Sivappu Malli

<p>Sathyanathan, Punyakodi and their partners are an atrocious lot. They keep suppressing the villagers and do not even allow them to get proper education due to fear of losing control over the village. On the other hand, Ranga and Tyagu are honest factory workers who lead the fight against the factory owner for the labourers’ rights. The clash between the two sections of society reaches a level where Sathyanathan and a gang plot to eliminate Ranga and Tyagu. They manage to do away with Tyagu; however, Ranga is too smart for them. How Ranga manages to punish the wrong doers is what the second half of the film is all about. K. Veerappan, a production executive at , saw the film (1981) and told AVM insiders it was very good; having faith in his words, bought the remake rights without watching the film. However, Saravanan did not produce the remake, titled directly under AVM, but the subsidiary Balasubramaniam & Company. Saravanan wanted to portray the lead role, but he declined due to unavailability of dates; the role went to . The film’s was held on 20 July 1981, and principal photography was completed within 35 working days, well before the already fixed 15 August release date. Though Vijayakanth was already acting in (1983) when he accepted , despite both films being shot in different towns, he would film for in the evening at after filming for in . Editing was handled by Vellaichami. While discussing about crediting lead actors’ names, ‘s brother Pandian was insistent about having his brother’s name to be placed first in opening credits; due to this reason both Vijayakanth and Chandrasekhar were left uncredited. The makers wanted Vijayakanth’s voice to be dubbed by a voice artist; however Vijayakanth insisted to dub for himself, he attended dubbing session during the shoot of . revolves around the themes of and . The soundtrack was composed by , with lyrics by . was released on 15 August 1981. Sindhu and Jeeva, reviewing the film for , appreciated Lokesh’s cinematography and Vellaichami’s editing, especially Lokesh’s use of slow motion shots. The song “Erimalai Eppadi Porukkum” became the theme for ‘s character in (2010).</p>