Varalaaru
File:Varalaru.JPG
Directed by	K. S. Ravikumar
Produced by	S. S. Chakravarthy
Written by	K. S. Ravikumar Ravi Sujatha
Starring	Ajith Kumar Asin Kanika
Music by	A. R. Rahman
Cinematography	P. C. Sreeram Priyan
Editing by	Thanikachalam
Studio	NIC Arts
Release date(s)	23 October 2006
Running time	166 mins
Country	India
Language	Tamil

Varalaaru (Tamil: வரலாறு; English: History) is a 2006 Indian Tamil film written and directed by K. S. Ravikumar. The film stars Ajith Kumar in three roles as a father and his two sons, while Asin and Kanika also played leading roles. Ramesh Khanna, Suman Shetty, Sujatha and M. S. Baskar play other supporting roles. The film's score and soundtrack were composed by A. R. Rahman, while the film's cinematography is by P. C. Sreeram. The film was referred to as Godfather prior to release but entertainement tax exemption changes led to the film being renamed. The film released on 23 October 2006 after long delays and became a large commercial success at the box office while Ajith's work in the film was critically acclaimed.

Plot [link]

Shivshankar (played by Ajith Kumar), a wheelchair user, has a son, Vishnu (also played by Ajith Kumar) who is playful, spoiled and irresponsible. To teach him a lesson, Shivshankar sends Vishnu to Thottapuram to help the poor. Vishnu doesn't want to go, but the owner of a local pizzeria convinces Vishnu and his friends that the village is one big brothel. In fact, Thottampuram is really a sacred village and the pizzeria owner hopes Vishnu and his friends will be beaten up. Visiting the village at the same time as Vishnu and his friends is the smart and pretty Divya (Asin Thottumkal) and her classmates who are there for their social activity course to improve hygiene in the village. Because of Vishnu's visit, the village head assigns Divya and friends to stay with poor families, reserving the large village building for the six rich guests. Vishnu and his five friends arrive, are greeted by the village and start to woo Divya and the girls, whom they mistake for Thottapuram's prostitutes. When Divya discovers their plan, she and her friends decide to teach Vishnu and his friends a lesson. They also want to ensure that Vishnu and his friends leave the large building so Divya and her friends can occupy it.

At a large feast that evening, Divya and the other girls woo Vishnu and his friends before leading them to the bedrooms. Vishnu's friends are injected with a substance called "Monkey Blood", which makes them itch all over and they leave, screaming and scratching. Vishnu himself refuses to sleep with Divya, saying he has committed lots of small mistakes and doesn't want to make a big one by sleeping with her. He asks her to leave her profession and Divya lies to him, saying she can't, as she has to support a family that is crippled with various diseases. Vishnu, moved, leaves. Vishnu offers Divya money so she can start a new life, but Divya refuses once again, saying she doesn't need a new life, she has to restore her honour - so Vishnu agrees to marry her in the village temple. Divya doesn't believe him, but Vishnu says he will be there to marry her the next day.

Divya doesn't come, however, and Vishnu and his friends see her leaving on a bus bearing the name of the girls' college. Vishnu and his friends now know they have been tricked and the girls weren't really prostitutes. When Vishnu returns home, Shivshankar discovers that his son has fallen in love. With his influence, Vishnu and Divya get engaged. Shortly thereafter, Shivashankar is disappointed with Vishnu's behavior and his attitude.Vishnu went to Divya's house after a party.Her father and brothers resisted him to talk to her in drunken state, eventually led to a fight.Vishnu went to Divya's cousin's house to meet Divya and apologise for his behavior the previous night but suddenly gets sexually agitated and attempted to rape Divya's cousin.After several days of this misbehavior, Vishnu is sent to a therapist.

Here enters Jeeva (the third role played by Ajith Kumar), Vishnu's twin. Assuming Vishnu's identity, he had taken the money from the bank, gone to Divya's place after party and attempted to rape Divya's cousin. Jeeva tries to stab Shivshakar and but stabs Shivshankar's assistant instead. It is revealed that Jeeva hates Shivshankar for leaving Jeeva's mother (Kanika). At the same time, Divya manages to sneak into Vishnu's hospital and tells him that she thinks he's innocent. She leaves and shortly afterwards, Jeeva appears, smuggles Vishnu out of the hospital, dumps him somewhere, takes over his identity and goes to kill Shivshankar. The father notices that it's not his son and gets out of his wheelchair in order to defend himself. Vishnu arrives at the scene, surprised that his father is able to walk and demands an explanation.

Shivshankar tells him that he once was a dancer who, due to dancing, gained a reputation of being effeminate. His mother had arranged for Shivshankar to marry her friend's daughter, (Kanika). He agreed but the girl rejected Shivshankar for being too feminine, therefore insulting him in front of the wedding crowd. Unable to bear the embarrassment, Shivshankar's mother died on the spot. Shivshankar, enraged, raped the girl, a deed that resulted in a pregnancy. The doctor refused to give her an abortion and so Vishnu was born, because Vishnu's grandmother wanted the child. Shivshankar takes his child from the mother saying that this child would be the only hope and reason of his life. Shivshankar confesses to Vishnu that he is ignorant of Jeeva's existence and the reason for his resemblance to them.

Jeeva escapes and now threatens the wedding between Vishnu and Divya. Shivshankar tries to stop him. Finally, Jeeva's grandmother comes out of hospital, explains that Jeeva is also Shivshankar's son and Vishnu's twin and that Kanika went mad when Jeeva was about to get hit by a lorry. Jeeva realizes what he has done. He wants Shivshankar to shoot him, but police misunderstand and think that Jeeva is pointing a gun at Shivshankar and the police try to shoot Jeeva. Shivshankar intervenes and is shot instead. Jeeva is taken into custody. Jeeva's mother does not accept food from anyone, until Vishnu comes dressed up as Jeeva and feeds her. It ends with stating that Shivshankar is their godfather.

Cast [link]

Production [link]

K. S. Ravikumar was forced to pull out of a project titled Jaggubhai which he had written and begun directing starring Rajinikanth in the lead role and consequently signed on Ajith Kumar, who haad just opted out of A. R. Murugadoss's action film, Mirattal. The filming of Godfather began in November 2004, with Ravikumar initially announcing a release date of April 2005.^[1][2] Asin, Ajith's pair in Mirattal was added to the film while A. R. Rahman was signed on as music composer to the film to be produced by S. S. Chakravarthy. Early reports suggested that one of Ajith's roles in the film would be a eunuch or a transgender,^[3] but the role eventually turned out to be that of a classical dancer.^[4] Shooting progressed from November 2004 til the end of the year.

In January 2005, it was announced that the film was put on hold due to financial problems, beginning a long delay in the production of the film.^[5] The film also faced problems, after the government had banned scenes involving smoking in films, with Godfather featuring several such scenes.^[6] Furthermore in mid 2005, Ajith Kumar had also fell out with the producer, who had made several films with him in the past and stated that the pair would never work together again.^[7] The indefinite delay had led to Ajith taking a forced sabbatical, with his market being at a low following the failure of his previous film Ji.^[8] Ravi Kumar tried to get in R. B. Choudary and his banner of Super Good Movies to finish the movie but to avail.^[9]

Chakravarthy avoided trouble by claiming he would finish the film by June 15, 2005 and signed a contract in March with the Tamil Nadu Producers Committee, who wanted to resolve the problem. The film re-started in April 2005, with a 10-day shoot in Ooty including a song, with Ravikumar revealing that further shots would be canned in Hyderabad and then in Canada and that the film will be ready for release by July 22, 2005. P. C. Sreeram opted out of the film after his dates clashed with his work in Kanda Naal Mudhal and was replaced by Priyan. Actress Meena who was supposed to do the father Ajith’s wife character has also opted out due to dates problems and after unfruitful discussion with Nadhiya, Kanika was signed.^[10] Problems arose in mid 2005, when Asin could not allot dates for the film due to her work in Ghajini, Majaa and Sivakasi.^[11] However by June 15, thirty five days work was still required and Ajith was forced to leave the project to begin work on Bala's Naan Kadavul as per the signed contract.^[12] Chakravarthy later reported Ajith Kumar for the delays and before further problems occurred, L. Suresh of Ananda Pictures, a leading Chennai based distributor, intervened and solved the existing problems by providing an interest-free loan.^[13] Subsequently the film became trouble free but took more than a year to finish the remaining portions and only released in October 2006 as Ajith took priority in completing Paramasivan and Thirupathi. Meanwhile, the title Godfather was reverted to Varalaru (History) after the state government gave an order to grant entertainment tax exemption to moviees titled in Tamil.^[14]

Release [link]

The film opened in October 2006 during the Diwali season alongside Silambarasan's Vallavan, S. P. Jananathan's E, Saran's Vattaram and Sarath Kumar's Thalaimagan, and emerged the biggest hit of the year.^[15][16] Varalaru opened in over 300 screens worldwide including 23 screens in Chennai district, crossed the 100 day mark in several screens and also went on to become Ajith Kumar's biggest hit until 2008.^[17] The critic from The Hindu gave a verdict that the film "scores in pace and performance!" and mentioned that "Ajith's skills as a performer have been appreciably honed and efficiently used" and that it is a "milestone in Ajit's cinema efforts, the film has the potential to propel its hero into a higher league in stardom", while describing Asin as "lustrous and sails through her role smoothly", while Kanika "gets more scope, which she makes good use of".^[18] Rediff.com also gave the film a positive review claiming that "Varalaaru is undoubtedly the only must-watch release this Diwali. Watch it for a display of all the elements of Ajith's versatility and range of emotions".^[19] The reviewer from Behindwoods praised the film saying "the narration and an implausible screenplay succeed in entertaining the masses", with the critic from Indiaglitz.com citing that "Varalaru may not make history. Yet, Ajith's work will certainly uplift to it being at least a local legend".^[20] The critic from Sify.com labelled the film as "average", criticising the time spent on the project and the director's handling.^[21] Ajith subsequently won the Filmfare Award for Best Actor – Tamil for 2006 for his triple role performance.

Ravi Teja announced he was going to remake the film in Telugu in 2007, but eventually did not do so.^[22] Further discussions by Pawan Kalyan to do the role in Telugu with Ravikumar as director also failed to materialise.^[23] In 2012, cinematographer Sethu Sriram opted to remake the film in Kannada under the original title, Godfather, featuring Upendra, Soundarya Jayamala and Catherine in the lead roles.^[24]

Music [link]

The film's soundtrack, composed by A. R. Rahman, features nine songs. Rahman finished composing the songs for the film by December 2004, with all songs written by Vairamuthu.^[25]

References [link]

External links [link]

• Varalaru at the Internet Movie Database