A. Bhimsingh or Bhim Singh (15 October 1924–16 January 1978) was an Indian filmmaker who worked predominantly in
Tamil cinema
Tamil cinema is the segment of Indian cinema dedicated to the production of motion pictures in the Tamil language, the main spoken language in the state of Tamil Nadu. It is nicknamed Kollywood, a portmanteau of the names Kodambakkam, a Ch ...
. Apart from Tamil, he made films in other languages that include 18 films in
Hindi
Modern Standard Hindi (, ), commonly referred to as Hindi, is the Standard language, standardised variety of the Hindustani language written in the Devanagari script. It is an official language of India, official language of the Government ...
, 8 films in
Telugu, 5 films in
Malayalam
Malayalam (; , ) is a Dravidian languages, Dravidian language spoken in the Indian state of Kerala and the union territories of Lakshadweep and Puducherry (union territory), Puducherry (Mahé district) by the Malayali people. It is one of ...
and 2 films in
Kannada
Kannada () is a Dravidian language spoken predominantly in the state of Karnataka in southwestern India, and spoken by a minority of the population in all neighbouring states. It has 44 million native speakers, and is additionally a ...
. Hailing from Andhra Pradesh, he started his film career as an assistant editor with the film-making duo
Krishnan–Panju in the late 1940s. Later, he became an assistant director before evolving as an independent director. His films mainly dealt with family and relationships. He made a series of films all of which started with the
Tamil syllable ''pa'', mainly with
Sivaji Ganesan
Villupuram. Chinnaiya Manrayar Ganesamoorthy (1 October 1928 – 21 July 2001), better known by his stage name Sivaji Ganesan, was an Indian actor and film producer. He was mainly active in Tamil cinema during the latter half of the 20th centur ...
.
Personal life
Bhimsingh married Sona, the sister of
Krishnan
Krishnan is a common name in South India, which refers to the Hindu deity Krishna. It is also combined with other names into a single name such as Ananthakrishnan, Balakrishnan, Gopalakrishnan, Jayakrishnan, Muralikrishnan, Ramakrishnan, Radhakris ...
, in 1949. He had eight children with her; one of his eight children,
B. Lenin is a film editor, and another son of his,
B. Kannan, is a cinematographer, who is known for his frequent collaborations with many of
Bharathiraja. Later, Bhimsingh's eldest son Naren married Panju's daughter. Bhimsingh was also married to actress
Sukumari in 1959 and has a son Suresh Bhimsingh.
Filmography
''Pa'' series
Many of Bhimsingh's films began with the syllable ''Pa'', starred Sivaji Ganesan, had music by Viswanathan–Ramamoorthy, and lyrics by Kannadasan. According to Ganesan, Bhimsingh hardly imagined that he would make a series of films that began with the letter ''Pa'', implying that he "might have thought about it at first because his name starts with the same letter in Tamil. Later he might have decided to stay on with this letter for sentimental reasons."
As an actor
*1975:
Cinema Paithyam
Recurring collaborators
Bhimsingh frequently associated with the same crew members. These included the assistant director duo Thirumalai–Mahalingam (who later became proper directors on films produced and written by Bhimsingh), cinematographer G. Vittal Rao and editor A. Paul Duraisingam. Ganesan appeared in 18 films directed by Bhimsingh, starting with ''
Raja Rani'' (1956).
Accolades
National Film Awards
The National Film Awards are awards for artistic and technical merit given for "Excellence within the Cinema of India, Indian film industry". Established in 1954, it has been administered, along with the International Film Festival of India ...
*
1959:
President's silver medal for Best Feature Film in Tamil – ''
Bhaaga Pirivinai''
*
1960:
Certificate of Merit for Best Feature Film in Tamil – ''
Kalathur Kannamma''
*
1961:
All India Certificate of Merit for the Second Best Feature Film – ''
Paava Mannippu''
* 1961:
Certificate of Merit for Second Best Feature Film in Tamil – ''
Pasamalar''
* 1964: Certificate of Merit for Second Best Feature Film in Tamil – ''
Pazhani''
References
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Bhimsingh, A.
Telugu film directors
Tamil film directors
1924 births
1978 deaths
Malayalam film directors
Hindi-language film directors
Telugu film editors
Tamil film editors
People from Chittoor district
Film directors from Andhra Pradesh
Screenwriters from Andhra Pradesh
Film producers from Andhra Pradesh
People from Anantapur district
Film editors from Andhra Pradesh
20th-century Indian screenwriters