Pori

Hari is an unemployed youth who runs a pavement book shop in Tripiclane area. His father, an upright retired schoolteacher, buys him a shop in a building with his PF money. He names it “Periyar Bookshop” and runs it with his two friends. Meanwhile, he constantly bumps into a TV reporter Pooja, and a happens. One day, a Malaysian-based businessman named Mahadevan comes and evicts Hari from the shop, claiming that it belongs to him. Hari now discovers that his father was cheated by a land mafia gang which specializes in forged documents and is hand-in-glove with revenue officials. He decides to take the gauntlet and unveil the evil forces behind the property grabbers. Soon, he discovers that Nama Shivayam, Vinayagam real estates owner, is the brains behind the entire operation. How Hari becomes a one-man army and brings Nama Shivayam to justice forms the rest of the story. The film was initially announced in December 2005 with and starring, before the latter was replaced by . A set resembling a street consisting of book shops and homes where most of the action takes place was built at AVM Studios for (equivalent to 75 lakh or US$89,000 in 2023) and was shot there for three weeks while the film was also shot around locations such as Besant Nagar, Ashok Nagar and K. K. Nagar. The song “Vedhala Murunga maram” was shot at Golconda Fort. Soundtrack was composed by , with lyrics by . The audio was launched at Sathyam Cinemas on 3 January 2007. wrote, “There is no script or narrative as the director deploys all cinematic cliches since time immemorial. Six songs at regular intervals that are badly picturised tests your patience. Jeeva has done a larger-than-life role which just does not suit him”. Shwetha Bhaskar of wrote, “Watch Pori if you want to aimlessly fritter time away”. Malini Mannath of wrote, “This is the director’s second film after the highly successful ‘Thiruda Thirudi’. The debut film, though lacking in finesse, had managed to hold audience interest with its humour, colourful characters and peppy song-dance numbers. But ‘Pori’ fails to excite with its lacklustre script and predictable situations”. Lajjavathi of wrote the story starts only after the break, so it becomes very tiring. She added that the director confuses himself and us by putting many characters. Malathi Rangarajan of wrote, “`Pori’s theme that comes to the fore rather late, is new … and that’s about it”. Karunas bought the film’s distribution rights for the areas North Arcot and South Arcot, however the film failed at the box-office and Karunas suffered losses in distribution.