HOW CAN A BUS CONDUCTOR BECOME A SCIENTIST?

Endhiran

As a lead up to the impending extravaganza, the trailer of the Rajinikanth starrer magnum opus Endhiran was released on September 11, 2010 all over Tamil Nadu. For the first time, probably in the history of Tamil cinema, the trailer release event was held with much fanfare and witnessed wild frenzy of the superstar’s fans across the state.

Satyam Cinemas played host to the trailer release event that was held in Chennai. The trailer was released by Rajini in the presence of producer and Sun Network’s Kalanidhi Maran. Suffice to say the event was star-studded and Tamil cinema, in its entirety, gathered at Satyam to cheer for the Endhiran team and the superstar himself on the feat. In other parts of Tamil Nadu, hundreds of Rajini fans made sure the event is given its due credit by bursting crackers and bringing the CD of the trailer in procession.

The Chennai event was peppered with arousing speeches by the who’s who of the Tamil film industry including Rajini himself, Vairamuthu, Shankar, K S Ravikumar, Lawrence, Baghyaraj, Cheran, Vijayakumar, Arya, Sarathkumar, Abhirami Ramanathan, Vivek, Parthiban and V C Guhanathan, apart from the invitees that ran into hundreds of names.

Rajini on Endhiran

“You will see many such interviews and speeches on the movie in the days to come. So I’ll keep this really short,” Rajini started off with his brief speech. While recalling Kalanidhi Maran’s unrelenting cooperation for the movie, Rajini mentioned that Mr. Maran is a very good planner. “Maran realized Shankar’s dream, without which the movie would not have been possible,” he said.

He also reminisced his initial skepticism in starring in a scientist’s role when the story was narrated to him by Shankar. Rajini said he asked Shankar that he has been doing only the roles of blue collared people like auto drivers and laborers. “I have been a conductor. I will only fit in those roles. I have my doubts about playing a scientist. But Shankar plainly asked me to visit the sets. I did obligingly. And the rest is for all to see,” Rajini admitted that he is impressed with Shankar’s talents.

He also mentioned about his doubts on performing the role of a robot. “Shankar did all the homework for me and if you think I’m a pretty good robot in the movie, only Shankar is responsible for it,” he added. As an ending note, Rajini said that he would only act in movies that make the Tamils proud.

Shankar on the highlights of Endhiran

In his speech, Shankar revealed the highlights of his million dollar baby. He detailed the interesting events behind the making of the movie. He stated that; while the trailer underlined the significant highlights of the movie, the movie itself will have hundreds of such scenes. “Rahman has scored three types of music for Endhiran, namely Symphony, Electronics and Indian Style,” Shankar said.
“While Oscar winner Pookkutty’s sound engineering will be poetic, cinematographer Rathnavelu made sure he brought out the handsome Rajini in every frame. The two robots in the movie are art director Sabu Cyril’s creations. To add to this, there is an electronic mosquito in the movie, called Ranguski. Late writer Sujatha came up with the name, incidentally that’s his childhood nick name among his friends”, he said.

He also praised the efforts of lyricist Pa. Vijay, Editor Anthony, Karunas and Santhanam. Shankar revealed that while Rajini played both the characters of the scientist and the robot there is another suspense character in the movie that will appear in the last 45 minutes of the movie.

Vairamuthu

Lyricist Vairamuthu, in his statement, mentioned that Endhiran should be dubbed in English. “Endhiran deserves to be dubbed in English, while we have movies like Avatar, Gladiator and Titanic dubbed in Tamil,” he wished.

Kalanidhi Maran

Mr. Maran declared that Rajini has already become an all India superstar what with the impending release of Endhiran on the cards. He revealed that the trailer was already shown to the Chief Minister who was awed by it.

Snippets of other speeches

K. S. Ravikumar said that he’s eager to watch the movie when it’s released before declaring that Rajini will even sing duets at the age of 80 since he’s ageless. Bhagyaraj, in his speech, reflected the sentiments of Vairamuthu and said that folks at Sun Pictures have proved that a movie which the entire world is expecting could be produced in Tamil too. Sharath wished that Mr. Maran would go to Hollywood to produce movies and would also get an Oscar. Vivek averred that he’s one of those people who want to watch the movie on the first day of its release.

The event was also attended by Latha Rajinikanth, Soundarya, Ashwin, Aishwarya Dhanush, Sundar C, Karan, Arun Vijay, Sibiraj, Jai, Shaam, Nakul, Dushyanth, Krishna, Dharani, Lingusamy, Kicha, producers Sathyajothi Thyagarajan, Kaja Mohideen, Editor Mohan, Amma Creations Shiva, Ayyappan, Sivashiri Srinivasan, K Muralidharan, Murali Narayanan and editor Anthony.