Sindhu Bhairavi

I personally feel that this is the best film ever made by Mr. K Balachandar. The story revolves around a successful classical singer Mr. JKB who has been surviving with a wife who does not have any knowledge in music. Mr. JKB happens to meet a woman who wanted a change in the way classical musics are fed to the common people. Mr. JKB, being a traditional singer, does not comply with her requests.

They meet often and Mr. JKB, gradually, falls in love (or should we call it true friendship?) with this woman. However, there comes a situation when she has to leave him. Unable to bear the lose, Mr. JKB loses all his fame and glory and becomes an alcoholic.

The story narrates how he overcomes the hurdle of being fallen between two women and regain his lost glory.

I always have a great respect for Mr. K Balachandar because most of his movies deal with the practical aspects of life and, importantly, the psychological behavior of people at different instances of life. This movie is still considered among the best Tamil movies ever made.

This will go down as one of the best ever movies made in Tamil cinema industry.

The movie poetically portrays the story of a singer, whose life passes through a roller coaster ride when a woman - apparently, the hero of the film - comes into his life, which eventually leaves the audience with happy tears.

I got to watch this masterpiece more than three decades after its theatrical release. My respect towards KB sir has grown manifold after witnessing this movie full of emotions. This is a musical film where each sequence of it was written with extreme intricacy blended with classical ragas and presented in such a way that it is understandable even for a layman with absolutely no knowledge on Carnatic music. This simply exemplifies the fact that music has no language - which was itself a sequence in the movie.

At the outset, let me confess that I am a bit partial to this movie. It has all the over-the-top melodrama of Balachander. You see, he has this tremendous need in him to stamp his seal all over his movies. That is his trademark and it has become accepted in Tamil film industry, even though it may appear ridiculous to many. This movie is no exception in that regard. But the story behind it, the performances and the direction are absolutely heart rending.

Sivakumar plays the role of a famous classical singer who is in an unhappy marriage to a woman named Bhairavi who has no skill in music whatsoever, and who doesn't have children (played sweetly by Sulakshana). He encounters a music lover, orphan and fan named Sindhu (played by Suhasini, she got the national award for best actress for the movie) in a contrived way typical of Balachander. She has strong feelings that South Indian classical music is not sung primarily in the South Indian language Tamil (mother tongue of all the main characters in movie and the language spoken in the state where all the main characters reside). This has made it inaccessible to the general Tamil public in the state. (As an aside, this is a truth and such an elitism has pervaded south indian classical music for the better part of last century.) Their views clash and an intellectual friendship begins which ends in an affair and Sindhu becoming pregnant. Unwilling to destroy the singer's family, Sindhu disappears from the scene. From here on, the singer degenerates and becomes an alcoholic. This is a HUGE no-no in indian classical music circles, known for its supposed piety and supposed cultural savvy. Everything goes downhill and only Sindhu can fix it. But no one knows where she is. Sindhu also has a story of her own regarding her origins. Balachander has wonderfully exposed the hypocrisy in the elitist societies in South India. (The period is grossly misplaced though. Such hypocrisy was common when Balachander himself was in his young age, not during the time he has set the movie in!) The climax resolves all the issues through another contrived, politically-correct ending that is vintage Balachander. The only problem I have with the movie is the song sequence when Sivakumar is drunk. It was totally unnecessary!

Unfortunately Sivakumar, who gave as good a performance as Suhasini did not win the best actor award. (He was later denied yet again for one of the best acting performances I have ever witnessed in Marupakkam. We won't get into the award politics in India.) The reason I'm biased towards this movie is because I am a classical singer myself. The music in the movie is absolutely superb. Ilayaraja is a genius and he proves himself yet again. He got a national award along with Chitra the playback singer for Suhasini. Just as Sivakumar didn't win an award, his playback singer Yesudas was also robbed of a thoroughly well deserved award for best playback singing.

Sindhu bhairavi . Another KB movie with a very powerful story line. Probably I suppose the screenplay and music had been the best for its success. Ilayaraaja had composed mind blowing songs fully based on traditional karnatic style. Credits go equally to Vairamuthu, Jesudas and Chitra. It is well known that KB is famous for extracting the best performances from every artist in the role. It is perfectly proved once again in this movie also. Though the lead artists Sivakumar, sulakshana and suhasini excel in their performances, Janakaraj and delhi ganesh also play minor, but important roles in the movie.

On the whole, watch this musical drama to feel that there had been artists and directors in the past who can bring out the best entertainers with no violence, vulgarity and foreign shoot outs.