Mundasupatti

Gopi, a Sathyamangalam-based photographer, and his assistant Alagumani arrive at a remote village called Mundasupatti on an assignment. The natives of this village are superstitious; they fear getting photographed, believing it will lead to death.

Ram Kumar had shot about 10 short films for the TV show, Naalaya Iyakunar. When Kadhalil Sodhappuvadhu Yeppadi released, he said he was inspired to make his own film. He took a year off to work on the script and to select his actors. He called it a challenge to convert the script for a short film into a full-length one and stated that he had added new characters for the film version.[1]

Vishnu Vishal was cast for the lead role, with the director stating that he wanted "someone who is funny, but very subtly so".[1] Vishnu, who had till then only played characters that were emotional,[4] for the first time attempted a full-length comedy role, who felt it was "very refreshing"[5] and added that "for the first time, I could relate to my character".[3] Nandita Swetha was signed for the lead female role,[6] and Ram said that he wanted "someone who is dusky" for the role of Kalaivaani, adding that he was impressed by her performance in Attakathi.[1] Kaali Venkat who had been part of the original short film played the assistant to Vishnu's character.[4][5] Ramdoss, seen in small roles previously, was given the role of an aspiring actor, a "fantastic role", according to him, that, he said, gave him "a lot of scope for acting".[5]

The filming started on 28 August 2013[7] and was completed by October 2013.[2] The film was shot in 57 days,[3] in Sathyamangalam, which has houses that are over a 100 years old.[1] Vishnu's Hollywood Photo Studio was located at Nirmala Theatre Road, Sathyamangalam.

The film's soundtrack was composed by independent musician Sean Roldan. It was the first film project he had signed on, although two of his soundtrack albums got released before the release of Mundasupatti.[8] Sean Roldan had composed seven tracks for the film, besides singing three of them. The lyrics for the songs were written by Muthamil and GKB. The soundtrack album was launched along with the film's trailer on 9 May 2014 at the Suryan FM 93.5 Radio station, Chennai.[9]

The songs as well as the score received very positive feedback by critics. Behindwoods gave it 3.25 out of 5 stars and called it "one of the most enterprising albums of this year".[10] Musicaloud.com gave it a score of 8.5 out of 10 and wrote, "There seems to be no stopping Sean Roldan".[11] Rediff wrote, "Sean Roldan's rustic songs and background score are definitely the highlights of the film, especially the folk styled Rasa Maharasa and the beautiful melody Idhu Enna".[12] Deccan Chronicle wrote, "The [other] standout of the film was Sean Roldan's background and music. His catchy but affectionate songs fit very well with the clayey tones of the film – which is to say that they mould and reshape the landscape in lieu with the plot".[13] Milliblog reviewed "Like Santhosh Narayanan, Sean Roldan is truly on a roll with his inventive spin on conventional Tamil film music."[14] The Rare Field reviewed as "Composer Sean Roldan hits the bulls-eye yet again, and with Mundasupatti, he has a hat-trick on his hands!"[15]

The satellite rights of the film were sold to STAR Vijay.[16] To promote the film the makers had created an interactive application on the website, www.mymundasupattistyle.com that allowed visitors to create their own avatars akin to characters from Mundasupatti.[17] The idea was well received and had gone viral on the social networking sites.[18]

A special screening of Mundasupatti was arranged for distributors and exhibitors couple of days prior to the release. Subsequently, the film opened across nearly 207 screens in Tamil Nadu, which was considered "very high for a Vishnu film".[19] The film released on 13 June 2014 alongside five other Tamil releases, but according to Sify.com, it got "the best of screens and prime shows in multiplexes".[20]

• Mundasupatti at IMDb