Thenali

Thenali
Directed by	K. S. Ravikumar
Produced by	R. Karpagam
Written by	Crazy Mohan
Starring	Kamal Haasan Jayaram Devayani Jyothika
Music by	A.R. Rahman
Cinematography	Priyan
Editing by	K. Thanigachalam
Studio	R. K. Celluloids
Release date(s)	October 26, 2000
Country	India
Language	Tamil

Thenali (Tamil: தெனாலி) is a 2000 Tamil feature film directed and produced by K. S. Ravikumar and written by Crazy Mohan. The film featured Kamal Haasan playing the title role, and also starred Jayaram, Devayani and Jyothika. The film's music was composed by A. R. Rahman, whilst cinematography was handled by Priyan. The film opened to positive reviews from critics and was a profitable venture at the box office.

Plot

Thenali (Kamal Hassan) is a man who fears anything and everything due to his earlier life in Sri Lanka. Dr. Panchabhootham (Delhi Ganesh) and his assistant (Ramesh Khanna), who are the doctors treating Thenali, are jealous of a relatively junior doctor Dr. Kailash (Jayaram) getting all the media attention. They decide to derail Dr. Kailash's success by sending Thenali over to him. Soon after their first appointment, Dr. Kailash heads to his home in Kodaikanal on a vacation with his wife Jalaja (Devayani) and his two children. Dr. Kailash tells Thenali to wait until after the vacation before his therapy can begin, but Panchabhootham asks for Thenali to go meet Kailash while on vacation.

The expected happens. Thenali falls in love with Janaki (Jyothika), the younger sister of Dr. Kailash, which was vehemently opposed by the latter. The whole film is about how Dr. Kailash goes mad with the antics of Thenali and even begins to suspect that his wife has an affair with Thenali, as she has a soft corner for the latter. He even tries to kill Thenali by tying him to a tree with a time bomb, which Thenali (not knowing it is a bomb) removes and puts it in the doctor's house, causing it to explode and Dr. Kailash, seeing this, suffers a paralytic attack.

Evantually, Thenali marries Janaki and cures Dr. Kailash through shock treatment by bringing Meena, B. H. Abdul Hameed and K. S. Ravikumar and makes Meena act as his Sri Lankan wife.

Cast

• Kamal Hassan as Thenali Soman
• Jayaram as Dr. Kailash
• Devayani as Jalaja
• Jyothika as Janaki
• Charle
• Ramesh Khanna
• Madhan Bob as Diamond Babu
• Delhi Ganesh as Panchabootham
• Meena as herself
• B. H. Abdul Hameed as himself
• K. S. Ravikumar as himself

Production

Kamal Haasan approached K. S. Ravikumar to make the film after the success of the director's Padayappa featuring Rajinikanth and the film took four months to be scripted by K. S. Ravikumar, Kamal Haasan and Crazy Mohan. The story of the film was partly inspired by the 1991 Hollywood movie What About Bob? directed by Frank Oz. Mohanlal was the initial choice to play Kailash and actress Simran was the original choice for the role of Janaki, but Jayaram and Jyothika later took the roles. Actress Meena was signed on by the producers to appear in a guest role. The film was launched at the Kalaivanar Arangam in Chennai on March 22, 2000 with Y. Gee. Mahendra as compere and with Rajinikanth as chief guest.

Kamal Haasan played a Sri Lankan Tamil in the film and to get the accent right, he took lessons from prominent television host, Abdul Hameed. Scenes were shot predominantly in Ooty, while some song sequences were shot in New Zealand.

Release

The film opened to positive reviews from critics. Malathi Rangarajan of The Hindu gave a verdict that the film was "a wholesome mix of rip-roaring action, witty dialogues and exotic locales". She mentioned that Kamal Haasan's performance was the film's best performance citing that "the enactment proves a cakewalk for him", whilst also praising Crazy Mohan's dialogue as "an indisputable highpoint" and Vikram Dharma's stunt concepts. However the critic from Rediff.com gave the film a negative review claiming "the comedy is on a single track in Thenali" and that "it is more tiresome than humorous".

Thenali went on to become a success at the box office, enjoying 100-day runs across halls in South India. A fifty day success meet was also held with Rajinikanth again attending the function, where Ravikumar revealed that it was the actor who picked the title, Thenali. It went on to win three Tamil Nadu State Film Awards with Thamarai picking up the Tamil Nadu State Film Award for Best Lyricist and Krishnamurthy won the Tamil Nadu State Film Award for Best Art Director in the technical award categories. Jayaram received a Tamil Nadu State Film Award Special Prize for his role in the film.

The film was dubbed into the Telugu language as Tenali under the production of singer, S. P. Balasubrahmanyam and won good reviews. A Hindi language remake with Shahrukh Khan in the role played by Jayaram was discussed, but the project failed to materialize.

Soundtrack

Thenali
Soundtrack album by A. R. Rahman
Released	2000
Recorded	Panchathan Record Inn
Genre	Feature Film Soundtrack
Length	35:55
Label	Sa Re Ga Ma
Producer	A. R. Rahman
A. R. Rahman chronology
Rhythm (2000) Thenali (2000) Zubeidaa (2000)

The soundtrack of the film was composed by A.R.Rahman, with lyrics written predominantly by newcomers. The album also featured the song "Injerungo", which became the first noted song of lyricist Thamarai, who used Jaffna slang within the song. The song "Swasame Swasame" from the soundtrack, was re-used in the final scene of the Hollywood film The Accidental Husband.

Track #	Song	Singer(s)	Lyrics
1	"Athini Sithini"	Hariharan , Chitra Sivaraman, Kamal Hassan	Arivumathi
2	"Swasame Swasame"	S.P.Balasubrahmanyam , Sadhana Sargam	Pa. Vijay
3	"Injerungo Injerungo"	Kamal Hassan , K. S. Chithra	Thamarai
4	"Porkalam Ange"	Srinivas , Gopika Poornima	Piraisoodan
5	"Alangatti Mazhai"	Kamal Hassan, Srinivas, Sujatha, Baby Silono Rath & Baby Saranya Srinivas	Kalaikumar
6	"Thenali"	Shankar Mahadevan, Clinton Cerejo	Ilayakamban

External links

• Thenali at the Internet Movie Database