''Thalayana Manthram'' () is a 1990 Indian Malayalam

comedy-drama Comedy drama, also known by the portmanteau ''dramedy'', is a genre of dramatic works that combines elements of comedy and drama. The modern, scripted-television examples tend to have more humorous bits than simple comic relief seen in a typical ...

film directed by Sathyan Anthikkad and written by Sreenivasan. The film stars Sreenivasan, Urvashi, Jayaram, and Parvathy. Urvashi's performance as Kanchana received widespread acclaim and is considered one of the best in her career.

Plot

Sukumaran ( Sreenivasan), his brother Mohanan ( Jayaram) and their mother belong to a middle-class family and live happily. Sukumaran is a supervisor in a construction company named JK Constructions and Mohanan is a shopkeeper. Mohanan has recently married Shailaja ( Parvathy Jayaram) who is a bank employee and is from a rich family unlike Sukumaran's wife Kanchana. Shylaja's fortunate life with money and job makes Kanchana envious of her and Kanchana slowly starts causing problems in the family by finding unnecessary issues which affects the smooth running of a peaceful family life. Finally Sukumaran leaves their family house and starts living in a rented house with Kanchana by Kanchana's request. The rented house is located in a posh colony wherein the residents are very rich. Soon Kanchana finds that living in luxury is not conducive with the economic situation of Sukumaran who is just a supervisor in a company. To match their social status Kanchana lies to her new neighbours that her husband is an engineer in a construction company. Soon Sukumaran pushes for demands like buying expensive home appliances, arranging a dance master for their daughter and sending her to an English medium school, buying an old car (in which Sukumaran would meet with an accident thereby increasing their medical expenses and car repair charges) etc. The huge economical demands slowly crush Sukumaran and it finally affects him in the manner of creditors demanding their money back. In order to meet their financial requirements Sukumaran finally decides to cheat his employer by forgery. The authorities soon come to know about the truth and one day, when Sukumaran is already under heavy economical pressures, the police arrive and arrest him. The next day, because of the ill reputation caused by the family the house owner drives Sukumaran's family out of their rented house. At this point Mohanan comes to their rescue knowing about the situations where his brother has been led by the ill advice of his wife Kanchana. Mohanan arranges money by selling his wife's gold ornaments and repays the creditors. Sukumaran is finally released from jail. In the end the family is re-united when Kanchana understands her mistakes.

Cast

* Sreenivasan as Sukumaran * Urvashi as Kanchana, Sukumaran's wife * Jayaram as Mohanan * Parvathy as Shylaja, Mohanan's wife * Innocent as T.G. Daniel *

K. P. A. C. Lalitha Maheshwari Amma, better known by her stage name K. P. A. C. Lalitha, was an Indian film and stage actress who worked primarily in Malyalam. She started her acting career with K. P. A. C., a theatre collective in Kayamkulam, Kerala. In a caree ...

as mother of Sukumaran and Mohan * Mammukoya as Kunjananthan Mesthiri *

Sukumari Sukumari Amma (6 October 1940 – 26 March 2013) was an Indian actress best known for her works in Malayalam and Tamil films. In a career spanning more than five decades, She has appeared in more than 2500 films predominantly in Malayalam, Tam ...

as Sulochana Thankappan * Philomina as Paruammayi * Meena as Jiji Daniel *

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 Thankappan *

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 Manager * Oduvil Unnikrishnan as Pothuval Mash * Paravoor Bharathan as Damodharan Pillai * Jagadish as Bhasurachandran (Cameo) * Kollam Thulasi as Dhamodharan Kartha (Cameo) *Sindhu Manu Varma as Jojo Daniel

Soundtrack

Awards

* Kerala State Film Award for Best Actress - Urvashi

Box office

The film was a commercial success.

References

External links

* {{Sathyan Anthikad 1990s Malayalam-language films Films with screenplays by Sreenivasan Indian drama films Films shot in Thiruvananthapuram Films directed by Sathyan Anthikad Films scored by Johnson Indian comedy films 1990 comedy films 1990 films