Selvaraghavan to direct Allu Arjun

Stylish actor Allu Arjun will soon join hands with talented Tamil director Selvaraghavan to make a fantasy flick with a whopping budget of Rs. 50 crores. According to sources, a leading Telugu producer will produce this extravaganza, which will start rolling by the end of this year, after Selvaraghavan completes his untitled Kamal Haasan starrer. More details are awaited. Meanwhile, Allu Arjun has just completed the shooting of another big budget film Badrinathunder the direction of V.V. Vinayak. The film is slated for March 27 release.

Happy Birthday Gautham Menon!

For hardcore action buffs and film lovers, director Gautham Menon's genre of films belongs to an exciting and unexplored stratum of Tamil cinema. An engineering graduate, Gautham entered movies as assistant director to the most-acclaimed Rajeev Menon while the latter was making Minsara Kanavu and learnt the nuances of the art of film making.

It started with the romantic musical Minnale with Madhavan, Reema Sen, Abbas and Vivek leading the cast, and Harris Jayaraj’s tunes luring the masses. This soothing melody was followed by a pumped-up action-packed Kaakha Kaakha – the trendsetting cop film that proved to be Suriya’s biggest break! Again Harris headed the music department and we got some soulful music to savour!

Several hurdles later, he enthralled audiences with the action thriller Vettaiyaadu Villaiyaaduwith Kamal Haasan playing an investigating officer who hunts down a pair of serial killers. Everything about the movie struck gold, especially the beautiful compositions by Harris! His next hit was Pachaikili Muthucharam with an interesting lineup off stars, an equally interesting story line and Harris’ hit melodies! Then came the melodious Varanam Aayiramwith Suriya, Divya Spandana and Sameera.

Having built up a formidable reputation with such classic and path-breaking films, Gautham then teamed up with the Mozart of Madras A.R. Rahman for Vinnaithaandi Varuvaayaa, a romantic musical starring Simbu and Trisha in the lead roles.

Gautam’s non-Tamil ventures include Rehna Hei Tere Dil Mein, the Hindi remake of Minnale. The movie did not score as well as the original. Gharshana [Telugu] was the remake ofKaakha Kaakha, and starred Venkatesh and Asin. The Telugu audience was awestruck by the action flick! Yemaya Chesave, the Telugu version of VTV, created wonders at the box office.

His latest experiment is Nadunisi Naaygal, starring Sameera Reddy and newcomer Veera in lead roles.

His upcoming production ventures includes Veppam and Azhagarsamyin Kuthirai (produced under his home banner Photon Kathaas). Apart from that, Gautham will soon remake VTV in Hindi with Prateik Babbar and Amy Jackson.

Gautam, in his own way, has contributed towards a change for the better in Tamil Cinema in terms of technical perfection and innovative and intriguing scripts. He has proved himself as a director with great potential and has won the respect of his peers and audiences. Today, as he celebrates his birthday, we would like to wish him loads of luck and success in the years to come!

Happy Birthday, Gautam!

Happy Birthday Premji!

He shot to fame withChennai 600028 and reached a peak with his

recent hit Saroja. He is none other than Premji Amaran. Who can

forget his comical one-liners? Premji celebrates his birthday today

and we wish him a very very happy birthday!

The actor is also quite excited about his upcoming project

2010 Bhagyaraj in which he plays the lead role. Interestingly,

this is Premji's first film as solo hero; it also stars newcomer Ankitha,

Vincent Asokan, Sridhar, Ravikanth, Uma Padmanaban and Subashini

in prominent roles. 2010 Bhagyaraj is directed by Venkatramani,

and produced by actress Sona Heiden.

Apart from that, Premiji is also thrilled about working with Thala Ajith

in Mankaatha (Ajith's 50th film) directed by his brother Venkat Prabhu.

Today, as he celebrates his birthday, we would like to wish him loads

of luck and success in the years to come!

Happy Birthday, Premji!

Shiv Sena condemns Nadunisi Naaygal

It seems like Shiv Sena is more keen on seeking out objectionable matters

in movies, over and above the Censor Board. The latest, Shiv Sena's

Tamil Nadu wing has condemned Gautham Menon's Nadunisi Naaygal,

as they allege the movie showed the Hindu God Meenakshi Amman in

crass taste. In the movie, a character named Meenakshi gets physically

intimate with her adopted teen son.

The organisation also condemned the excessive presence of lewd and

sexually deviant scenes. The storyline, which also showed an incestuous

tale was condemned, as Shiv Sena felt it showed the father-son relationship

in poor light. The organisation says these scenes and storyline are a direct

attack on Hinduism and the conservative Tamil Society, and called for an

immediate removal of the objectionable scenes and characters.

Suriya, Jyothika together again

The last time Suriya and his better half Jyothika stood together in front of the camera was perhaps for a television commercial shot for a leading telecommunication services provider.

Once again the much talked about pair is ready to share the screen space together, this time too for an ad. "It was after much persuasion we were able to convince Jyothika for shooting," Suriya says.

"As a fan, I really miss Jyothika on screen. I have always been telling her to take up acting again. But she is not ready as her sole priority is to raise kids without any deviation," adds the top actor.

For Suriya, life is so good after marrying Jo. "But for her, I wouldn’t have realised that life is this beautiful," he says. Suriya however regrets that he was unable to gift his sweet heart something this Valentines Day, as they had to attend a close relative’s (producer Gnanavelraja) wedding in Coimbatore.

‘Vanthaan Ventraan’ is no remake

Director Kannan has cleared the air by saying that his forthcoming

film ‘Vanthaan Ventraan’,

starring Jeeva and Tapsee in lead roles, is not a remake, but based on

an original script penned by him.

“My maiden film ‘Jayam Kondaan’ too is not inspired by any other movie.

Only my second venture ‘Kanden Kadhalai’ is the Tamil adaptation of

Bollywood hit Jab We Met,” says the former associate of Mani Ratnam.

Saying that ‘Vanthaan Ventraan’ would be an interesting mix of romance,

action and comedy, the filmmaker says Jeeva, Tapsee and Santhanam

had ensured that the package would be presented well to the audience.

“Though Jeeva is playing a boxer, it is just his profession in the movie

and it doesn’t have any crucial importance. The screenplay will be so

different and I am hopeful that film-buffs would love

watching ‘Vanthaan Ventraan’,” Kannan further says.

Get ready for ‘7am Arivu’. Audio on March 28

Phrases like ‘eagerly waited’ and ‘much anticipated’ are fast becoming clichés when talking about a Suriya film these days. So simply put, the shooting of Suriya’s ‘7am Arivu’ will complete by mid March and the audio of the film will be launched on March 28. In the film Suriya plays Anwar Basha, a trapeze artiste who also doubles up as an animal trainer. Shruthi Kamal plays Shalini, his love interest. Suriya was trained for his acrobatic acts by a renowned circus company in Coimbatore and as always the creative actor learnt the art well. According to sources the audio launch will be a spectacular feat with Suriya performing some dare devilry acrobatics live on stage. The mega music launch will happen at the Nehru Indoor Stadium on March 28. Suriya will perform acts like trapeze, 10 balls juggle, human pyramid etc. He will do some 10 amazing feats along with trained circus artistes who will be specially flown in for the event. As soon as the shoot is completed by mid March, AR Murugadoss will go into post production immediately. The innovative story line demands high end special effects and ARM will spend two months to get them perfect. The producer of the ‘7am Arivu’, Udhayanidhi Stalin of Red Giants is planning to release the film in August. It will also be dubbed in Telugu.