Neerkumizhi

Sethu, an orphan is a patient who is constantly playing pranks on the other hospital patients, the nurse in-charge and the doctors. A romantic bond develops between a young doctor, Indra and another patient, a football player, Arun much to the chagrin of her father, the senior-most doctor in the hospital. The football player has a greedy brother who tries to arrange for his sibling to be killed. How Sethu, on learning that he is terminally ill cherishes the short time he has to live and takes it upon himself to unite the lovers forms the rest of the story. marked the directorial debut of who earlier worked as a screenwriter and it was based on his stage play of the same name. The film was produced by A. K. Velan under Thirumalai Films. Cinematography was handled by Nimay Ghosh, and the art direction by Ranganna. A. K. Velan who saw the play decided to adapt it as a film and insisted Balachander to direct the film adaptation to which he agreed despite initial reservations due to his lack of knowledge about film direction. , , and , who were part of the play, returned to the film adaptation. Balachander said that he was advised by friends and relatives to change the title but he was adamant and kept the title. The music was composed by , in his debut. Balachander wanted to sing the song “Aadi Adangum” as he felt that “his emphasis on certain words and letters always produced the effect required.” The title song is based on ” “. was released on 23 October 1965, during day. , in a review dated 14 November 1965, said that despite its few flaws, the film could be watched once for Nagesh. Writing in , T. M. Ramachandran named it his favourite Diwali release of the year because “it blazes a new trail in screen entertainment”, while calling it better than the original play. praised the film for its story and Nagesh’s performance.