''Minnaram'' () is a 1994 Indian
Malayalam
Malayalam (; , ) is a Dravidian language spoken in the Indian state of Kerala and the union territories of Lakshadweep and Puducherry (Mahé district) by the Malayali people. It is one of 22 scheduled languages of India. Malayalam was des ...
-language
romantic comedy
Romantic comedy (also known as romcom or rom-com) is a subgenre of comedy and slice of life fiction, focusing on lighthearted, humorous plot lines centered on romantic ideas, such as how true love is able to surmount most obstacles. In a typica ...
film written and directed by
Priyadarshan
Priyadarshan (born 30 January 1957) is an Indian film director, screenwriter and producer who works predominantly in Malayalam and Hindi films, while also having done six films in Tamil and two films in Telugu. He has done about 31 films in Hi ...
from a story by
Cheriyan Kalpakavadi
Cheriyan Kalpakavadi ( ml, ചെറിയാൻ കൽപകവാടി) is an Indian story, screenplay and dialogue writer known for his association with director Venu Nagavally and actor Mohanlal. The partnership has produced some of the m ...
. The film stars
Mohanlal
Mohanlal Viswanathan (born 21 May 1960), known mononymously as Mohanlal, is an Indian actor, film producer, playback singer, film distributor, and director who predominantly works in Malayalam cinema besides also having sporadically appeare ...
,
Shobana
Shobana Chandrakumar Pillai (born 21 March 1970) is an Indian actress and Bharatanatyam dancer. She acts predominantly in Malayalam films along with Telugu and Tamil films with few Hindi, Kannada and English films. She has won two National Fil ...
, and
Thilakan
Palappurathu Kesavan Surendranatha Thilakan (15 July 1935 – 24 September 2012) was an Indian film and stage actor who appeared in over 200 Malayalam films. Thilakan was known for his elaborate method acting, realistic and spontaneous appearan ...
, with
Sankaradi
Chandrashekaran Menon, better known by his screen name Sankaradi (14 July 1924 – 8 October 2001), was an Indian actor. He was a veteran Malayalam comedian and character artist, who had over 700 Malayalam films to his credit. He dominated the ...
,
K. P. Ummer
Kachinamthoduka Puthiyapurayil Ummer known as K. P. Ummer (Malayalam: കെ.പി. ഉമ്മർ) was an Indian actor from Thekkepuram quarter of Kozhikode, Kerala, India. He was active in the Malayalam cinema from early sixties until late ...
,
Jagathy Sreekumar
Sreekumar P. K. (born 5 January 1951), better known by his stage name Jagathy Sreekumar or simply Jagathy, is an Indian actor, director and playback singer, who has appeared in over 1500 Malayalam films in a career spanning almost four decad ...
,
Geetha Vijayan
Geetha Vijayan (born 22 June 1972) is an Indian actress who appears in Malayalam movies, a few Tamil and Hindi movies. She debuted in the 1990 Malayalam comedy- thriller film ''In Harihar Nagar''. She has since acted in more than 150 Malayalam ...
,
Venu Nagavally
Venu Nagavally (16 April 1949 – 10 September 2010) was an Indian actor, screenwriter and director best known for his work in Malayalam cinema, Malayalam film industry. He has directed 12 films. Son of writer, commentator, and broadcaster Nagav ...
, and
Lalu Alex
Lalu Alex is an Indian actor who works in Malayalam cinema. In a career spanning four decades, Lalu Alex has acted over 250 movies and is known for his character roles, comic roles and antagonistic roles in Malayalam movie industry.
Lalu Alex ...
in supporting roles.
It was produced by R. Mohan through
Goodknight Films. The film was a commercial success at box office.
Plot
Bobby, who was orphaned at an early age, is raised by his uncle, Retd. I.G Matthews, as his son. Everyone adores him, particularly his cousin Baby's pre-teen children. He is engaged to Tina, Chackochan's daughter. Nina, his college sweetheart, unexpectedly appears with an infant who was purportedly fathered by Bobby. He vigorously refutes her accusations and goes to considerable lengths to show that she is mistaken. Bobby is also exposed as a liar when Nina manipulates Matthews into believing her story.
Bobby's family is forced to take on the duty of keeping the new information hidden from Chackochan since they are unable to make an immediate decision. As a result, Nina is introduced to others as a home instructor for Baby's children. Bobby is unable to verify his claims that the child is not the consequence of his previous relationship with Nina. This leads to a series of humorous occurrences involving Unnunni, who becomes anxious about Bobby having an illicit affair with his wife, Daisy. Bobby tells Daisy, who has been his best friend since childhood, about how his relationship with Nina began, evolved, and ended. In the interim, Nina proves to be a skilled tutor and gradually forges close relationships with every member of Bobby's family except for Bobby.
When Chackochan finally learns that Nina has already been married to Bobby, he calls off the ceremony and publicly shames Matthews for being dishonest. Bobby, with nothing to lose, demands Nina to be his wife for real, but Nina flatly refuses. Nina, unable to deal with Bobby's intimidation, breaks down and tells him the truth.
Baby learns the truth from Nina about the child and is informed that Bobby has been telling the truth about everything. During his troubled marriage, Baby had an affair with Nina's sister, who ultimately died during labor, leaving Nina in a precarious position to deliver the child in Baby's care. Baby first declines, fearing that the scandal will destroy his marriage. But Matthews overhears the talk and slaps Baby. He also feels sad for Bobby, who had already suffered plenty.
However, fate has a cruel twist in store for Nina when she faints shortly after rejecting Bobby's proposal to marry her. Bobby and his family are then informed by Nina's brother, Dr. Romy, that she shares the same deadly illness as her sister,
polycythemia vera
Polycythemia vera is an uncommon myeloproliferative neoplasm (a type of chronic leukemia) in which the bone marrow makes too many red blood cells. It may also result in the overproduction of white blood cells and platelets.
Most of the health ...
. He worries that she must have accidentally missed one or two doses, resulting in her collapse. He recalls Nina's adamant desire to guarantee that her niece was not orphaned, and her pledge that she would die only in her brother's arms. Along with a group of medical professionals, Bobby's family is fighting against the odds for Nina's health. Nina is relieved to see that her niece has been happily welcomed into her extended family. However, her emotional outburst puts her in critical condition, leaving the family in mental anguish.
Bobby works against the clock to get the radioactive phosphorus medication (Phosphorus-32) in time to prevent his loved one from having an acute relapse, as per the predetermined timeline. Despite his best efforts and everyone's prayers, he is unable to arrive in time to save her. Both Dr. Romy and Bobby are devastated. With the family now silently grieving, the movie concludes with Bobby seemingly by himself as well.
Cast
*
Mohanlal
Mohanlal Viswanathan (born 21 May 1960), known mononymously as Mohanlal, is an Indian actor, film producer, playback singer, film distributor, and director who predominantly works in Malayalam cinema besides also having sporadically appeare ...
as Bobby
*
Shobana
Shobana Chandrakumar Pillai (born 21 March 1970) is an Indian actress and Bharatanatyam dancer. She acts predominantly in Malayalam films along with Telugu and Tamil films with few Hindi, Kannada and English films. She has won two National Fil ...
as Neena, Bobby's love interest
*
Thilakan
Palappurathu Kesavan Surendranatha Thilakan (15 July 1935 – 24 September 2012) was an Indian film and stage actor who appeared in over 200 Malayalam films. Thilakan was known for his elaborate method acting, realistic and spontaneous appearan ...
as Retd. I. G. Matthews, Bobby's father
*
Lalu Alex
Lalu Alex is an Indian actor who works in Malayalam cinema. In a career spanning four decades, Lalu Alex has acted over 250 movies and is known for his character roles, comic roles and antagonistic roles in Malayalam movie industry.
Lalu Alex ...
as Dr. Romy, Neena's brother
*
Anju as Teena, Chackochan's daughter
*
Jagathi Sreekumar
Sreekumar P. K. (born 5 January 1951), better known by his stage name Jagathy Sreekumar or simply Jagathy, is an Indian actor, director and playback singer, who has appeared in over 1500 Malayalam films in a career spanning almost four decades ...
as Unnunni
*
K. P. Ummer
Kachinamthoduka Puthiyapurayil Ummer known as K. P. Ummer (Malayalam: കെ.പി. ഉമ്മർ) was an Indian actor from Thekkepuram quarter of Kozhikode, Kerala, India. He was active in the Malayalam cinema from early sixties until late ...
as Chackochan
*
Venu Nagavalli
Venu Nagavally (16 April 1949 – 10 September 2010) was an Indian actor, screenwriter and director best known for his work in Malayalam film industry. He has directed 12 films. Son of writer, commentator, and broadcaster Nagavally R. S. Kurup, ...
as Baby
*
Sankaradi
Chandrashekaran Menon, better known by his screen name Sankaradi (14 July 1924 – 8 October 2001), was an Indian actor. He was a veteran Malayalam comedian and character artist, who had over 700 Malayalam films to his credit. He dominated the ...
as Iyer
*
Augustine
Augustine of Hippo ( , ; la, Aurelius Augustinus Hipponensis; 13 November 354 – 28 August 430), also known as Saint Augustine, was a theologian and philosopher of Berbers, Berber origin and the bishop of Hippo Regius in Numidia (Roman pr ...
as Doctor Stephen
*
Maniyanpilla Raju
Sudheer Kumar (born 20 April 1955), better known by his stage name Maniyanpilla Raju (Malayalam:മണിയൻപിള്ള രാജു), is an Indian actor and producer who works in Malayalam film industry.[Kuthiravattam Pappu
Padmadalakshan, better known by his stage name Kuthiravattam Pappu (24 December 1936 – 25 February 2000), was a popular Indian stage and film actor. His repertoire of acting was based on his unique style and use of the ''Kozhikodan'' dialect, i ...]
as Cleetus, Tutor
*
T. P. Madhavan
T. P. Madhavan (born 7 November 1935) is an Indian actor who appeared in Malayalam films. He started acting at the age of 40. He has acted in more than 600 films. He came into the film industry playing villain roles; later he started doing com ...
as Doctor Peter
*
Geetha Vijayan
Geetha Vijayan (born 22 June 1972) is an Indian actress who appears in Malayalam movies, a few Tamil and Hindi movies. She debuted in the 1990 Malayalam comedy- thriller film ''In Harihar Nagar''. She has since acted in more than 150 Malayalam ...
as Jaya
*
Subhashini
Subhashini (born 2 August 1965) is a South Indian films and television actress. Her sister is famous actress Jayasudha. Both of them are nieces of famous actress and director Vijaya Nirmala. She worked with Rajini's Johnny movie's songAasaiya K ...
as Daisy
*
Reena as Reena
*
Bobby Kottarakkara
Bobby Kottarakkara (11 March 1952 – 3 December 2000) was an Indian actor who acted in Malayalam films. He was born to Pareedkunju Ravuthar in Kottarakkara. He began his acting career on stage. He made his film debut with Mucheettukalikkaarant ...
as Michael
*
Ravi Menon
Chalappurathu Raveendranatha Menon (1950 – 24 November 2007), popularly known as Ravi Menon was a veteran Indian film actor who worked in Malayalam cinema. He was born in Sreekrishnapuram, Palakkad in 1950. He completed diploma from the Film a ...
as Priest Ouseppachan
*
Nandhu
Nandalal Krishnamoorthy better known by his stage name Nandu is an Indian actor primarily working in Malayalam films. Although he has been in the industry for more than 30 years, he is acclaimed for his performance in Mohanlal' s ''Spirit'', dir ...
*
Antony Perumbavoor
Malekudy Joseph Antony, better known as Antony Perumbavoor is an Indian film producer, distributor, cinema exhibitor and actor, who works in Malayalam film industry. He began his career as a chauffeur to Mohanlal in 1987 and started appearing ...
as James, a man at badminton court
* Baby Ambili as child artist
* Master Krishna (Hari Krishna Bharadwaj) as child artist
* Priyadarshan
* Jithesh Krishnankutty as Jithumon
* Aswathi as child artist
* Thara Thomas Moolayil as child artist
* Karthika Prathap as child artist
Music
Remake
It was remade in
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 ...
as ''
Azhagana Naatkal'' in 2001.
Priyadarshan
Priyadarshan (born 30 January 1957) is an Indian film director, screenwriter and producer who works predominantly in Malayalam and Hindi films, while also having done six films in Tamil and two films in Telugu. He has done about 31 films in Hi ...
himself loosely remade the film in
Hindi
Hindi (Devanāgarī: or , ), or more precisely Modern Standard Hindi (Devanagari: ), is an Indo-Aryan language spoken chiefly in the Hindi Belt region encompassing parts of northern, central, eastern, and western India. Hindi has been de ...
as ''
Hungama 2
''Hungama 2'' is a 2021 Indian Hindi-language romantic comedy film directed by Priyadarshan and jointly produced by Ratan Jain, Ganesh Jain, Chetan Jain and Armaan Ventures. It is the spiritual sequel of Priyadarshan's own 2003 film Hungama. It ...
'' (2021). However, a dog explosion comedy sequence from this movie had been earlier used by Priyadarshan in another Hindi movie ''
Yeh Teraa Ghar Yeh Meraa Ghar
''Yeh Teraa Ghar Yeh Meraa Ghar'' () is a 2001 Indian Hindi-language comedy film directed by Priyadarshan. This story of the film is an remake of the Mohanlal-starrer movie ''Sanmanassullavarkku Samadhanam'' with a dog explosion comedy sequence ...
''.
References
External links
*
{{Priyadarshan
1994 films
1990s Malayalam-language films
Films shot in Ooty
Malayalam films remade in other languages
Films directed by Priyadarshan