''Samuthiram'' () is a 2001 Indian

Tamil Tamil may refer to: * Tamils, an ethnic group native to India and some other parts of Asia ** Sri Lankan Tamils, Tamil people native to Sri Lanka also called ilankai tamils **Tamil Malaysians, Tamil people native to Malaysia * Tamil language, nati ...

-language

drama film In film and television, drama is a category or genre of narrative fiction (or semi-fiction) intended to be more serious than humorous in tone. Drama of this kind is usually qualified with additional terms that specify its particular super ...

written by

Erode Soundar Erode () is a city in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu. Erode is the seventh largest urban agglomeration in the state, after Chennai, Coimbatore, Madurai, Tiruchirapalli, Tiruppur and Salem. It is also the administrative headquarters of the E ...

and directed by

K. S. Ravikumar K. S. Ravikumar (born 30 May 1958) is an Indian film director, screenwriter, producer, actor, primarily working in Tamil films. Career 1990–1997 Ravikumar worked as co-director on R. B. Choudary's production ''Pudhu Vasantham'' directe ...

. The film stars an ensemble cast of

Sarath Kumar Sarathkumar Ramanathan (born 14 July 1954) is an Indian actor, politician, filmmaker, and singer. He has acted in more than 130 Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam and Kannada films. He has won two Tamil Nadu State Film Awards and three Filmfare Awards S ...

, Murali,

Manoj Bharathiraja Manoj K. Bharathi (born 11 September 1976 as Manoj Bharathiraja) is an Indian actor. He is most noted as the son of director Bharathiraja. Manoj made his acting debut with ''Taj Mahal'' in 1999. He has been the part of few Tamil movies like '' ...

Kaveri The Kaveri (also known as Cauvery, the anglicized name) is one of the major Indian rivers flowing through the states of Karnataka and Tamil Nadu. The Kaveri river rises at Talakaveri in the Brahmagiri range in the Western Ghats, Kodagu di ...

Abhirami Abhirami may refer to: * Abhirami (actress) Abhirami () (née Divya Gopikumar; July 1983) is an Indian actress and television host. She has acted in Malayalam, Tamil, Telugu and Kannada films. Early life and education She was born as Divya in ...

Sindhu Menon Sindhu Menon is an Indian actress, who has starred in Kannada, Telugu, Malayalam and Tamil films. Early life Sindhu Menon was born in Bangalore, Karnataka, India into a Malayali family. She has an elder brother, Karthik, who worked as a Kann ...

and Monal. The film's score and soundtrack are composed by

Sabesh–Murali Sabesh–Murali is an Indian music director duo, who have jointly composed for many Tamil films in Chennai, India. Sabesh and Murali are siblings who began their careers working under their brother, the music director Deva, as assistant compose ...

. The film was released on 31 August 2001. The film was remade in Telugu as '' Siva Rama Raju'' with

Jagapathi Babu Veeramachaneni Jagapathi Rao Chowdary (born 12 February 1962), professionally known as Jagapathi Babu (), is an Indian actor known for his works predominantly in Telugu cinema. He has also appeared in a few Tamil, , Kannada and Malayalam films ...

, in Bengali as '' Kartabya'' and in Kannada as '' Paramashiva'' with V. Ravichandran. Even though it got mixed reviews, it became a "superhit" at the box office.

Plot

Selvarasu is the head of his family, and his two brothers Thangarasu and Chinnarasu are ready to give up their lives for him. The three brothers are very fond of their sister Rasamani. A rich man from the neighboring village Chinniyampalyam Zamin Rangarajan, feels insulted when Thangarasu mishandles his son Aakash during a temple festival, and to take revenge, he comes with a wedding proposal to make Rasamani his daughter-in-law. At the time of the wedding, the groom's family demands the entire wealth of Selvarasu to be transferred to Rasamani as the dowry, for which Selvarasu and his brothers agree. The brothers are insulted at every opportunity, while Rasamani is also ill-treated by her husband and father in law. Selvarasu is married to Lakshmi, while Thangarasu is married to his cousin Durga and Chinnarasu is in love with his classmate Priya. Rasamani conceives but still undergoes the torture of her family. Chinnarasu's wedding is arranged with Priya, and the brothers eagerly await for the arrival of Rasamani for the wedding. However, Rasamani is locked up in a room by Aakash, who is not permitting her to attend the wedding. Aakash also injures her feet while she tries to escape from her house with plans of attending the wedding. The brothers come to Rasamani's home requesting her to come for the wedding and are shocked to know that she is hurt and locked in a room. The brothers fight Aakash's goons. Rasamani gets furious and decides to end her relationship with Aakash. She removes the

thaali A mangala sutra (), or thaali (ISO: ''tāḷi''), is a necklace that the groom ties around the bride's neck in the Indian subcontinent, in a ceremony called ''Mangalya Dharanam'' (). The necklace serves as a visual marker of status as a m ...

and throws on the face of her husband and decides to go with her brothers. In the end, Aakash and his father reform and accept Rasamani and her brothers.

Cast

as Selvarasu * Murali as Thangarasu, Selvarasu's brother *

as Chinnarasu, Selvarasu's brother *

as Rasamani, the sister of the brothers *

as Lakshmi, Selvarasu's wife *

as Durga, Thangarasu's wife and cousin * Monal as Priya, Chinnarasu's love interest *

Goundamani Subramaniyan Karuppaiya (born 25 May 1939), known by his stage name Goundamani, is an Indian actor and comedian who works in Tamil cinema. He is known for his comic duo partnership in Tamil films with fellow actor Senthil. The pair dominated ...

as Ramanathan, Selvarasu's maternal uncle *

Manivannan S. Manivannan Rajagopal (31 July 1953 – 15 June 2013), better known by his mononym Manivannan, was an Indian film director, actor and activist who worked mainly in Tamil cinema and also worked in a few Telugu & Malayalam films. In a care ...

as Sundaram *

Senthil Senthil (born 23 March 1951) is an Indian comedy actor who works in Tamil cinema. He is famous for his comedian roles along with fellow actor Goundamani. The pair dominated the Tamil industry as comedians in the 1980s and 90s.Pyramid Natarajan Pyramid Natarajan is a former Indian actor and producer, who has appeared in character roles in Tamil cinema. He made his breakthrough as an actor playing a role in Mani Ratnam's ''Alaipayuthey'' (2000) portraying the role of Madhavan's father ...

as Chinnapalayam Zamin Rangarajan, Rasamani's father-in-law * Priyanka as Bride Girl *

Manjula Vijayakumar Manjula Vijayakumar (4 July 195423 July 2013) was an Indian actress. She acted in more than 100 films in South Indian languages like Tamil, Telugu, Kannada and Malayalam. Personal life She and actor Vijayakumar got married in 1976. The coupl ...

as Parvathi, Durga's mother * Thyagu as Priya's father *

Riyaz Khan Riyaz Khan is an Indian actor and bodybuilder. He predominantly works in Malayalam and Tamil films and television series, besides acting in a few Telugu and Kannada films, as well as two Hindi films. Riyaz debuted in Malayalam through the 1994 ...

as Priya's brother * Santhana Bharathi as Rajalingam Gounder, Lakshmi's father *

Pandu In the Hindu epic ''Mahabharata'', Pandu ( sa, पाण्डु, Pāṇḍu, pale) was a king of the Kuru Kingdom. He was the foster-father of the five Pandava brothers, who were the boons bestowed upon his wife Kunti by a number of deiti ...

as College Principal *

Manobala Manobala (born 8 December 1953) is an Indian film director, producer, actor and comedian who predominantly plays supporting roles in Tamil-language films. He started his career in Tamil cinema in the early 1970s and with Kamal Haasan's refere ...

as Professor *

Vasu Vikram Vasu Vikram is an Indian actor and stage director who has worked on Tamil-language films and in television dramas. Career Vasu Vikram is the son of actor M. R. R. Vasu, and the grandson of M. R. Radha. Several other members of his family are ...

as Maruthamuthu * Lavanya *

Crane Manohar Crane Manohar (born 4 October 1965) is an Indian actor who appears in Tamil films, mostly in comedy roles. He appeared in many Vadivelu and Vivek comedy tracks. Career Manohar initially worked as a crane technician for films and when he sta ...

as Mercenary Hitman *

Raadhika Raadhika Sarathkumar is an Indian actress, entrepreneur, producer and politician who works predominantly in Tamil cinema along with Telugu cinema as well as a few Malayalam, Hindi and Kannada films. She is the founder and CP of the Radaan Me ...

(cameo appearance) *

(guest appearance in song "Vidiya Vidiya") * Sridhar as dancer

Production

R. B. Choudary Ratanlal Bhagatram Choudary is an Indian film producer who has worked in several film industries, predominantly in Tamil and Telugu along with a few films in Malayalam and Hindi. He is the founder of the production company Super Good Films. Ca ...

's financial problems meant that the director

financed the first schedule of the film by himself. The producer acknowledged and thanked the director at the audio launch function. In June 2001, during the shoot of the film in the

Mandya Mandya is a city in the state of Karnataka. It is the headquarter of Mandya district and is located from Mysore and from Bangalore. Sugar factories contribute to the major economic output. It is also called Sugar city (which in Kannada mea ...

district of Karnataka, the team were attacked by angry villagers. The set was trashed and crew members were injured. The climax of the film was changed after the completion of the shoot.

Soundtrack

, brothers of music composer Deva, made their debut as full-fledged composers with this project after composing background music for their brother's films previously. *"Kaa Vitta" –

Mano Mano may refer to: People * Mano people, an ethnic group in Liberia * Mano (name), a list of people with either the given name or surname * Mano (Mozambican footballer) (born 1984), real name Celso Halilo de Abdul * Mano (Portuguese footballer) ...

Anuradha Sriram Anuradha Sriram (born 9 July 1970) is an Indian carnatic and playback singer and child actress who hails from the Indian state of Tamil Nadu. She has sung more than 700 songs in Tamil, Telugu, Sinhala, Malayalam, Kannada, Bengali and Hindi ...

*"Kandupidi" – Hariharan,

Ganga The Ganges ( ) (in India: Ganga ( ); in Bangladesh: Padma ( )). "The Ganges Basin, known in India as the Ganga and in Bangladesh as the Padma, is an international river to which India, Bangladesh, Nepal and China are the riparian states." is ...

*"Azhagana Chinna Devathai" –

Shankar Mahadevan Shankar Mahadevan (born 3 March 1967) is an Indian singer and composer who is part of the Shankar–Ehsaan–Loy trio that writes music for Indian films. Personal life and early career Shankar Mahadevan was born in Chembur, Mumbai into a T ...

, Harini *"Vidiya Vidiya" –

Udit Narayan Udit is an Indian masculine given name that may refer to: * Udit Narayan, Bollywood playback singer *Udit Narayan (politician) (born 1960), Fijian politician of Indian descent *Udit Narayan Singh (1770–1835), Indian monarch * Udit Patel (born 19 ...

Sadhana Sargam Sadhana Sargam (née Ghanekar, born 7 March 1969) is an Indian singer known for her playback career in Indian cinema predominantly in Hindi, Bengali, Telugu and Tamil language films. She is a recipient of the National Film Award and Filmfar ...

*"Pineaple Vannathodu" – Shankar Mahadevan

Release

''Samudhiram'' released on 31 August 2001.

Critical reception

The movie generally got mixed reviews as it was felt that the story is not new. Malathi Rangarajan from thehindu.com stated ''Samudhiram'' is a story of the sincere affection that exists in a family – love that is more filial than fraternal; attachment that is more unnatural than normal. Screenindia wrote that stars performed well in the film.''Kalki'' review
/ref>

References

{{Authority control Tamil films remade in other languages 2001 films Indian drama films Films directed by K. S. Ravikumar 2000s Tamil-language films 2001 drama films Super Good Films films