''Moondru Pillaigal'' () is a 1952 Indian

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 ...

produced by

S. S. Vasan Subramaniam Srinivasan (4 January 1904 – 26 August 1969), popularly known by his screen name S. S. Vasan, was an Indian journalist, writer, advertiser, film producer, director and business tycoon. He is the founder of the Tamil-language maga ...

. Based on

Victor Fleming Victor Lonzo Fleming (February 23, 1889 – January 6, 1949) was an American film director, cinematographer, and producer. His most popular films were ''Gone with the Wind (film), Gone with the Wind'', for which he won an Academy Award for Best ...

's 1927 American film ''

The Way of All Flesh ''The Way of All Flesh'' (sometimes called ''Ernest Pontifex, or the Way of All Flesh'') is a semi-autobiographical novel by Samuel Butler that attacks Victorian-era hypocrisy. Written between 1873 and 1884, it traces four generations of the ...

'', it is about a couple and their three sons. The film was directed by Nagendra Rao and stars himself alongside

Kannamba Pasupuleti Kannamba (''Pasupulēţi Kannāṃba'') (5 October 1911 – 7 May 1968) was an Indian actress, playback singer and film producer of Telugu cinema, of Andhra Pradesh, India. She acted in more than 170 films and produced about 25 films ...

, with M. K. Radha,

Gemini Ganesan Ramasamy Ganesan (17 November 1920 – 22 March 2005), better known by his stage name Gemini Ganesan, was an Indian actor who worked mainly in Tamil cinema. He was referred to as the ''Kaadhal Mannan'' (King of Romance) for his romantic roles ...

and Sriram in supporting roles. It was simultaneously produced and released in

Telugu Telugu may refer to: * Telugu language, a major Dravidian language of India *Telugu people, an ethno-linguistic group of India * Telugu script, used to write the Telugu language ** Telugu (Unicode block), a block of Telugu characters in Unicode S ...

under the title ''Mugguru Kodukulu''. The film failed at the box office, which led to Vasan destroying all copies of it, thus making it a

lost film A lost film is a feature or short film that no longer exists in any studio archive, private collection, public archive or the U.S. Library of Congress. Conditions During most of the 20th century, U.S. copyright law required at least one copy o ...

Plot

Gunavathi and Somasekhar, a couple, have three sons. The youngest one takes responsibility for a theft allegedly committed by their his and goes to jail. The dejected Somasekhar commits suicide and Gunavathi is abandoned by the other two sons. Later, when the youngest son is released from jail, he takes care of his mother despite being jobless. However, he receives an offer from a film company to act as the main character in a film produced by them based on the ''

Ramayana The ''Rāmāyana'' (; sa, रामायणम्, ) is a Sanskrit literature, Sanskrit Indian epic poetry, epic composed over a period of nearly a millennium, with scholars' estimates for the earliest stage of the text ranging from the 8th ...

''. He succeeds in his job and manages to unite the family.

Cast

Cast from the song book *

as Gunavathi * Nagendra Rao as Somasekhar * M. K. Radha as Muthu (Adult) * Sriram as Kannan (Adult) *

Ganesh Ganesha ( sa, गणेश, ), also known as Ganapati, Vinayaka, and Pillaiyar, is one of the best-known and most worshipped Deva_(Hinduism), deities in the Hindu deities, Hindu pantheon and is the Supreme God in Ganapatya sect. His image is ...

as Sekhar (Adult) * Kumari Vanaja as Kamala (Adult) * Sundari Bai as Pankajam * Suryaprabha as Kamini * G. Pattu Iyer as Ramadas * Narayana Rao as Film Proprietor * Chandra Babu as Music Director * Vikatam Krishnamurthi as Film Dealer * S. Krishnamoorthy as Film Production Assistant * Seetharaman as Film Production Assistant * Sethumadhavan as Muthu (Child) * Sudhakar as Kannan (Child) * Sudhindra as Sekhar (Child) * Seetha as Kamala's Friend * K. Ramaswamy as Pedagogue * Venkat as Bar-at-Law * Ramakrishna Rao as Marwari * G. V. Sharma as Amina * V. T. Kalyanam as Race Broker * Saraswathi as Susheela (Adult) * Rathna Papa as Muthu's Girl * Mohan as Muthu's Boy * Premakumari as Kamala (Child) * Vijaya Rao as Doctor * Balan as Sub Inspector * Velayutham as Old Metal Merchant * P. M. Devan as Office Proprietor * Bindu Madhavan as Film Director * Rama Narasu as Production Manager * B. S. P. Rao as Naughty Student * T. S. B. Rao as Jatka Man * Sampath Kumar as Suresh * Muthukrishna Reddy as Milkman

Production

The film was based on the 1927 American

silent film A silent film is a film with no synchronized recorded sound (or more generally, no audible dialogue). Though silent films convey narrative and emotion visually, various plot elements (such as a setting or era) or key lines of dialogue may, when ...

'', directed by

. The family drama was successful in India, and was adapted into a 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 ...

titled '' Khazanchi'' (1941). The Hindi film was highly successful in

Madras Chennai (, ), formerly known as Madras ( the official name until 1996), is the capital city of Tamil Nadu, the southernmost Indian state. The largest city of the state in area and population, Chennai is located on the Coromandel Coast of th ...

and ran for more than 25 weeks. Nagendra Rao, an established producer and director in

Kannada cinema Kannada cinema, also known as Sandalwood, or Chandanavana, is the segment of Indian cinema dedicated to the production of motion pictures in the Kannada language widely spoken in the state of Karnataka. The 1934 film ''Sati Sulochana'' directed ...

, was impressed by the film and decided to direct the

adaptation. He approached the Tamil film producer

Gemini Studios Gemini Studios was an Indian film studio based in Madras, Tamil Nadu. It was launched when S. S. Vasan, a businessman of many ventures (including the ownership of Ananda Vikatan) bought Motion Picture Producers' Combines from Krishnaswamy Subr ...

who had earlier produced '' Apoorva Sagodharargal'', in which Rao played a role. Although Vasan was initially reluctant he agreed to finance the film. It was simultaneously produced and released in

under the title ''Mugguru Kodukulu''. According to writer

Ashokamitran Ashokamitran (22 September 1931 – 23 March 2017) was the pen name of Jagadisa Thyagarajan, an Indian writer regarded as one of the most influential figures in post-independent Tamil literature. He began his prolific literary career with the p ...

, who was then associated with Gemini, novelist

R. K. Narayan Rasipuram Krishnaswami Iyer Narayanaswami (10 October 1906 – 13 May 2001) was an Indian writer known for his work set in the fictional South Indian town of Malgudi. He was a leading author of early Indian literature in English along with Mul ...

wrote a treatment for this film. J. P. Chandrababu, who would later go on to become an established comedian in Tamil cinema, played a small role lasting a single sequence in the film. Savitri, who would later become an established actress in the Telugu and Tamil film industries, was to make her acting debut with this film. Ganesh (later known as

), who played a supporting role as one among the three sons in the film was also as a casting assistant with Gemini, the production company. He recommended her for a small role in the film; however, she was not selected for the role.

Table of ''Moondru Pillaigal'' and ''Mugguru Kodukulu'' Casts

Reception

''Moondru Pillaigal'' failed at the box-office, which led to Vasan destroying all copies of it, thus making it a

. Ashokamitran said there was nothing "seriously wrong" with the film, but felt that "the audience just couldn't take another film about a family torn asunder in the fourth reel and reunited in the last."

Soundtrack

Music was composed by P. S. Anantharaman and supervised by M. D. Parthasarathy while the lyrics were penned by

Kothamangalam Subbu Kothamangalam Subbu (born S. M. Subramanian, 10 November 1910 – 15 February 1974) was an Indian poet, lyricist, author, actor and film director based in Tamil Nadu. He wrote the cult classic Tamil novel ''Thillana Mohanambal'' and was awarded ...

and V. Seetharaman. The song "Antha Rama Sowndharyam" is set in the

Carnatic raga Carnatic raga refers to ''ragas'' used in Carnatic music. A Carnatic raga has several components - primordial sound (''nāda''), tonal system (''swara''), pitch (''śruti''), scale, ornaments ('' gamaka'') and important tones. Origins and histo ...

known as

Kedaragaula Kedaragaula (pronounced kēdāragaula) is a rāgam in Carnatic music (musical scale of South Indian classical music). It is a ''janya'' rāgam (derived scale) from the 28th ''melakarta'' scale ''Harikambhoji'', and is sometimes spelled as Kedar ...

References

Bibliography

External links

* {{Gemini Studios 1950s lost films 1950s multilingual films 1950s Tamil-language films Gemini Studios films Indian drama films Indian family films Indian multilingual films Indian remakes of American films Lost drama films Lost Indian films