Giri (film)

Giri is a 2004 Indian Tamil-language action comedy film directed and co-written by Sundar C, starring Arjun Sarja, Ramya and Reema Sen, with Devayani, Vadivelu, and Prakash Raj among others enacting supporting roles. The film was released on 1 October 2004 and become a profitable venture at the box office and was remade in Kannada in 2020 as Shivarjuna starring his nephew Chiranjeevi Sarja. This film is also noted to be actress Khushbu's productional debut in her production company house Avni Cinemax. The film was dubbed into Telugu under the same name.

Plot
Veerapandi Puram and Soolachery are two villages, which are on either side of a river and are always feuding as the headmen Veerasamy and Sethupathy have personal enmity. Due to some misunderstanding regarding Sethupathy's children's death, Sethupathy seeks revenge against Veerasamy and tries to kill Veerasamy's son Suryaprakash, but Suryaprakash is saved by his servant's son Giri, where Suryaprakash suddenly disappears. 20 years later, Shiva arrives in Kumbakonam with a mission to protect DSP Chandrashekhar's wife and his son from Sethupathy and his gangsters, where he lives with a bakery owner named Veerabagu. During a wedding reception, Shiva saves Chandrashekhar's family from being murdered by Sethupathy's son. When questioned about his identity, it is revealed that Shiva is actually Giri and Chandrashekhar was actually Suryaprakash whom Sethupathy had killed after learning about his real identity. To protect the rest of the family, Giri was sent to bring them back to the village. In the present, Giri wipes out Sethupathy and his family during a boat race, thus avenging Suryaprakash's death.

Production
The producer of the film did not pay popular Kannada actress Ramya for the film because the film was not released in Karnataka. The filming was held at Chennai, Kumbakonam, Mayavaram and Trichy. A boat race scene was picturised at Kerala while some songs were shot at a village near Kumbakonam.

Soundtrack
Music and background score were handled by D. Imman.

Reception
Indiaglitz wrote "the story sinks in the quagmire of pulp and predictability". Behindwoods wrote "The story of the film is very well predictable to the climax. This film is not Sundar C's exceptional best. He was confused on satisfying the Telugu and the Tamil viewers at the same time (This film is also produced in Telugu), bringing in an average film."