Sivaji 2007


Sivaji Interesting Facts

As of July 2007, "Shivaji" is highest grossing Tamil movie ever. It grossed 100 crores (1 billion) Indian rupees in it's third weekend. First Tamil film and non-Hindi Indian movie to gross 100 crores and also the fastest Indian movie to gross that much.

Rajinikanth appears as a white skinned European guy in a song sequence. The Digital skin grafting effects used to create the dark skinned Rajini into a white skin guy took almost one year with the help of 25 technicians. All this, with the help of computer graphics that lifts a European woman's skin and grafts it into the superstar's face. Each of the over 6,500 frames had to be worked on individually and he same process has been used to create an almost black Rajini in the song sequence too. This process is said to be the first in Indian cinema, if not in World cinema. "Whatever shot we took with Rajini sir, we took with a white girl we selected. We went for the girl because she would have softer skin and flushed cheeks. We took the tone and texture from her face and applied it on his face," said cinematographer 'Anand K. V.'.

In the film, "Boss" stands for "Bachelor of Social Service."

Sivaji is the first ever Tamil Movie to appear in the U.K Top Ten. It was released in just 12 screens all over U.K and gained the nineth place.

S.P. Balasubrahmanyam sang a segment of "Balleilakka" for two minutes non-stop.

After helping make S. Shankar's last film Anniyan (2005) a success, Prakash Raj was almost immediately selected to play the role of Adisesha in this film. However, he couldn't accept the role due to conflicting schedules with other films, so the role was offered to big names like Sathyaraj, Mohanlal, Amitabh Bachchan, Sanjay Dutt and Nana Patekar, before it was finally accepted by Suman.

The movie was released with 4600 prints worldwide and created a record in India as the only movie to be screened with more than 700 shows on a single day. Hyderabad (142 shows) and Chennai (140 shows) together account for 282 shows on it's first day.

Grossed 300 million rupees in it's first weekend. Most Tamil films would not make that amount totally.

Sivaji is the first Indian film to incorporate the latest 4K resolution technology that is used only on big-budget Hollywood films. In India, 2K resolution for digital intermediate (DI) is the set standard.

This is 168th film for AVM, the production company and the 100th Tamil film (not counting his other language films) for Rajinikanth.

The song "Sahana" was shot in a glass palace constructed solely for the song at a cost of Rs. 1 crore. After shooting, the palace was taken apart and all the glass panes were sold.

A notable lyric in the song "Balleilakka" goes: "Annan vandha / Tamil Nadum America" (" If Sivaji comes to Tamil Nadu, / it will become America"). Rajinikanth, originally a bus conductor from Karnataka, arrived in Tamil Nadu, and changed it forever by becoming its biggest Superstar.

A trailer of Rajinikanth's next film, the animated feature Sultan (2008), was released and shown with this film.

In the first half of the film, Sivaji (Rajinikanth) parts his hair from the left. This is reminiscent of Rajini's original trademark hairdo before the late 80s.

The word "Balleilakka" is derived from the balalaika, a Russian guitar.

The song "Balleilakka" features most of the crew in the film.

Vadivelu was considered for the role of Sivaji's "Mama" (Uncle), after he received rave reviews for his comic chemistry in Chandramukhi (2005) with Rajinikanth, however Vivek was selected.

Was set to be released in April 14th 2007, was postponed to May and finally to June 15th 2007. The continuous change in the release date of the film has caused a confusion in the Tamil film industry. Many other big films stayed away because they don't want to clash with Shivaji, in the end there were no big release for the months of April and May. For the first time in the history of Tamil commercial cinema since the 50's there was no big summer release.

Sivaji is one of the costliest Tamil and Indian film ever made. Rumoured to cost between 650-800 million Indian rupees.

The casting for the role of Thamizhselvi was legendary, possibly rivalling that of the original Superman (1978). To begin with, Aishwarya Rai Bachchan had been considered to play the role as a favour for director S. Shankar, who gave her her first hit with Jeans (1998); however, she turned down the role, due to her marriage and crowded filming schedules. Then Ayesha Takia was offered the role, but she turned it down because she had problems with the Tamil language. Next, Rani Mukerji was offered the role, but she asked too large a fee and so was dropped. Jyotika, Trisha Krishnan. 'Nayantara (II)' and Sneha were all considered and rejected before finally Shriya Saran was chosen.

The song "Style" was shot in Bilbao, Spain.

The hospital seen in the film was actually a remodelled bank.

First Tamil film and the first non Hindi Indian movie to feature in UK Top 10.

Rajinikanth officially told that director Shankar approached him with three stories,one of them was shivaji and the other one enthiran which had the same actor and the third one, I which was a milestone in actor Vikram's Carrier.

THis movie was shot in M.S. Ramayya college BANGALORE for 2 days To shoot an important sequence and many tried to get glimpse of Rajnikanth and ended getting their camera confiscated for filming illegally

For this movie, Rajinikanth reportedly received a renumeration of 26 crore RS., Making him the second highest paid actor in Asia.

The title track was the first song shot for the film. It was also the most expensive song shot for the film, costing Rs. 3.5 crores.

Although in the movie it is shown that the protagonist dies with electrocution and later revived with DC version. This might seem imaginary and dramatic. Although the same is possible. A person following electrocution can enter a state of 'suspended animation' with no respiration and mild cardiac arrythmia and no pulse. This can be confused with death. In such cases ECG can be taken to confirm death. DC version ( electric stimulation of heart) can be given to revive the person.

The dubbed Hindi version did not have a theatrical release in British Columbia,Canada.

Awards Won

2007 National Film Awards

2008 Filmfare Awards South

2007 Vijay Awards

2007 Tamil Nadu State Film Awards

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