Iravum Pagalum

<p>Rajasekar is a wealthy college student who lives with his widowed mother Maragadhavalli and leads an untroubled life; he is in love with Parimala, his classmate. One night, Rajasekar and Maragadhavalli are robbed of their wealth by a gang. As Maragadhavalli prevents Rajasekar from reporting this incident to the police, he sets out to unravel the mystery behind his mother’s silence. set up a production company named “Citadel Films”, the name being inspired by the novel . He wanted to adapt that novel into a Tamil film, but Citadel Films co-founder F. Nagoor dissuaded him from doing so as he felt the subject was “risky”. He instead suggested a crime thriller, which became . Due to the film’s low budget, Joseph chose to cast newcomers. Joseph cast theatre actor Subramaniam Shankar in the lead role, christening him and marking the actor’s film debut. C. Vasantha was cast as the female lead, also making her film debut. was also cast in what would have been his film debut, but was removed after distributors were not supportive of him. , in his film debut, appeared uncredited. The film was produced by Joseph Thomas under the Citadel banner, photographed by B. B. Lucas, and edited by P. Radhakrishnan and M. Vellaisaamy. The final length of the film was 4,509.67 metres (14,795.5 ft). The soundtrack album was composed by . The lyrics were written by . was released on 14 January 1965, day. Despite facing competition from other Pongal releases such as and , the film became a commercial success. said on 6 February 1965, ” , despite a muddled script, is above the level of the run-of-the-mill suspense thrillers and has obvious box office potential”.</p>