Lingaa

Rajinikanth turned 64 on 12 December 2014, and his fans celebrated in cinemas: that was the day 'Lingaa' opened, the first time one of his films had been released on his birthday. It reunited him with director K. S. Ravikumar fifteen years after 'Padayappa', and gave fans two Rajinis for the price of one. He plays a present day petty thief and his grandfather, an engineer and king who built a dam to save his people under the British Raj.

In the village of Solaiyur, a corrupt politician wants to tear down the old dam and build a new one so he can pocket the contract. The inspector who won't declare it unsafe hides the evidence in a temple that's been shut for seventy years, and the village head is convinced only a descendant of Raja Lingeswaran can open it. His granddaughter Lakshmi, a journalist, sets off to find one.

She finds Lingaa, a smooth talking thief who wants nothing to do with a grandfather who left his family penniless. Once he's finally in Solaiyur, the villagers welcome him like a hero and all he can think about is what's inside the temple: a lingam made of emerald. But the village still remembers who Lingeswaran was, and that story might change the way he sees things.

Anushka Shetty plays Lakshmi, and Sonakshi Sinha, in her Tamil film debut, is Bharathi, the woman at Lingeswaran's side in 1939. Jagapathi Babu is the villain, Santhanam supplies the comedy and A. R. Rahman wrote the music. The whole thing was shot in just six months, in Mysore, at Ramoji Film City in Hyderabad and, for the climax, at Linganamakki Dam and Jog Falls.

Critics were divided. Most couldn't resist Rajinikanth's charisma, but plenty complained about a running time of nearly three hours and an over the top climax. It opened huge, yet it cost so much that many Tamil Nadu distributors lost money and ended up asking the star to compensate them.

• Action
• Comedy
• Drama