Rahman's Movie Entry

Dileep ( A.R.Rahman) was quite happy in his world of advertisements. He had no intention of joining the film industry as a music composer.Around 1991, ace Tamil movie director Manirathnam was on the lookout for a new music composer for his films. His long-standing, fruitful association with the doyen of Tamil film music Ilaiyaraja had come to an end when the latter reportedly made some disdainful comments during the making of Manirathnam’s ‘Dhalapathi’.

One day, at an awards function for excellence in the field of advertising, Manirathnam chanced upon Dileep, who received the award for the best ad jingle, which he had composed for the popular Leo Coffee ad. At the celebrations party that followed the awards presentation ceremony, Manirathnam was introduced to the young composer by his cousin Sharada Trilok of Trish Productions. Rahman had produced some outstanding work for Trish Productions. She (Sharada Trilok) had words of praise for the young composer. Manirathnam got curious and requested him for a sample of his wares.

The composer readily complied and invited the director over to his studio. Manirathnam turned up at the studio only after 3 months, where the 24-year-old lad played out a tune that he had been pushed into composing by his school friend G. Bharat Bala alias Bala when they both had been greatly disturbed by the socio-political tensions in South India over the Cauvery river waters issue.Listening to the tune that was played, Manirathnam was hooked instantly. Dileep effortlessly ‘qualified’ in Manirathnam’s eyes as ‘deserving’, and thus, when the appropriate opportunity came along, he decided to give him a ‘break’.

Without a second thought he signed on the composer to score the music for his next venture, produced by the veteran Tamil director K Balachander for his respected ‘Kavithalayaa’ banner. The film was ‘Roja’. That tune took the avatar of the song ‘Thamizha Thamizha’ in ‘Roja’. Rahman’s D-Day arrived when ‘Roja’ was released on Saturday, August 15th, 1992 . It was awaited with curiosity since it was Manirathnam’s first film without Ilaiyaraja. Skeptics doubted the ability of a 25-year old debutant. The entire film world and filmgoers were in for a pleasant surprise. Rahman delivered the goods and how? To call the music just a ‘Super Hit’ would be an understatement.

The music of the film became a phenomenal success and revolutionized modern day Indian film music. Rahman became a household name in Tamil Nadu overnight. ‘Roja’ won every conceivable award in music that year. Rahman even got the ‘Rajat Kamal’ for best Music Director at the National Film Awards, the first time ever by a debutante. Every producer was trying to impress upon Rahman to work for his/her projects. Because of all this, Rahman decided to leave the jingles world and concentrate on film music.Throughout India , Rahman’s other work were also received wholeheartedly by music lovers.

However, it was a Ram Gopal Varma’s ‘Rangeela’ – Rahman’s first original Hindi score – which truly established him as one of the prominent music composers of Bollywood. In North India too, Rahman became a ’star’ overnight, and as is the tradition in Bollywood, suddenly all kinds of producers were seen queuing outside his house. Rahman however, wisely chose to stay selective and took on only projects that interested him. He also made it a point to work entirely on his own terms and conditions. He still works only from Chennai where he lives; has his own studio in his house from where he works; likes to work only at nights.

Since ‘Roja’, he has created music for mega blockbuster films including ‘Pudhiya Mugam’, ‘Gentleman’, ‘Kizhakku Cheemaiyilae’, ‘Duet’, ‘Kadhalan’, ‘Bombay’, ‘May Madham’, ‘Indian’, ‘Muthu’, ‘Kadhal Desam’, ‘Love Birds’, ‘Sapney’, ‘Jeans’, ‘Dil Se..’, ‘Kadhalar Dhinam’, ‘Sangamam’, ‘En Swasa Katrae’ and many others. His 1995 soundtrack for ‘ Bombay ‘ crossed 5 million units and Rahman had arrived as the ‘King of Indian Music’ with sales of more than 50 million albums over a period of 3 years. The success continued with films like ‘Dil Se…’ with Manirathnam, and ‘ Taal ‘ with Subhash Ghai. After working in many movies of the typical popular genre, several offbeat reputed directors and producers like Govind Nihalani, Shyam Benegal, Deepa Mehta have worked with Rahman in movies like ‘Thakshak’, ‘Zubeidaa’, ‘Fire’, and ‘1947 Earth’.