Thoranai


Thoranai or Pistha is a 2009 Indian masala film directed by Sabha Ayyappan and produced by Vikram Krishna under the banner G K Film Corporation. It stars Vishal and Shriya Saran in the lead roles, while Prakash Raj, Kishore and Santhanam appear in other pivotal roles. The film was simultaneously shot in Tamil and Telugu languages with different supporting cast in the Telugu version. Thoranai and Pistha were released on 29 May 2009.

Plot

Murugan is a native of Madurai who arrives at Chennai to find his long-lost brother Ganesan, who had run away from home about two decades ago. Murugan gets stuck in a rivalry between gangsters Guru and Tamizharasu, where he learns that Guru is actually Ganesan. Murugan decides to protect Guru/Ganesan from Tamizharasu and a cat-and-mouse game ensues. Guru/Ganesan finally decide to reform himself where he reunites with Murugan and his mother, while Tamizharasu is killed in a police encounter.

Cast

Production

Among the forty scripts that he heard, Vishal okayed Sabha Ayyappan as the director. Ayyappan had previously worked as an assistant director to Boopathy Pandian for Malaikottai.

Music

The music was composed by Mani Sharma. In a music review, Karthik of Milliblog wrote, "Thoranai has what a Vishal starrer deserves – massy and straight forward songs that aim at your feet with Manisharma scoring better than his other recent Tamil soundtracks".
;Tamil version
SongSingersLyricsLength
"Vedi Vedi Saravedi"Naveen, RanjithViveka4:26
"Vaa Chellam"Udit NarayanPa. Vijay5:07
"Pattucha"Vijay Yesudas, Janani MadhanKabilan3:58
"Peliccan Paravaigal"Ranjith, Rita, Rahul, JaiVaali4:07
"Manjasela Mandakini"Tippu, SaindhaviPa. Vijay4:20
"Vaa Chellam" RanjithPa. Vijay5:07

;Telugu version
  • "Pidi Pidi" - Ranjith, Naveen
  • "Naa Maharani" - Udit Narayan
  • "Pattuko Pattuko" - Narayanan, Janani Madhan
  • "Oka Pelican" - Rahul, Suchithra
  • "Naa Maharani" - Ranjith
  • "Mandakini" - Tippu, Saindhavi

    Critical reception

Sify wrote "Arbitrarily packing in elements of every genre without actually bothering to stop and see if the mix does work, Thoranai is like an overcooked stew." Pavithra Srinivasan of Rediff wrote "Thoranai's only merit is that it's marginally better than Sathyam. The Times of India gave 2/5 stars and wrote "It is a formidable star cast that you see in Thoranai. However, what is missing is a convincing story". Reviewing the Telugu version, BVS Prakash of The Times of India gave 1.5/5 stars and wrote "Inspite of a dud like Salute, Tamil star Vishal hasn't realised the significance of a solid plot even for a star-centric film."