5 Norm-Breaking Mani Rathnam Movies That Changed The Face Of Indian Cinema

There are no rules to legendariness. As a popular actor once attributed his success to being at the right place at the right moment, this filmmaker wasn't far behind. From being a sales manager in a private firm to not obtaining any pre-requisite training in filmmaking with clear focus on quality than quantity, Mani Rathnam never quite chased commerical success.He was attracted by the medium. He was mad about stories. He enjoyed the translation between paper and the screen. He hardly has 30 films to his credit and is totally unfazed about hype and sustaining his image. A birthday is an excuse to rekindle the fond memories he has provided, so we are unashamed to show the stuff that made him be worshipped the way he has been and will be in the coming times.

1.Mouna Ragam (1986)

This was a time where underplaying wasn't quite closely associated with storytelling. Mouna Ragam demanded space to arrive as a slease of new life to Tamil cinema. Dealing with a couple who almost make a mess in coming to terms with their past, the movie was obviously ahead of its counterparts by a few years sprinkling its narrative with an adorable alliance of humour, maturity, insecurity and longing. Being Mani Ratnam's biggest break as a storyteller besides serving a showcase of PC Sriram's wile in convincing his audiences of a Chennai set to be located in Delhi, this was a subtle indication of the director who was aptly quoted by Kamal Hassan for building that necessary bridge between old-school and contemporary cinema.

2.Nayagan (1987)

Nayagan, apart from boasting the presence of an artist like Kamal Haasan was special for its uncoloured, objective portrayal of the then man of the masses Varadarajan Mudaliar whose words were literally the norm in Mumbai. Although a life-story of a proclaimed gangster, Nayagan stood the test of times and marched ahead for possessing several engaging threads of a strained daughter-father equation, loyalist friendships and the true-to-life tussle between the softer and darker humane shades. The director once said he purposely gave Kamal Hassan a neat clean shaved look with a veshti to portray the character's purer dimensions.

3.Geethanjali (1989)

A partial tribute to the 14-year-old cancer battler in the 1980's with an obvious indication to the Tagore classic by the same name, Geethanjali was made with an intention of extracting visual poetry out of tragedy, as per the maker. Shot mostly in the winter times at the picturesque locales of Ooty, Mani Rathnam wanted to double the stereotype of a cancer patient with his on-screen couple in this movie and still coat it with hope and entertainment. One of those last few movies that saw Ilayaraja and Mani Ratnam work together, it was panned initially, only to go down as a classic which till date remains the only Telugu film of the director.

4. Iruvar (1997)

A fictional biopic of the association between the Tamil star cum politician MG Ramachandran and the politically ambitious poet Karunanidhi, Iruvar was the biggest risk in Mani Ratnam's career. He in many interviews has admitted to have tried his best to push the envelope in recreating the historic era, the dramatic topping with adept focus on staging,background score and cinematographic value through Iruvar. Confessing that this result was one that surprised him the most considering the efforts that went behind the detailing, Mani Ratnam was no wrong in labelling Iruvar his personal favourite. A commercial failure might be a harsh tag to categorise Iruvar into but none can deny its welcome departure from template ridden, one-dimensional biopics.No prizes for guessing that this was Aishwarya Rai's cinematic launchpad.

5.Kannathil Muthamittal (2002)

Inspired from a feature in Readers Digest as suggested by his wife, actress Suhaasini Mani Rathnam, Kannathil Muthamittal was a very risky arena to take plunge into, for the obvious sensitiveness surrounding the Srilankan Tamil issue. The feature was reportedly of an adopted girl in the US who was desperate to know of her original roots and the reason behind her parents' baffling decision of admitting her in an orphanage. Just like his earlier films Roja and Bombay, the maker wanted this to be a story of drama and humanity than using this as a cheap opportunity to take sides.Showing the emotional turmoil of a 10-year-old-girl, the film in the words of the director was an attempt to settle the audiences with the first half and exactly undo the impact in the second half. Co-incidentally, Mani Rathnam had actor Siddharth as one of his assistants for this movie.