manjil Virinja Pookal) is married to Bhagyaraj - a director sometimes likened to our own Balachandra Menon.

Rekha- I remember her role in Mohanlal starrer, Auto(?).
Yes, she is still around. I also did see her in a couple of Idea star singer episodes.

Veedu, was great and Archana, is a Balu Mahendra's find, a director who has an penchant for dark (relatively) heroines.

A competent actress.

I think she garnered more than a couple of National Awards, including one for a Kannada movie.

Unknown said...

Because of computer crash was depending on an Internet place for my blog posts, but lagged behind in communications. Now I am fully back in action.

Unknown said...

Nebu, I understand that Asin was born at Cochin and graduated from St. Teresa's. Her father's name is Joseph; mother Dr. Seline. They belong to Thottumgal family but it is not clear whether it originally belonged to Palai.

Unknown said...

I haven't seen 'Rettaivaal kuruvi'. Have made a note of it. Thanks for the lead, Maddy.

Unknown said...

Thanks for the correction, Ottayan.

renown world said...

Tamil Movies | Tamil Songs

Unknown said...

nice article