''Pistha'' () is a 1997 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 comedy film directed by K.S. Ravikumar and starring Karthik,

Nagma Nagma Arvind Morarji (born Nandita Arvind Morarji on 25 December 1974) is an Indian politician and former actress. She was a popular lead actress in the 1990s. She made her cinematic debut in the film '' Baaghi'' opposite Salman Khan in 1990. ...

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 care ...

and T. S. B. K. Moulee. The movie completed a 180-day run in theaters and turned out to be a blockbuster. It was a profitable venture for Pyramid Natarjan.

Plot

Manigandan is a server in a hotel who is a devotee of Lord Ayyappan (the bachelor god). He follows a fasting for Ayyappan and is very sincere and honest. One day a businessman, named Dharmaraj, visits the hotel where Manigandan works. He admires Manigandan's sincerity and offers him the General Manager job in his factory at

Ooty Ooty (), officially known as Udhagamandalam (also known as Ootacamund (); abbreviated as Udhagai), is a city and a municipality in the Nilgiris district of the South Indian state of Tamil Nadu. It is located north west of Coimbatore and so ...

. Dharmaraj takes Manigandan to his factory and office to introduce him to his employees who do not do any work but play games, sit idle, watch TV etc. Innocent Mani does not understand why employees do not work but gets scared that he must manage all of them, a task which was impossible for 419 managers before him. Manigandan sees a girl who breaks everything she sees, and yet Dharmaraj pays for everything she broke. He finds out that she is Vennila, daughter of Dharmaraj who is a spoilt young lady who cannot be controlled even by her father. Manigandan and Vennila fight frequently. Vennila makes every attempt to get rid of him, but a spark develops between them. Vennila visits the home of her sister's lover to give money for their expenses. She finds out that she must inherit all her grandfather's property if she can continue to afford money for them. The only way to inherit the property is to get married as per his will. She wants to help her sister, so decides to marry Manigandan and attempts to win his heart. Manigandan also declares his love for Vennila but Dharmaraj objects to the match as Vennila is very dangerous girl and she might spoil his life. He is reluctantly persuaded to accept the marriage, and Manigandan and Vennila get married. On the day of the marriage, to everybody's surprise, Manigandan is revealed to be an ex-convict. Vennila is shocked by this. It is now Manigandan's turn to overpower Vennila and he begins his game. The rest of the story follows with the fight between Manigandan and Vennila and how Manigandan surpasses Vennila's arrogance. In the end, it is revealed that the sister's lover is actually a crook who is already married and had illicitly socialized with her sister as he wanted to steal her property. In a fight ensuing, Manigandan pushes him and makes him disabled, Vennila asks for forgiveness to Manigandan & Co for her mistakes which they eventually accept. The film ends with Manigandan turning into Ayyappan devotee again.

Cast

* Karthik as Manigandan *

as Vennila * Mouli as Dharmaraj *

as Manikandan's friend *

Sindhu The Indus ( ) is a transboundary river of Asia and a trans-Himalayan river of South and Central Asia. The river rises in mountain springs northeast of Mount Kailash in Western Tibet, flows northwest through the disputed region of Kashmir, ...

Balu Anand Balu Anand (1954 – 3 June 2016) was an Indian actor and director who worked in Tamil-language films (Kollywood). He appeared in over 100 films as an actor and directed several films, such as ''Naane Raja Naane Mandhiri'', ''Annanagar Mudhal T ...

as Balu, Dharmaraj's servant *

Vasu Vikram Vasu Vikram is an Indian actor and stage director who has worked on Tamil-language films and in television dramas. Career Vasu Vikram is the son of actor M. R. R. Vasu, and the grandson of M. R. Radha. Several other members of his family are al ...

as Ramakrishnan, Dharmaraj's ex-Manager *Sai Arun * Mansoor Ali Khan as Adv. Adhimoolam *

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 ...

*Kavignar Kalidasan as Hotel owner *

Jayashree Jayashree is an Indian name. People with the name include: * M. Jayashree, Indian actress *B. Jayashree, Indian actress, director and singer *Jayashree (actress), Indian actress *Jayashree Banerjee Jayashree Banerjee (born 2 July 1938) is a le ...

as Shanti (Guest Appearance) *

K. S. Ravikumar K. S. Ravikumar (born 30 May 1958) is an Indian film director, screenwriter, producer, actor, primarily working in Tamil films. Career 1990–1997 Ravikumar worked as co-director on R. B. Choudary's production ''Pudhu Vasantham'' direct ...

in a Special Appearance

Release

The film won positive reviews, with a critic from Indolink.com stating it was a "fun movie" and that "the second half of the film was a tremendous laugh riot".

Soundtrack

The music was composed by

S. A. Rajkumar S. A. Rajkumar is an Indian composer and lyricist. He has made music for all South Indian language films in Tamil, Malayalam, Telugu, and Kannada. Early life Rajkumar's father was a vocalist performing in stage shows conducted by popular mu ...

and lyrics were penned by Kavignar Kalidasan.

References

External links

Pistha
on YouTube

{{K. S. Ravikumar 20009 1997 films Films directed by K. S. Ravikumar Films scored by S. A. Rajkumar Indian comedy films 1990s Tamil-language films 1997 comedy films