''Nooravathu Naal'' () is a 1984 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, na ...

-language mystery

thriller film Thriller film, also known as suspense film or suspense thriller, is a broad film genre that evokes excitement and suspense in the audience. The suspense element found in most films' plots is particularly exploited by the filmmaker in this genre. ...

written and directed by

Manivannan S. Manivannan Rajagopal (31 July 1953 – 15 June 2013), better known by his mononym Manivannan, was an Indian film director, actor and activist who worked mainly in Tamil cinema and also worked in a few Telugu & Malayalam films. In a car ...

. The film stars

Vijayakanth Narayanan Vijayaraj Alagarswami (born 25 August 1952), better known by his stage name Vijayakanth, is an Indian politician and former actor who has worked predominantly in Tamil cinema. He was the Leader of the Opposition in the Tamil Nadu Leg ...

, Mohan and

Nalini Nalini (Devanagari: नलिनी) is a female gender Indian given name, which means "lotus", "goddess Gayatri","mother of Vedas", "sweet nectar", "Amrit", Feminine "lily" in Sanskrit.''Baby Names''"Nalini" Retrieved on 9 January 2016. The name ...

, with

Thengai Srinivasan Thengai Srinivasan (21 October 1937 – 9 November 1987) was an Indian actor who appeared in Tamil-language films and plays from the 1960s to the 1980s. He was given the prefix ''Thengai'' (coconut) after his role as a coconut-seller in th ...

Janagaraj Janagaraj is an Indian actor who has appeared in over 200 films predominantly in Tamil cinema as a comedian or in supporting roles. He also starred in few Malayalam, Telugu and Hindi films. Early life Janagaraj was born to Vadivelu and Muthu ...

and

Sathyaraj Rangaraj Subbiah (born 3 October 1954), professionally known as Sathyaraj, is an Indian actor, producer, director and a media personality who has predominantly appeares in Tamil cinema and Telugu Cinema. His 240 films also include works in Mal ...

in supporting roles. It is an unofficial adaptation of the 1977 Italian

giallo In Italian cinema, ''Giallo'' (; plural ''gialli'', from ''giallo'', Italian for yellow) is a genre of mystery fiction and thrillers that often contains slasher, crime fiction, psychological thriller, psychological horror, sexploitation, and, ...

film '' Sette note in nero''. The film was remade in

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 wa ...

as ''

Aayiram Kannukal ''Aayiram Kannukal'' () is a 1986 Indian Malayalam film, directed by Joshiy and produced by Rajan Prakash. The film stars Mammootty, Ratheesh, Shobhana, Jose Prakash and Rajalakshmi in lead roles. The film had musical score by Raghu Kumar. Th ...

'' (1986) and 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 ...

as '' 100 Days'' (1991).

Plot

Devi, a college student has a strange premonition one night of her sister being murdered. Her sister soon goes missing. After a few years, Devi meets and marries a rich businessman Ramkumar. Soon after, Devi has another vision of an unknown woman being murdered and seeks the help of her brother-in-law Raj to help her save the possible victim. Raj is reluctant to believe her story but assists her anyway. Devi also finds a decomposed body in the bungalow where she lives with Ramkumar, which she believes is her sister's based on her previous vision. Devi and Raj's investigations lead them to the museum where Devi's sister worked and a strange man who tries to assassinate them. Whether Devi's strange premonitions are true and whether she and Raj are able to trap the mysterious killer forms the rest of the story.

Cast

as Raj * Mohan as Ramkumar *

as Devi *

as Ramanathan *

as John *

as Jayaraman *

Y. Vijaya Yenigandla Vijaya (born 8 February 1957) is an Indian actress and classical dancer. She has appeared in more than 1000 films in Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam and Kannada languages. Early life and education Y. Vijaya was born on 8 February 1957 in Ku ...

as Parvathi *

Kovai Sarala Kovai Sarala is an Indian actress and comedian, who prominently plays supporting roles in Tamil and Telugu films. She has won the Tamil Nadu State Film Award for Best Comedian three times, for her performances in '' Sathi Leelavathi'' (1995), '' ...

as Manju * Kokila as Sarasu

Production

''Nooravathu Naal'' was directed by

and produced by S. N. S. Thirumal under Thirupathisamy Pictures, with cinematography by A. Sabapathy. Manivannan selected

to portray a negative role. For the character look, he sported a clean-shaven pate, wore sunglasses and a red jerkin. He completed his portions within five days.

Soundtrack

The music was composed by

Ilaiyaraaja Ilaiyaraaja (born R. Gnanathesikan, 3 June 1943) is an Indian musician, composer, arranger, conductor, orchestrator, instrumentalist, lyricist and singer, popular for his works in Indian Cinema, prominently in Tamil films. Reputed to be one o ...

. The song "Vizhiyile Mani Vizhiyil" was re-used from the song "Jotheyali Jothe Jotheyali" from the 1981

Kannada Kannada (; ಕನ್ನಡ, ), originally romanised Canarese, is a Dravidian language spoken predominantly by the people of Karnataka in southwestern India, with minorities in all neighbouring states. It has around 47 million native s ...

film '' Geetha'' and further reused in the 2007 Hindi film ''

Cheeni Kum ''Cheeni Kum'' (Hindi for ''Less Sugar'') is a 2007 Indian Hindi-language romantic comedy film directed by R. Balki and starring Amitabh Bachchan, Tabu, Paresh Rawal, Zohra Sehgal and Swini Khara. ''Cheeni Kum'' premiered at the 2007 Cannes F ...

'' as the song "Jaane Do Na". It is set in the Carnatic raga known as

Kapi Kapi, Kapı, or KAPI may refer to: Places * Kapi, Estonia, a village in Estonia * Kapı, Karataş, a village in Turkey * a possible old volcanic eruption site near Krakatoa People * Mari Kapi (1950–2009), Papua New Guinean judge * Mustafa ...

Reception

''Nooravathu Naal'' was released on 23 February 1984, and ran for over 200 days in theatres.

Legacy

Sathyaraj's performance as a psychopath killer received huge acclaim and made him popular among audiences. The film became a milestone in Tamil cinema, with regards to "scene construction". The serial killers Auto Shankar and Jayaprakash were inspired by the film to commit murders. Sangeetha Devi Dundoo of ''

The Hindu ''The Hindu'' is an Indian English-language daily newspaper owned by The Hindu Group, headquartered in Chennai, Tamil Nadu. It began as a weekly in 1878 and became a daily in 1889. It is one of the Indian newspapers of record and the secon ...

'' in her review of the Telugu film ''

Tripura Tripura (, Bengali: ) is a state in Northeast India. The third-smallest state in the country, it covers ; and the seventh-least populous state with a population of 36.71 lakh ( 3.67 million). It is bordered by Assam and Mizoram to the ea ...

'' (2015) said that the idea of hiding corpses inside a wall is inspired from ''Nooravathu Naal''.

References

Bibliography

* *

External links

* {{Manivannan 1980s mystery thriller films 1980s Tamil-language films 1985 films Films directed by Manivannan Films scored by Ilaiyaraaja Indian mystery thriller films Indian remakes of Italian films Tamil films remade in other languages