Moondru Mudichu

<p>Balaji and Prasath are roommates in Chennai. Balaji falls in love with 18-year-old Selvi, who lives in the same apartment complex. Prasath, who has his eyes on Selvi, pretends to back Balaji’s love while secretly hoping to create a divide between them. Selvi realizes Prasath’s intentions when she finds out that he has seduced Menaka, an innocent girl living in the same apartment complex. However, she is unable to convince Balaji, who hero-worships Prasath. Things come to a head when Selvi, Balaji and Prasath go for a picnic by the lake. Balaji topples over by accident. Prasath refuses to jump in and save Balaji, on the pretext that he does not know swimming. A devastated Selvi returns home to another shock: her sister, who plays small roles in films, has been in a fire accident which has left her face permanently scarred. Overnight, Selvi’s life undergoes a change. Selvi comes across an advertisement in the paper for a second marriage to Viswanathan, a wealthy man in Salem with four children, and applies for the same. However, Viswanathan refuses to marry a young girl like Selvi and asks her to take care of the kids instead. Impressed by her service, he requests her to marry his eldest son, who turns out to be none other than Prasath, who visits his father during the weekend. Prasath continues to harass Selvi and orders her to marry him. He gives her a week to decide and returns to Chennai. In an attempt to salvage her life, Selvi successfully persuades Viswanathan to marry her before Prasath returns the next weekend. This puts Prasath in an uncomfortable situation, as Selvi taunts him back using her ‘mother’ status. Meanwhile, Selvi spots Menaka, who has given birth to Prasath’s child, and brings them home and tries to convince Prasath to marry her, who rejects them. Viswanathan accidentally finds out about the prior relationship between Prasath and Selvi and enacts an accident to make Prasath agree to his immoral past. Prasath repents for his mistakes and agrees to marry Menaka. is a remake of the 1973 film . was offered to play a negative role but did not accept, resulting in being cast. It was Rajinikanth’s first major role in Tamil. , who portrayed a negative role in s remake (1975), played a different role this time. This was the first film where played an adult character. She was paid 5000, Haasan was paid 30,000 and Rajinikanth was paid 2000. The budget of the film was (equivalent to 3.0 crore or US$360,000 in 2023). The soundtrack was composed by and lyrics were by . was released on 22 October 1976, day. Kanthan of appreciated the film for its cast performances, and called the pre- portions better than the post-interval ones. The film became a success, and many of Prasath’s traits became signature moves of Rajinikanth in his future films such as his tendency to flip cigarettes into his mouth; critic felt that with Prasath’s recurring Hindi catchphrase “Teek Hai?” ( ), “the seed for future Rajini catchphrases had been sown.”</p>