Kamal Haasan's Kalaignan

Kalaignan கலைஞன் is a 1993 Tamil-language thriller film directed by G. B. Vijay and produced by Ramkumar Ganesan. The film features Kamal Haasan and Bindiya in the lead roles while Gur Dutt, Sivaranjani, Sindhuja and Nirmalamma play supporting roles. The film opened in April 1993 to an average response.

Plot

The movie revolves around a Tamil pop Singer Indrajeet (Kamal Hassan) based in Bangalore who has a large female following. The movie opens with the death of a back up dancer (Sivaranjani) in Indrajeets group and soon a police detective (Nasser) is put in charge of the investigation. Although, the police suspect Indrajeet, as he is very short tempered, they have no evidence linking him to the crime. Meanwhile Divya (Bindiya), the sister of the dancer, arrives to her grandmother’s house to find out the truth about her sister’s death. She goes to meet Indrajeet but is put off by his arrogance. She also talks to his manager and other musicians who all have differing opinions about her sister.

While investigating about her sister, she is attacked in a bar but coincidentally Indrajeet saves her and takes her to his concert. During the concert, Indrajeet gets flashes of his parent’s death in an accident in his childhood and breaks down into tears. At the end of the concert, a girl gets on stage and kisses him to the bemusement of all. That night, the girl who got on stage earlier, is killed by someone wearing Indrajeet’s coat. Still with no concrete evidence the police began to keep a closer eye on Indrajeet and find that Divya seems to have an interest in him. To warn her, police reveal to Divya that Indrajeet is her sister’s death’s main and only suspect.

Divya plans to out Indrajeet with the help of Sivaranjani’s friends, who attacked her earlier in the bar mistakenly. She feigns to have fallen for Indrajeet and she stages a kidnapping to test Indrajeet’s skill with the knife (all the girls murdered where skillfully cut by the murderer). He turns out to be quite good with the knife. But the next day, he sees her talking to the kidnapper and manages to determine that she was faking her love.

So he comes clean to her about her sister. Divya’s sister was an unstable substance abuser who had a thing for him, but he didn’t reciprocate. She even had threatened to commit suicide if he didn’t reciprocate but he manages to save her and that was the last he had seen her. The killer, who has pictures of this, which looks like incriminating him has been blackmailing him into coming to the murder scenes just minutes after the murder takes place. Divya believes him and falls for him.

One afternoon, while with Divya, the killer calls and demands Indrajeet to come to a place out of town or he will kill another person. He refuses as he has had enough and tells the killer that he can tell the truth to the police even if the pictures are handed to them. But Divya, in order to find her sisters killer slips away and goes to that location in their car. Indrajeet, worrying about her, goes to the location.

The killer’s next victim happens to be Divya’s grandmother who had car troubles but had accepted the help of the killer, having recognized him. The killer strangles her in her car and takes a picture of the dead body and leaves. Divya arrives and calls the police. Indrajeet arrives at the scene and notices that the police have found one of his glove in the murder scene and he is their suspect. He escapes the police and runs away to his manager’s house. The police arrive at the manager’s house and he asks Indrajeet to hide in the closet. Indrajeet find a jacket similar to his in the closet and also the other glove found at the murder scene. He realizes that his manager is the killer and flees. The manager sneakily lead the police to his closet but finds Indrajeet gone.

Indrajeet calls his manager (Gur Dutt) and impersonates a forest official who has photographed his murder earlier and asks for money. He specifies a location and asks the manager to get there soon. He enters the house when the manager leaves and looks around. He is able to find a secret room filled with photographs of his victims. He calls the manager again and makes him run to another location. After that he reveals his true identity and says that he now has proof of his innocence since the killers reflection is on the car window when he took the photograph earlier. Shocked, he stumbles out but runs into Divya. He kidnaps her and tells Indrajeet to come to an abandoned house outside the city with the photographs.

The police spot Indrajeet and chase him. Meanwhile the manager reveals to Divya that he has started killing because her sister turned down him and laughed at him for being a lesser man than Indrajeet. He, in his jealous rage killed her and other girls who liked Indrajeet. Indrajeet manages to escape the police and rescue Divya. The manager is killed and the police find the truth when the grandmother (Nirmalamma), who had only been unconscious, ousts the killer.

Cast

Kamal Haasan as Indrajeet

Bindiya as Divya

Sivaranjani as Sandhya

Sindhuja

Gur Dutt

Nirmalamma

Nassar

Chinni Jayanth

Production

G. B. Vijay was previously associate director for Prathap Pothan and worked with Kamal Haasan in 1989 film Vetri Vizha which was directed by Pothan and produced by Sivaji Productions. Hence Ramkumar of the production house gave Vijay a chance to make his second film, after the Prabhu-starrer Naalaiya Seithi, in a venture starring Kamal Haasan.[1] Malayalam cinematographer Jayanan Vincent was in charge of the film's photography, while Sabu Cyril designed disco themed sets for songs in the film.[2]

Release

A critic gave the film 2 out of 4, stating "Kamal plays his role with the right amount of seriousness needed to cast suspicion on himself" and that "Bindiya, who bears a close resemblance to Madhuri Dixit, romances nicely and looks scared." The reviewer adds that "the portions of the movie dealing with the killer have been handled well but the soundtrack is a big letdown."[3]

Shortly after the release of Kalaignan, Kamal Haasan's 1982 Hindi film Sanam Teri Kasam was dubbed and released in Tamil as Paadagan. Still images from his look in Kalaignan as a pop singer were used for the publicity of the dubbed film.[4] The director, G. B. Vijay, later moved away from directing feature films and apprenticed under Rajiv Menon as an ad film maker. He also played a pivotal role in mentoring Gautham Menon, while he went on to write the dialogues for Minsara Kanavu (1997).[5]

Soundtrack

Kalaignan

Soundtrack album by Ilaiyaraaja

Released 1993

Genre Feature film soundtrack

The Music was composed by Ilaiyaraaja and lyrics were written by Vaali.

Edekku Muddakanna - S.P Balasubramanyam

Kalaignan Kattu - S.P Balasubramanyam

Kokkarakko - Kamal Haasan

Dillu Baru Jaane - Mano, Chithra

Endhan Nenjil - K.J Yesudas, S.Janaki