''Manam Pola Mangalyam'' () is a 1953 Indian

Tamil language Tamil (; ' , ) is a Dravidian language natively spoken by the Tamil people of South Asia. Tamil is an official language of the Indian state of Tamil Nadu, the sovereign nations of Sri Lanka and Singapore, and the Indian territory o ...

comedy film A comedy film is a category of film which emphasizes humor. These films are designed to make the audience laugh through amusement. Films in this style traditionally have a happy ending ( black comedy being an exception). Comedy is one of the o ...

directed by P. Pullaiah. The film features

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 Savithri in the lead roles. No print of the film is known to survive, 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 ...

Plot

Cast

Credits adapted from ''

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 sec ...

'': ;Male cast * R. Ganesh *

K. Sarangapani Kumbakonam Sarangapani (1904-1984) was an Indian actor who worked mainly in Tamil cinema Tamil cinema, also known as Kollywood is a part of Indian Cinema; primarily engaged in production of motion pictures in the Tamil language. Based out ...

* Friend Ramasami * T. N. Sivathanu * T. N. Meenakshi * K. Natarajan * C. Rajarathnam * S. Peer Mohammed * T. K. Kalyanam * G. V. Sharma * V. P. Balaraman * Gundu Mani * Loose Arumugam * Kottapuli Jayaraman ;Female cast * Savithri * Surabhi Balasaraswathi * M. R. Santhanalakshmi

Production

''Manam Pola Mangalyam'' was directed by P. Pullaiah and produced by Narayanan and Company. The storyline was written by Telugu screenwriter Vempati Sadhasivabramham, the Tamil script by Umachandran and K. V. Srinivasan. All three men received credit onscreen for the story and screenplay. Gemini Ganesan (then known as R. Ganesh) was cast as the male lead. He appeared in a dual role, one of his characters being an asylum escapee. Savitri and Surabhi Balasaraswathi played the female leads. Although Ganesan was the male lead, K. Sarangapani, who played an ageing man wanting to marry the heroine, received top billing in the film's credits. The final length of the film was .

Soundtrack

The soundtrack was composed by Addepalli Rama Rao, with lyrics by Kanaka Surabhi.

Playback singer A playback singer, also known as a ghost singer, is a singer whose singing is pre-recorded for use in films. Playback singers record songs for soundtracks, and actors or actresses lip-sync the songs for cameras; the actual singer does not ap ...

s are V. J. Varma, A. M. Rajah,

M. L. Vasanthakumari Madras Lalitangi Vasanthakumari (popularly referred to as MLV) (3 July 1928 – 31 October 1990) was a Carnatic musician and playback singer for film songs in many Indian languages. MLV and her contemporaries D. K. Pattammal and M. S. Subbulak ...

, P. Leela,

Radha Jayalakshmi Radha (born 1932) and Jayalakshmi (1932 - 2014), popularly known as Radha Jayalakshmi ( ta, ராதா ஜெயலட்சுமி), were an Indian Carnatic music vocalist duo as well as playback singers in films in the 1940s and 1950s. Th ...

Jikki Pillavalu Gajapathy Krishnaveni (3 November 1935 – 16 August 2004), more famously known as Jikki, was an Indian playback singer from Andhra Pradesh. She sang around 10,000 songs in Telugu, Tamil, Kannada, Malayalam, Hindi, and Sinhalese langua ...

& P. Suseela. One of the soundtrack's hit numbers was "Maappillai Doi", performed by A. M. Rajah and P. Leela.

Reception

The film became a major commercial success, and a breakthrough in the careers of both Savitri and Ganesan. The duo would subsequently act in many films together which became successful. Film historian

Randor Guy Madabhushi Rangadorai (born 8 November 1937), better known by his pen name Randor Guy, is an Indian lawyer, columnist and film and legal historian associated with the English language newspaper ''The Hindu''. He is also the official editor of the ...

praised the fact that Ganesan "did not indulge in fisticuffs every fifth scene, nor did he deliver jaw-breaking, alliterative and seemingly endless passages of dialogue." He said the film would be "Remembered for the excellent performances of the new hero in a double role, Gemini Ganesh, Savithri and Sarangapani and the melodious tunes of Rama Rao which are still fondly remembered by old-timers."

References

External links

{{IMDb title, 0256174 Films directed by P. Pullayya Indian comedy films Lost Indian films 1953 films 1950s lost films Lost comedy films Films scored by Addepalli Rama Rao