Anantha Poongatre

Anantha Poongatre
Directed by	Raj Kapoor
Written by	Shivaram Gandhi (dialogues)
Screenplay by	Raj Kapoor
Story by	Raj Kapoor
Produced by	M Kajamydeen
Starring	Ajith Kumar Meena Karthik Malavika
Cinematography	Priyan
Edited by	B Lenin V T Vijayan
Music by	Deva
Production company	Roja Combines
Distributed by	Roja Combines
Release date	18 June 1999
Running time	154 minutes
Country	India
Language	Tamil
Budget	₹4.4 crore

Anantha Poongatre (Tamil: ஆனந்த பூங்காற்றே) is a Tamil film directed by Raj Kapoor and starring Ajith Kumar, Meena , Karthik and Malavika in the lead roles. The film is based upon how respect can be mistaken as love by circumstances and the film subsequently opened to positive reviews and became commercial success, securing two state awards.

Plot

Meenakshi (Meena) is a widow living with her son Nandu (Pathanjali Srinivasan). Jeeva (Ajithkumar), living in the same colony, has been pining silently for her for the last four years. He runs an organisation called A-to-Z, which can get anything done for anybody.

Jeeva follows Divya (Malavika) get some information on her for her suitor but she ends up falling for him and pursues him relentlessly. He avoids her, telling her that he is already in love with someone else and when cornered, reveals that it is Meenakshi.

This leads to some surprising revelations about Meenakshi's past, Meenatchi is a music student of Haridas (Karthik). Haridas has a child, whose mother Banu (Banupriya) died giving birth to him. Their mutual respect is mistaken for romance by her father (Vijayakumar) and Haridas is killed in the fracas. Later Meena vows to live like a widow, taking care of Haridas' child. However, that very day, Jeeva and his parents were about to see Meenatchi as a prospective bride. When Jeeva sees this scene unfolding before his eyes, he starts admiring her courage. Despite his parent's protests, he assures Meenatchi's father that he would make her change her mind and that he would marry her. But Meenatchi's world turns upside down when Divya's father, a staunch supporter of love marriage, kidnaps Nandu and asks Jeeva to marry Divya. Jeeva of course accepts and things are then resolved in the climax.

Cast

• Ajith Kumar as Jeeva
• Meena as Meenakshi
• Karthik as Haridas
• Malavika as Divya
• Manivannan
• Vadivelu
• Vijayakumar as Meenakshi's father
• Raj Kapoor
• Rajan P. Dev
• Bala Singh
• Manobala
• Madhan Bob
• Mayilswamy
• Ambika
• Kovai Sarala
• Bhanupriya in a guest appearance
• Raju Sundaram cameo in song "Meenatchi Meenatchi"

Production

During production, the producer M Kajamydeen had attempted unsuccessfully to oust Ajithkumar from the project and replace him with Prashanth. The producer and Ajith later clashed following the failure of their action film, Jana in 2004. Initially Vindhya was assigned to play Malavika's role in the film, but was later dropped from the project.

Release

The film won two Tamil Nadu State Awards with the Tamil Nadu State Film Award for Best Dialogue Writer going to Shivaram Gandhi while it also won the Tamil Nadu State Film Award for Best Film Portraying Woman in Good Light. The film was remade as Subhakaryam in Telugu and then also later remade in the Kannada language in 2009 as Rajakumari.

Soundtrack

Anantha Poongatre
Soundtrack album by Deva
Released	1999
Genre	Feature film soundtrack
Label	Five Star Audio
Producer	Deva

The music composed by Deva while lyrics written by Vairamuthu and Ponniyin Selvan (Meenatchi Meenatchi).

Song	Singers
Semeena	Hariharan
Udhayam Theatre	Deva
Solai Kuyil	Hariharan, Sujatha Mohan
Solai Kuyil(2)	Sujatha Mohan
Vaikkasi Oram	Hariharan
Paatukku Paalaivanam	Hariharan
Meenatchi Meenatchi	Deva
Uyire Nee Vilagadhe	Swarnalatha
Yekka Yekka	Srinivas, Swarnalatha