The Malayalam film Manjummel Boys directed by Chidambaram S. Poduval of Jan. E. Man (2021) fame continues to witness an outstanding audience turnout in cinemas in Kerala and Tamil Nadu, and is now officially a blockbuster. The survival thriller has been receiving a terrific response among Tamil audiences too after it was revealed that the film includes several references to 'Ulaganayagan' Kamal Haasan's cult classic Gunaa (1991). With Manjummel Boys turning out to be a resounding critical and commercial success, director Chidambaram and the film's team had a rendezvous 'Ulaganayagan' Kamal Haasan earlier this week, with Gunaa director Santhana Bharathi also seen at the interaction.
The special meeting saw the Manjummel Boys team share with Kamal Haasan how Gunaa was a big source of inspiration for the caves depicted in their film as it is major plot element. In that light, Santhana Bharathi sat down with Galatta for an exclusive interview to talk about the big difference between the caves depicted in Manjummel Boys and Gunaa. Speaking about the iconic Guna Caves otherwise known as the Devil's Kitchen where Gunaa was shot and how Manjummel Boys made him revisit the past, Santhana Bharathi stated, "Definitely it reminded about the scenes we filmed there. But, we shot on location whereas they have filmed on a set. So, they cannot be compared with each other. But, it didn't look a bit like a set. They took the location as a reference to create the set and shoot. The stones on the set are the same as in the caves and they have recreated it beautifully."
Talking further about the Gunaa references in Manjummel Boys, Santhana Bharathi stated, "I enjoyed the film a lot. In particular, I liked the placement of the 'Manidhar unarndhu kollum...' dialogue and song because we used it for love, but they changed it for friendship. After all, it's all love. The film is going housefull everywhere and that particular moment is getting huge claps."
Watch Santhana Bharathi talk about Manjummel Boys in the video below:
