''Meendum Savithri'' () is a 1996

Tamil Tamil may refer to: * Tamils, an ethnic group native to India and some other parts of Asia **Sri Lankan Tamils, Tamil people native to Sri Lanka also called ilankai tamils **Tamil Malaysians, Tamil people native to Malaysia * Tamil language, nativ ...

-language

drama film In film and television, drama is a category or genre of narrative fiction (or semi-fiction) intended to be more serious than humorous in tone. Drama of this kind is usually qualified with additional terms that specify its particular super-g ...

directed by

Visu Meenakshisundaram Ramasamy Viswanathan (1 July 1945 – 22 March 2020), best known by his stage name Visu, was an Indian writer, director, stage, film and television actor and talk-show host. Visu initially worked as an assistant to director K ...

. The film stars

Revathi Asha Kelunni Nair (born 8 July 1966), better known by her stage name Revathi, is an Indian actress and director, known for her works predominantly in Tamil & Malayalam cinema - in addition to Telugu, Hindi & Kannada films. She has won several ...

Saranya Ponvannan Saranya Ponvannan (born Sheela Christina) is an Indian actress who predominantly appears in Tamil, Telugu, and Malayalam language films. Saranya made her debut in a lead role in Mani Ratnam's ''Nayakan'' (1987) and went on to play lead roles from ...

Nizhalgal Ravi Ravichandran Samanna (born 16 April 1956), known professionally as Nizhalgal Ravi, is an Indian film, television and voice actor who works mainly in Tamil cinema. He has performed in Tamil, Malayalam and Telugu films and television series. He st ...

and

Raja ''Raja'' (; from , IAST ') is a royal title used for South Asian monarchs. The title is equivalent to king or princely ruler in South Asia and Southeast Asia. The title has a long history in South Asia and Southeast Asia, being attested f ...

, with

Ramesh Aravind Ramesh Aravind is an Indian actor, director, screenwriter and television presenter who predominantly works in Kannada films and television. In a career of over 34 years, Aravind has been appeared in over 140 films including several Tamil and T ...

Nagesh Nagesh (born Cheyur Krishnarao Nageshwaran; (27 September 1933 – 31 January 2009) was an Indian actor, mostly remembered for his roles as a comedian in Tamil films during the 1960s. Nagesh was born in Dharapuram. He acted in over 1,000 film ...

Jaiganesh Jai Ganesh (1946 – 11 February 2001) was an Indian Tamil film actor. He had supporting roles in the films '' Aval Oru Thodar Kathai'' and ''Attukara Alamelu'', among others. His most popular roles have been as a supporting actor or as a vill ...

, Annapoorna, Seetha and

Pandu In the Hindu epic ''Mahabharata'', Pandu ( sa, पाण्डु, Pāṇḍu, pale) was a king of the Kuru Kingdom. He was the foster-father of the five Pandava brothers, who were the boons bestowed upon his wife Kunti by a number of deities ...

playing supporting roles. The film, produced by

B. Nagi Reddy Bommireddy Nagi Reddi (2 December 1912 – 25 February 2004) was an Indian film producer and director mainly in Telugu cinema. He set up Vijaya Vauhini Studios in Chennai, which was then Asia's biggest film studio. As his elder brother (who w ...

, had musical score by

Devendran Devendran also known as Ravi Devendran is an Indian music composer who is concentrating in Tamil-language films. He is known for the melodious composition of chartbuster ''Kannukkul Nooru Nilava...'' from the Bharathiraja directed film ''Vedha ...

and was released on 9 February 1996. It is based on Visu's novel of the same name that was serialised in ''

Ananda Vikatan ''Ananda Vikatan'' is a Tamil-language weekly magazine published from Chennai, India. History and profile ''Ananda Vikatan'' was started by Late Pudhoor Vaidyanadhaiyar in February 1926 as a monthly publication. The issue for December 1927 wa ...

''. Despite positive reviews, the film bombed at the box-office. The film was simultaneously made in Telugu as ''Neti Savithri'' with Gollapudi Maruthi Rao replacing Visu.

Plot

Manju is an outspoken woman and she works in a small company. She lives with her father Narayana Moorthy who tries to reform the people as much as possible. Belonging to a middle-class family, she cannot provide a dowry for the potential grooms. One day, Manju comes across an innovative advertisement : a groom is looking for a bride without any dowries. The groom is Vasudevan who seems to be the perfect future husband. When Manju and Narayana Moorthy meet his family, Narayana Moorthy is shocked. Vasudevan's father Ramamoorthy became mentally ill when his business failed, his sister Gayathri became mentally ill when someone raped her, his brother Bhaskar is a drunkard and his mother is an asthma patient. Finally, Manju and Vasudevan get married. During the first night, Vasudevan beats her and falls down unconscious. Vasudevan's family was, in fact, acting, they are perfectly all right but they are scared of something. The truth is that Vasudevan was already married to Uma. Uma was initially in love with Narasimman, a do-gooder however she later rejects him after discovering that he is a con man, she marries Vasudevan. Narasimman in order to extract money from her creates photographs showing him and Uma being married which leads to Vasudevan assume that Uma had cheated him. Vasudevan gets affected psychologically due to her absence in order to make him normal his whole family pretends to be suffering from problems. Manju then plans to expose Narasimman's cruel ways. She and Vasudevan's family disguise themselves as a rich family from Mumbai with Bhaskar disguising himself as broker Ananthakrishnan. Narayana Moorthy who learns of the plan also joins the act as her rich father. Narayana Moorthy though not happy with the developments has to go along with the act after Manju threatens to commit suicide. During the engagement between Manju and Narasimman, Narasimman's evil ways are exposed and he is arrested by the police. In the end, Manju unites Vasu and Uma by throwing her thali inside the temple hundi and resumes her daily routine.

Cast

as Manju *

as Uma *

as Narasimman *

as Vasudevan *

as Bhaskar *

as Narayana Moorthy *

as Ramamoorthy *

as Chandramouli * Annapoorna as Vasudevan's mother *Seetha as Gayathri *

as Gajendran *

Kumarimuthu Kumarimuthu (20 December 1940 – 28 February 2016) was a Tamil film character actor, comedian and politician of the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK). He was known for his unique comical laugh. Career Kumarimuthu starred in 728 films in his car ...

*Jamuna Srinivasan as Meenatchi *Ganga * Suryakanth *

Oru Viral Krishna Rao Oru Viral Krishna Rao was an Indian actor and comedian who appeared in Tamil-language films. A recipient of the state government's Kalaimamani award, Rao got the nickname ''Oru Viral ''Oru Viral'' () is a 1965 Indian Tamil-language mystery fil ...

Idichapuli Selvaraj Idichapuli Selvaraj ( – 30 January 2012) was a veteran Tamil comedy actor. He acted in more than five hundred films. He acted along with lot of actors. He also worked as an assistant director for the M. G. Ramachandran films like ''Idhayakkani ...

Omakuchi Narasimhan Narasimhan (c. 1936 - 12 March 2009), popularly known as Omakuchi, was an Indian stage and film actor. He acted in over 1,500 films in 14 Indian languages, predominantly in Tamil. Early life Born in Kumbakonam in 1936, Narasimhan made his ...

; Telugu cast *

Gollapudi Maruti Rao Gollapudi Maruti Rao (14 April 1939 – 12 December 2019) was an Indian actor, screenwriter, dramatist, playwright, columnist and dialogue writer known for his works in Telugu cinema, Telugu theatre and Telugu Literature. Rao acted in over 250 ...

as Minor Babu * Rallapalli as Gajendra * Chitti Babu *K. K. Sarma *Juttu Narasimham as Pullaih

Soundtrack

The film score and the soundtrack were composed by

. The soundtrack, released in 1996, features 5 tracks with lyrics written by Piraisoodan.

Reception

K. Vijiyin of ''

New Straits Times The ''New Straits Times'' is an English-language newspaper published in Malaysia. It is Malaysia's oldest newspaper still in print (though not the first), having been founded as ''The Straits Times'' on 15 July 1845. It was relaunched as the ' ...

'' wrote, "With Visu's strong dialogues and his customary wisecracks, Meendum Savithri proves to be an entertaining movie, teaching proper values at the same time".

References

External links

{{Visu 1990s Tamil-language films 1996 drama films 1996 films Films based on Indian novels Films directed by Visu Films with screenplays by Visu Indian drama films