Pudhumai Penn

<p>Seetha lives a simple life with her father, a Tamil teacher in a village. After Seetha’s elder sister committed suicide by suffering from harassment from her husband’s family, Seetha’s father struggles to find a suitable groom for her owing to his poor financial condition. One day, her father meets Ram, a bank employee, and introduces him to Seetha. After a few days, Ram meets Seetha and the pair decides to get married. Ram’s mother doesn’t like Seetha, as her family haven’t provided dowry and she insults Seetha frequently. Seetha decides to tolerate this treatment due to her love for Ram, but her father commits suicide, unable to bear his daughter’s suffering. Ram invites his new boss, Rajasekar, to his home for lunch. Rajasekar is attracted to Seetha, who keeps her distance from him. Meanwhile, Ram’s sister becomes pregnant by Ram’s friend and their families push them to marry. Unable to pay the wedding expenses, Ram steals money from the bank, but gets caught by Rajasekar, who says that if Ram will allow him to have sex with Seetha, he will forgive Ram and not inform the police about the theft. Angered by this suggestion, Ram beats up Rajasekar and leaves home. The next day, Rajasekar is found dead and Ram is arrested by the police on suspicion of murder. Seetha decides to seek help from David, a criminal lawyer and a friend of her father’s, but learns that David has moved away. Seetha finds another lawyer for Ram, and begins modeling for a painter to pay the legal expenses, and is also able to financially assist Ram’s mother and sister. However, Ram’s mother insults Seetha by accusing her of prostitution. One day, the painter asks Seetha to pose nude, which angers Seetha, and she stops modeling for him. She begins earning money through various jobs such as cooking and household chores. One day, Seetha sees David and follows him home. She asks David to appear in court on behalf of Ram. David tells Seetha that he killed Rajasekar for raping his sister and apologises that Ram was falsely arrested. David appears in the court and confesses to the murder, leading to Ram’s release. Later, Seetha learns that she is pregnant and looks forward to sharing the news with Ram. However, Ram’s mother convinces Ram that he is not the father of Seetha’s baby. When Ram questions Seetha about the child’s paternity, she considers committing suicide, but instead decides to leave home and live on her own. wanted to make a film with after the success of his (1979) which never happened. A few years later they both collaborated on the project which eventually became . The film’s story was written by who revealed this story was initially supposed to be made as Bharathiraja’s debut titled ( ) with and which got shelved. marked the acting debut of . It was also ‘s only collaboration with AVM. was 17 years old when doing this film. The studio’s name was prefixed to the film’s title ( ). A few scenes were shot at . The soundtrack was composed by , while the lyrics were written by . The song “Kasthuri Maane” is set in raga and “Kadhal Mayakkam” is set in . was released on 14 July 1984, and ran for 208 days in the Mini Priya theatre, . The film failed at the box-office during its first run. , then the , decided to re-release the film with tax exemption by reducing ticket prices to three rupees which led to bigger success. of praised the performances of cast and direction but was critical of logical mistakes and found the climax of Revathi leaving home disappointing and added that the film can be enjoyed in bits and pieces here and there. Balumani of praised the acting and dialogues and also praised Bharathiraja and AVM for making a film with a revolutionary message.</p>