Aadhavan

Aadhavan
Directed by	K. S. Ravikumar
Written by	K. S. Ravikumar
Story by	Ramesh Khanna
Produced by	Udhayanidhi Stalin
Starring	Suriya Nayantara Vadivelu Murali B. Saroja Devi Rahul Dev
Cinematography	Ganesh Rajavelu
Edited by	Don Max
Music by	Harris Jayaraj
Production company	Red Giant Movies
Distributed by	Red Giant Movies Ayngaran International (UK) Five Star (Malaysia)[1]
Release date	17 October 2009 (2009-10-17)
Running time	168 minutes
Country	India
Language	Tamil
Budget	₹30 crore[2]

Aadhavan (transl. Sun) is a 2009 Indian Tamil-language masala film directed by K. S. Ravikumar, from a story written by Ramesh Khanna, and produced by Udhayanidhi Stalin under Red Giant Movies. The film stars Suriya, alongside Nayantara, Vadivelu, Murali, B. Saroja Devi, Rahul Dev, Sayaji Shinde and Anand Babu. The music was composed by Harris Jayaraj, while cinematography and editing were handled by Ganesh Rajavelu and Don Max.

Aadhavan was released on 17 October 2009 to mixed reviews from critics and became a commercially successful at the box office. It was dubbed in Hindi as Dildaar – The Arya in 2011 and in Telugu as Ghatikudu. The core plot was loosely based on the 1990 Malayalam film His Highness Abdullah and it was remade in Bengali as Shikari.^{[3][4][5][6][7][8]}

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In the US, an unknown client speaks to a mafia group to eradicate a fake godman. The mafia group arranges the hit through a Kolkata-based middleman as the fake godman will be arriving there. The middleman gives the contract to Ibrahim Rowther. The godman gets killed by Ibrahim's adopted son Aadhavan, a skilled mercenary. Aadhavan gets several contracts in various parts of the world as a result of eradicating the godman.

In Mumbai, Aadhavan meets Dr. Abdul Kulkarni, who hires him to kill Subramaniam, a prominent judge as he is handling the inquiry and verdict on Abdul's child kidnapping and organ trafficking cases in Kolkata. Aadhavan unsuccessfully attempts to snipe Subramaniam and Kulkarni insults him. A furious Aadhavan vows to kill Subramaniam within 10 days, where he threatens Subramaniam's servant Kuppan alias Bannerjee to help him get into the house as Murugan, Bannerjee's brother-in-law, by abducting the actual Murugan and have him held in his ship.

Aadhavan slowly begins to win over the members of Subramaniam's household – his mother, her granddaughter Thara, and his other relatives. Thara is attracted to Aadhavan's intelligence and simple-innocent nature. Meanwhile, Subramaniam and his family is on a trip to Darjeeling, and Thara asks Aadhavan to hide a guitar belonging to Ilaiyaman, her madcap musician cousin (whose name is a portmanteau of Ilaiyaraaja and A. R. Rahman). Aadhavan uses this opportunity, plants a mobile bomb in the guitar and places it in one of the cars, which explodes at the wrong time.

Meanwhile, a security officer, who is the chief of the security team protecting Subramaniam at Subramaniam's house, keeps informing Kulkarni of Aadhavan's entry and happenings. Thara is now suspicious about Aadhavan and after questioning him in secret, Aadhavan informs her that he is really Subramaniam's long-lost son Madhavan. Thara soon informs all the members of the household about Madhavan's return and they are overjoyed, with Thara and Aadhavan falling in love with each other. However, they hide it from Subramaniam and Ilaiyaman because of Subramaniam's hatred towards Madhavan. Aadhavan tells Bannerjee that he lied to Thara about being Madhavan to distract her suspicions. On Thara's birthday, a flashback reveals that Aadhavan is indeed Madhavan.

Past: A 10-year-old Madhavan unknowingly carries a gift with a hidden bomb for his cousin Thara's birthday. Madhavan's friend's mother plants a bomb in the toy as revenge against Subramaniam for her gangster husband's jail sentence. Though Thara survives, Thara's mother Anu opens the box and is killed along with her husband in the explosion. Subramaniam blames Madhavan for Anu's death and for his friendship with a gangster's son and thrashes him. In anger and fear of going to a juvenile prison, Madhavan steals a gun from the cops, accidentally shoots Subramaniam and runs away from home. Madhavan kills his friend's mother as she is responsible for Anu's death. He saves Ibrahim from death and is re-christened as Aadhavan.

Present: Ibrahim's son Tharani tries to kill Subramaniam, but is stopped by Madhavan and reveals his true identity. Ibrahim challenges that he will kill them within two days. Kulkarni threatens Ibrahim and his gang to surrender to the police and makes a confession about Madhavan and his plans. When the ACP confronts Madhavan and is about to have him hauled off, Madhavan gets Subramaniam's laptop (containing the verdict and inquiry reports), takes him and Thara as hostages and drives away, after stealing the ACP's gun and using to injure him and the guards, when they intervene on him and killing the security chief. Meanwhile, the police commissioner arrives, arrests the ACP, as he is Kulkarni's man and makes a confession that the police actually had caught Madhavan after his very first attempt to kill Subramaniam. After being questioned by the commissioner, Madhavan said that he backed off and misfired on purpose at the last moment after he found that he was going to kill his own father. The police ask him to go back to the house to protect Subramaniam over a 24/7 hiatus time every day, for which Madhavan agrees.

The commissioner uses Madhavan to nab individuals linked to various criminal and terrorist organizations. This information is relayed to Subramaniam by the commissioner, who is tearfully reunites with Madhavan. Meanwhile, Kulkarni attacks the vehicle in which the trio is travelling, and a fight ensues where Madhavan saves Subramaniam and Thara and Kulkarni gets killed. The minister and the middleman that was involved in the contract killings gare arrested. Madhavan serves a short term in prison for his previous wrongdoings, but is subsequently released from the prison for his contribution to saving Subramaniam. Madhavan and Thara are now married, live in the household with the huge family. Once yet again, Bannerjee brings two assistants (his brothers-in-law) to help him and asks approval from Subramaniam, who then consulted in Madhavan, to check them out, with the whole family being suspicious of them being secretly hitmen. Upon inquiring on them, Madhavan approves of them with the whole family accepting them.

The song "Eno Eno Panithuli" was shot at Iceland, making Aadhavan the first South Indian film to be shot there.^[9] Shooting also took place at the Chettinad Palace, Chennai.^[10]

The soundtrack features 6 tracks composed by Harris Jayaraj. The soundtrack was released on 19 August by S. Shankar. The album received positive reviews from critics, with praise being dedicated to the songs "Hasili Fisile" (set in Kharaharapriya ragam) and "Vaarayo Vaarayo". Pavithra Srinivasan from Rediff said "Harris Jeyaraj is one of those composers who is not capable of turning out bad stuff even on a bad day, this album stands out from a mile away."^[11] Due to the album's critical and commercial success, Harris Jayaraj received the Vijay Award for Best Music Director and was also nominated for the Filmfare Award for Best Music Director.

The film was released on 17 October 2009.^[14]

Sify wrote "Ranging through a wide field of comedy laced with action, Aadhavan is good fun while it lasts. It's a roller-coaster ride of pure unadulterated masala".^[15] Rediff wrote "Aadhavan is uncomplicated, clean, fun, and doesn't expect you to take it seriously."^[16] Malathi Rangarajan of The Hindu wrote "Post-interval, you have to wait quite a while for some concrete action from Aadhavan, the Infallible!"^[17]

The film grossed ₹4.76 cr from Chennai box office in its 8 weeks.^[18] The film grossed good numbers in Malaysia as well as UK.^[19] Overseas, the film grossed about $1,541,485, approximately.^[20] The film was a hit at the box office.^[21][22] The film was dubbed into Telugu as Ghatikudu.^[23] It was also dubbed into Hindi as Dildaar: The Arya.^[24]

The movie was remade in Bengali as Shikari starring Bangladeshi star Shakib Khan.^[5][6][7][8] Shikari is a 2016 Bangladesh India joint venture action thriller drama film directed by Joydeep Mukherjee and Zakir Hossain Simanto.^[26]

• Aadhavan at IMDb