Anjali (1990 film)
Anjali | |
---|---|
File:Anjali film.jpg Theatrical release poster | |
Directed by | Mani Ratnam |
Written by | Mani Ratnam |
Produced by | G. Venkateswaran |
Starring | |
Cinematography | Madhu Ambat |
Edited by | |
Music by | Ilaiyaraaja |
Production company | G. V. Films |
Distributed by | G. V. Films |
Release date |
|
Running time | 155 minutes[1] |
Country | India |
Language | Tamil |
Anjali is a 1990 Indian Tamil-language drama film written and directed by Mani Ratnam. It stars Raghuvaran, Revathi, Master Tarun, Baby Shruti Vijaykumar and Baby Shamili in the leading roles. The background score and soundtrack was composed by Ilaiyaraaja. Anjali was the composer's 500th film. The film deals with the story of a dying mentally disabled child, and the emotional trauma experienced by her family. The film was dubbed into Hindi and Telugu and released under the same name. Anjali was critically acclaimed, winning three National Film Awards. It was chosen as India's official entry to the Oscars in 1991, but was not nominated.[2] This film is remade in Sinhala as Doni.
Plot
Civil engineer Shekhar lives with his wife Chitra and their two young children Arjun and Anu. Chitra delivers her third child, but the daughter is claimed to be stillborn. Two years later, Shekar and his family move to a new apartment complex. The family seems to have moved on from their grief due to the stillborn child incident and live happily. After a few altercations with the kids in the colony, Arjun and Anu are accepted by all the kids as their own. The kids are all for pulling pranks and generally causing a clamor around the apartment colony. One such constant joke, they play on a mentally disabled ex-watchman of the colony, much to the chagrin of his wife. The only tenant they are afraid of is an ex-convict, who lives alone in one of the apartments.
On one particular day, Chitra and the kids decided to surprise Shekhar by meeting him at his construction area, unannounced. Nevertheless, on coming to the site, they learned from one of the construction workers that Shekhar has left to conduct an emergency matter elsewhere. When Shekhar returns home for dinner that night, Chitra casually asks him where he was on that day, to which he replies that he was at the construction site the whole day. Chitra feels hurt to hear Shekhar lying and leaves the dining hall. Arjun and Anu too sense that their father is lying to them and leave the place. Nevertheless, before leaving the room, Anu blurts out accusations on her father, saying that he's lying about being at the site the whole day. Shekhar apologises to Chitra and consoles her and they both make up.
On New Year's Eve, Arjun slips out late at night with the older children to celebrate while Shekhar is out of town on a business trip. Nevertheless, while dancing with his friends on the road, Arjun sees Shekhar with another woman and is shocked to know that his father has lied to them about going out of the town. Later, Arjun and the other children are hauled by the police back to their homes. Chitra is furious to learn about Arjun's escapade and when Shekhar comes back, asks him to punish Arjun. While Shekhar inquires him about the incident, Arjun, who was still angry at his father, blurts out that he saw Shekhar with another woman on New Year's Eve. Chitra and Anu become shocked on hearing about the incident. Chitra then starts suspecting that Shekhar is having affair with another woman and confronts him about it, but Shekhar swears on both his kids that he is not.
A few days later, while on the bus, Chitra spots Shekhar talking to a woman (Saranya Ponvannan). She gets out of the bus and confronts him. Without waiting for his explanations, she rushes back home, packs her bags and threatens to walk out of the house with her kids. Shekhar pleads her to stay but she doesn't stop. Finally, Shekhar comes clean.
Their third child, Anjali (Shamili), was born mentally ill and with a terminal illness a few years ago. The doctors did not give the child more than a couple of months to live. To avoid the sadness for a couple of months from an already physically exhausted Chitra and to protect his children from the trauma, he colludes with the doctors to lie to his family that the child was stillborn. But much to the surprise of everyone, the child has made it past her second birthday and is seemingly physically healthy. The woman Shekar was talking to is Anjali's doctor. Although Chitra is saddened by this betrayal, she decides to bring Anjali back home.
Anjali is not like a normal child and requires constant attention from both the parents. This causes the other two siblings to dislike Anjali. Moreover, the other kids in the colony and school tease them by making fun of Anjali's condition. One day, the other kids in the colony make fun of Anjali by tying a string of cans behind her. This causes Arjun to fight with the other kids. He gets bruised which saddens Anjali, but a special bond is born between the siblings. Arjun becomes protective of her and challenges the other kids in the colony to a fight if they can't accept her. The kids accept Anjali and all the kids come to love her.
This causes the parents of the kids to worry as they don't want their kids to be close with a mentally disabled child. During an apartment association meeting, the parents of the kids demand that Shekar and Chitra either leave the apartment or institutionalize Anjali. The only person to argue for Anjali's presence is the ex-convict. The parents are afraid of him and let it go. But soon, Anjali wins over everyone in the apartment complex and everyone comes to like her.
Meanwhile, Shekhar, during a late-night visit to his construction site with Chitra and Anjali, is witness to a murder. He reports this to the police and the murderer is arrested. The murderer is enraged and visits Shekar's house after getting out on bail. He physically assaults and plans on killing Shekhar. But the ex-convict comes to the rescue and kills the murderer in the altercation when he threatens Shekhar's family and is arrested. The ex-convict thanks Shekhar before leaving as Anjali was the only person to show compassion to him.
The next morning, Anu wakes up and goes to wake up Anjali, but she doesn't get up. Anjali had died in her sleep. As more and more people come after hearing Anu's screams, they all are saddened by the demise of the girl who taught them acceptance and forgiveness.
Cast
- Shamili as Anjali[1]
- Revathi as Chitra[1]
- Raghuvaran as Shekar[1]
- Tarun Kumar as Arjun[1]
- Shruti Vijaykumar as Anu[1]
- Prabhu as the ex-convict Dennis Joseph[1]
- V. K. Ramasamy as Umapathi[1]
- Janagaraj
- Poornam Vishwanathan
- Cheenu Mohan
- Aarthi
- Vishnuvaradhan
- Krishna
- Anand Krishnamoorthi
- Richard Rishi
- Babu Antony
- Shantipriya - Special appearance in the song "Iravu Nilavu"
Production
The idea of Anjali was developed by Mani Ratnam during the making of Nayakan (1987).[3] While Revathi was finalised for the female lead,[1] Mohan was originally considered for playing the male lead, but he refused as he believed his fans would not accept seeing him as "the father of two kids".[4] Hence, Raghuvaran was chosen.[5] Anjali was also Ratnam's first film since Mouna Ragam (1986) without P. C. Sreeram as cinematographer, for which he used Madhu Ambat instead.[6][1] Ambat said he agreed to work on the film because he liked Ratnam's earlier work.[7] B. Lenin and V. T. Vijayan served as editors.[1] Shamili was three years old while doing this film. The crew had difficulty to get the character right for her, so they found the solution by recording videos of a special child. Shamili's father put in a lot of effort and he would make her watch every day to observe the actions of the child.[8]
Release and reception
Anjali was released on 12 July 1990.[9] The following day, N. Krishnaswamy wrote for The Indian Express that "directing so many kids must have been such a difficult task ... and [Mani Ratnam] has been so successful in this department."[10] On 5 August 1990, Ananda Vikatan overwhelmingly appreciated the film, rating it 58 out of 100.[11]
Bangalore Mirror reported that the film was inspired by the 1979 televised docudrama Son-Rise: A Miracle of Love.[12]
Accolades
- Won - Silver Lotus Award - Best Child Artist - Shamili, Tarun, Shruti
- Won - Silver Lotus Award - Best Audiography - Pandu Rangan
- Won - Silver Lotus Award - National Film Award for Best Feature Film in Tamil - Anjali - G. Venkateswaran, Mani Ratnam
Tamil Nadu State Film Awards
- Won - Tamil Nadu State Film Award Special Prize for Best Film.
- Won - Tamil Nadu state Film awards for best child artist
Soundtrack
The soundtrack was composed by Ilaiyaraaja and lyrics by Vaali.[13]
No. | Title | Singer(s) | Length |
---|---|---|---|
1. | "Something Something" | Karthik Raja, Yuvan Shankar Raja, Bhavatharini, Venkat Prabhu, Premji Amaran, Bala,Parthi Bhaskar & Hari Bhaskar | 5:03 |
2. | "Raathiri Nerathil" | S. P. Balasubrahmanyam | 4:58 |
3. | "Iravu Nilavu" | S Janaki, Karthik Raja, Yuvan Shankar Raja, Bhavatharini, Venkat Prabhu, Premji Amaran, Parthi Bhaskar & Hari Bhaskar | 4:46 |
4. | "Anjali Anjali" | Sathya, Karthik Raja, Yuvan Shankar Raja, Bhavatharini, Venkat Prabhu, Premji Amaran, Parthi Bhaskar, Hari Bhaskar, Vaishnavi | 5:33 |
5. | "Vaanam Namakku" | Karthik Raja, Yuvan Shankar Raja, Bhavatharini, Venkat Prabhu, Premji Amaran, Parthi Bhaskar, Hari Bhaskar | 4:51 |
6. | "Vegam Vegam" | Usha Uthup | 4:56 |
7. | "Motta Maadi" | Karthik Raja, Yuvan Shankar Raja, Bhavatharini, Venkat Prabhu, Premji Amaran, Parthi Bhaskar, Hari Bhaskar | 4:32 |
Total length: | 34:39 |
See also
- List of submissions to the 63rd Academy Awards for Best Foreign Language Film
- List of Indian submissions for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film
References
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Rangan 2012, p. 290.
- ^ "India's Oscar failures". India Today. 16 February 2009. Retrieved 29 May 2018.
- ^ Rangan 2012, p. 93.
- ^ Kumar, S. Shiva (21 March 2019). "'Mike' Mohan: The unsung phenomenon". The Hindu. Retrieved 29 March 2019.
- ^ Rangan 2012, p. 96.
- ^ Rangan 2012, p. 98.
- ^ Warrier, Shobha (12 January 2000). "'Manoj is going to be the next Spielberg'". Rediff.com. Retrieved 29 May 2018.
- ^ Rangan 2012, pp. 99–100.
- ^ "Anjali". The Indian Express. 12 July 1990. p. 11.
- ^ Krishnaswamy, N. (13 July 1990). "Anjali". The Indian Express. p. 7.
- ^ Vikatan Review Board (5 August 1990). "சினிமா விமர்சனம்: அஞ்சலி". Ananda Vikatan (in Tamil). Archived from the original on 30 July 2020. Retrieved 30 July 2020.
- ^ "Bypassing copycats, Sandalwood style". Bangalore Mirror. 29 January 2012. Archived from the original on 29 March 2019. Retrieved 29 March 2019.
- ^ "Anjali (1990)". Music India Online. Retrieved 29 May 2018.
External links
Bibliography
- Rangan, Baradwaj (2012). Conversations with Mani Ratnam. Penguin Books India. ISBN 978-0-670-08520-0.
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- 1990 films
- 1990s Tamil-language films
- 1990s musical drama films
- Best Tamil Feature Film National Film Award winners
- Films about autism
- Films directed by Mani Ratnam
- Films about disability in India
- Films that won the Best Audiography National Film Award
- Indian children's films
- Indian films
- Indian musical drama films
- Tamil film scores by Ilaiyaraaja
- Tamil-language films
- 1990 drama films