(English: One Goat’s Mercy Petition)
Official Trailer
Official Teaser
Motion Poster
Director – Suresh Sangaiah
DOP – R V Saran
Music – Raguraam
Editor – K L Praveen
Executive Producer – Siddhi Pujara
Producer – Eros International Media Limited
Release Date – 2nd June 2017
Oru Kidayin Karunai Manu (OKKM) is based on a true sequence of events that happened in a small town known as Rajapalyam situated in Tamil Nadu.
A few days after the much-celebrated wedding of Ramamurthy (Vidaarth) and Seetha (Raveena Ravi), the people of Naduvapatti are fully consumed by their planned pilgrimage to visit their village deity, Lord Munniandi. Ramamurthy’s grandmother has vowed to sacrifice a goat, which she has been carefully raising for years. As soon as her grandson finally tied the knot, she is intent on fulfilling her promise as soon as possible. As Ramamurthy prepares for their pilgrimage, the family leases out a large lorry truck and a driver to carry them on their travels, buy enough groceries for their sacrificial feast and sends out their invitations to ensure everyone partakes in the auspicious occasion.
As they happily progress on their way with their unique band of Naduvapatti personalities, with Ramamurthy and Seetha front and centre in all the festivities, their journey is suddenly ‘cursed’ when they accidentally run over a young man in the middle of nowhere, close by to their deity’s temple. With no other witnesses in sight, and a desperate attempt to protect the newly married Ramamurthy, who was illegally driving at the time to impress Seetha, the community debates ways to hide the accident. After much confusion they reach a consensus to conceal the body for a day to see if anyone comes in search of the victim.
As a long night of anxiety ensues, the community attempts to bury the body with little success, as they are spooked by late night visitors in the forest and individually make a run for it, losing members of the group along the way. At a loss for what to do Ramamurthy makes a call to his estranged uncle, Vasudevan (George Maryan) a lawyer – requesting he come help them somehow.
As the community obsesses over the ‘inauspiciousness’ of the accident for their marriage, Ramamurthy and Seetha are both ridden with terrible guilt due to their actions. When Vasudevan finally arrives, he brings the owner of the lorry truck whom they’ve been avoiding, along with the missing member of their group, Seetha’s older brother. Upon inspecting the body, lawyer Vasudevan secretly guesses the victim died due to other causes before he was run over by Ramamurthy. After calling a doctor to confirm his suspicions, Vasudevan, out of spite for prior family disagreements and in a desire to earn a bundle in legal fees from the unsuspecting folks, conceals the truth. Instead, he poses another grave moral dilemma that freezes the people of Naduvapatti: he suggests they choose one amongst them to serve as a sacrificial goat and take the blame, rather than all of them being led to the slaughter.
Honours for the film:
OKKM won the award for the Best Film in the competition category at the 15th Chennai International Film Festival.
OKKM was successfully selected for the 17th New York Indian Film Festival and had its World Premiere on 6th May 2017 at Village Theatre, New York.
Oru Kidayin Karunai Manu was also selected for the 2017 Singapore South Asian International Film Festival and had a successful screening on 4th September 2017.
OKKM is the first film in the Tamil industry where Eros International & the lead actor Vidaarth took a step forward to pay their due respect to the film’s lead actress by ensuring that Raveena Ravi’s name appears first in the opening credits of the film.
OKKM was commended by the mainstream Actors, Producers and Directors of Tamil Cinema for it becoming a commercial success at the box-office despite it being a very off-beat and a unique film with an uncommon story-line.
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