32 Years Of Karagatakkaran: Fun trivia from the evergreen entertainer

It is one of the biggest blockbusters that Tamil cinema has ever seen and is considered an evergreen entertainer. With Gangai Amaren's Karagatakkaran turning 32 today, here are some interesting trivia on the film that the director had shared with us in an earlier interview...

Gangai Amaren has always acknowledged that Thillana Mohanambal was the reason this film could be made. "That was about a dancer and a nadaswaram vidwan falling in love and I wanted to do a film where both were dancers. And Karagattam was the right dance form for that,” he explains. In fact, he even had a scene that was a homage to the Sivaji Ganesan-Padmini-starrer. “In one scene, Sivaji sir would get ready to go meet Padmini amma and TS Balaiah would slyly tag along. I created a similar situation and made it into a song — Ooru Vittu Ooru Vandhu,” he says.

Amaren says that he intended to use the puja of the film as the title credits right from the start. “I was anyway getting Annan (Ilaiyaraaja) to sing, so I had this scene where I go and ask him to do that saying it would be lucky, and follow it up with the puja footage,” he says.

Amaren had already done Enga Ooru Paattukaaran and Shenbagame Shenbagame with Ramarajan, so, they shared a rapport. And since this one was also a village subject, he says he did not even have to think of another hero. And since both those films were hits, the producers were also keen on it.

It was Amaren's wife who suggested that he take a look at actress Devika’s daughter, saying she was pretty and young. Since her mom was in films, Kanaghaa had learnt dance, so the filmmaker asked her to come for a makeup test. When they looked at the output on the big screen, he knew she was the right choice. He even had Devika's hand placing a pottu on Kanaghaa’s head in her introduction scene!

Though he cannot recollect its name, Amaren says, "It had a scene where Adoor Bhasi tells his assistant to get two bananas. The guy eats one and gives the other to him. And when Bhasi asks for the second banana, he cleverly says that was the one he had given him and walks away. I wanted to do this with a naïve guy doing the same to a cleverer guy. So, we developed it in a way that the same thing gets asked three or four times and in various modulations,” he explains. He wanted to have another scene where a similar episode occurs to show Senthil’s character hasn’t changed one bit, and so shot the vethala paaku comedy.

Since the actors were not trained in the dance form, the team devised customised Karagams for them. “We had three iron plates welded to the Karagam’s sombu. The loose ends could be clipped on to the head of the actors, and over this, a wig would be placed to hide the plates. We did this for both Ramarajan and Kanaghaa. They would often come to the shot wearing the Karagam on their head so that people don’t realise what we were doing,” reveals Amaren.

The director had wanted a rusty, old car as he already had scenes involving the scrap dealer who turns up wherever the hero’s party goes and shouts ‘Pazhaya eeyam pithaalaikku perichambalam’. And he wanted it to be a convertible so that he could shoot the actors easily that way. But the production could get only this car — a Chevorlet Impala Convertible 1958 model — which they managed to find in a neighbouring village. So, he came up with a story for the car — who had all owned it, including a glamour queen by the name of Soppanasundari. And the director thinks he gave that name because there was an old film by that name.

The team had only half an hour time to shoot Kovai Sarala's portion in the song Maanguyile Poonguyile. "This was the version of Maanguyile Poonguyile, which the troupe performs in front of the village. She was in another shoot and we called her to shoot this saying we had to get it completed by that day. She learnt the steps danced exactly like a Karagam dancer in a short time,” praises Amaren.

Amaren says Ilaiyaraaja laughed like anything when he showed the maestro the film. "Once he composed that theme music, the film went to the next level. He went on to finish the work up to the interval portion in one afternoon," he says.

Ilaiyaraaja was part of the silver jubilee celebrations that were held in many theatres across the state. The team went together on a bus. “Goundamani annan, who we know since our drama days, did some galatta, Senthil sang and Raaja annan enjoyed all of it,” says Amaren.