One of the best film in 2008 and it is best known for its excellent music and if you are a Tamil cinema fan you would have guessed it and the movie is Varanam Ayiram.Credit goes to Surya who took tremendous effort to act in this move, who also developed six pack for this movie.So in this article let us see about the technicians and artists who has worked in this movie.

Actually Gautam decided to use the name Naan Thaan and Udal Porul Aavi for this project but after that he decided to go with the title "Varanam Ayiram" which means 1000 elephants and this also symbolically means that the hero has the strength of thousand elephants to overcome the problems he faced in his life and start a new life.

But many felt that this film is a combination of Cheran's tow hit films Autograph and Thavamai Thavamirinthu, where the story Autograph is more or less like a person who was dejected after the love failure and Thavamai Thavamirinthu is about the Son's love fo his father.

Initially the project was set to create some history in Indian Film Industry, when they decided to shoot in Afghanistan for 10 and eventually it would have becomes the second Indian film after Kabul Express to be filmed in Afghanistan, but later due to some security reasons Gautam dropped this plan.

Another interesting thing that happened during the post production is that the production managers have lost the film reels while they were returning to India, and this reel was very important as it contained all the scenes and songs that were shot in USA.The production managers seemed to have to lost the reels in the Singapore airport.It has been estimated that these reels worth around 2.5 to 3 crores.But fortunately the Singapore Airport authorities found the reels and they handed over to the team.

Behind the screen

i)This film was directed by the famous Tamil director Gautham Vasudev Menon.This is the second time Gautam has directed Surya and their previous work was also a hit film, Kaka Kaka.As a matter of fact Kaka Kaka was a turning point for both of them.Gautam also mentioned that this film is very close to his heart because he considers the Krishnan character in this movie as his own father.

Initially he announced that shooting will take place in Afghanistan for 10 days, but due to security issues he called off this idea.Gautam also said that this film is more or less based on the story of the movie "Forrest Gump" and also said that he will change accoring to Tamil audience.

The secret for Gautam's success is his team.In all his film he considers Harris Jayaraj as the music director and naturally all his film becomes a musical treat.But reports says that after this film Gautam had a misunderstanding with Harris and as a result of this he chose A.R.Rahman for his next film "Vinnaithandi Varuvaya".

ii)This film was produced by Venu Ravichandran, also called as Aaskar Ravichandran and he also distributed the film in India.

iii)The music for this film is composed by Harris Jayaraj.All the songs were hit and they eventually ruled the Tamil cinema in the year 2008.

iv)This film was distributed all over the world by Cloud Nine Pictures  and by Bharat Creations in USA.

v)Officially this film was treleased on November 14, 2008 and it ran for more than 100 days in many theatre.

vi)R. Rathnavelu is the cinematographer of this film and those who have watched the film could gave understand the great work done by Rathnavelu.Especially in songs he has done a fabulous job.All the songs were great hit and credit also goes to Ratnavelu because without his work the picturization wouldn't have become so good.

vi)The budget of this film is around 14 crores and this was a blockbuster in 2008 and it managed to earn 28 crores and was second best in the year after Kamal's Dasavatharam.This film also gross around 6 crores in Chennai alone.

vii)Another important man who is responsible for the success of this movie is Anthony Gonsalvez, who is the editor of this movie and he also has done a good job, which marked the way for the success of this movie.

Artists and Cast

i)Surya as Krishnan.This was quite a challenging role for Surya, which he has never done before as a 70 year old man.He was a very good father and a lovely husband.He lives and dies for his family.He is aslo shown as a cute lover when he proposed to Malini.He usually smokes and it resulted in throat cancer.

The most important thing about this character is that he is very encouraging and he also encourages Surya to go to USA and bring back Meghna.Apart from this he also teaches the basics of bowling in cricket to Surya.

ii)Surya as Surya.He is a charming lover and he loves his family.He is very much close to his dad.He is patriotic, and a scene in this movie where he carries the operation to rescue the hostage from terrorist, inspite of hearing the his father death news on the midway of the operation.

He has a great role in this movie and worked out so hard for his role of he army officer and National Security Guard commando.He is also addicted to drugs when Meghna died.He is very courageous and he usually never give up and thats why he decides to go to USA in search of Meghna, thanks to the encouragement from his father.

iii)Simran as Malini Krishnan.This is a very good role for Simran and she is very lovely and kind to his husband and children Surya and Shriya.But one thing we can feel in this movie that make up work was not so natural at her old age when compared to Krishnan,i.e Surya at his older age looks very natural than that of Simran.

But when we speak of her character her performance was good and in the climax she gives hope to Surya, who lost his father, that Krishnan will always watch and bless thier family.Initially Tabu was chosen for this role but she rejected thi offer.

iv)Sameera Reddy as Meghna.This is her first Tamil film after many Telugu movies.After this film she was appreciated by all for her performance and also got many oppurtunities in Tamil films.She doesn't come throughout the movie as she appers only for a short while.The introduction scene for her takes place in the Train where she meets Surya.Then in USA she was killed in Okhlahama in a bomb blast while she was attending a seminar.

She was shown as brilliant student who tops the university in this film.Initially Genelia D'Souza  was chosen for this movie but due to some salary issues she rejected this offer.But prior to that Deepika Padukone  was all set to make her film debut in this character even before acting in Om Shanti Om.But she backed off due to the inactiveness of the film during that time

v)Divya as Priya.She is the daughter of Krishnan's friend Thomas.She is also the best friend of Surya's sister Shriya.But later in the film it was revealed that even from her young age she was in love with Surya.She later propose to Surya, but that time Surya rejects.But after some years she meets Surya at NSG commando base in Dehradun and that time Surya also expresses his love and after that they get married and have a son.

Swept the Awards

2008 was a very good year for Tamil cinema and three most important films that won many awards are Dasavatharam, Subramaniyapuram and of course Varanam Ayiram.Varanam Ayiram managed to win many awards and especially at the prestigiouis Vjiay awards,ITFA,Flimfare awards and the TamilNadu State awards.


i)Surya won the awrad for Best Actor Catoegary at

#)Tamilnadu State Awards

#)Fimmfare Awards

#)Vijay Awards and at this function he honestly said that Kamalhassan deserves to get this awatd for Dasavatharam and he also fell in his knees and got the blessings.It was an emotional event.

ii)Rajeevan and Ravi won the Tamil Nadu start award for Best Art Director and Best Audiographer award respectively

iii)Gautam fot the best favourite director award at the Vijay awards and he was also nominted for best direction at the filmfare.This film also won best film awards at the Vjiay Awards

iv)Harris javaraj won the Best Music dirctor award at

#)ITFA awards

#)Vijay awards for the favourite song "Ava Enna Enna thedi vantha Anjala" and also the Best Music director award.


Apart from them other members of the Varanam Ayiram team who won awards includes

1)Best Male play back Singer awards for Hariharan for Nenjukkul Peithidum at the Vijay awards and he was also nomianted for the film fare awards

2)Lyricist Thamarai won the best Best Lyricist for Nenjukkul Peithidum at Vijay awards

3)Yogesh and Banu won the Best Make Up award at the Vijay awards.

4)Simran won bets supporting actress awards at the vijay awards.

5)At the Filmfare awards Naresh Iyer won the best singer award for "Mundhinam Parthene..."

For the information about the story of the movie please click here