Athbhutha Dweepu


Albhutha Dweepu is a 2005 Malayalam-language Indian Fantasy movie, directed by Vinayan. The film stars the ensemble cast led by Guinness Pakru, Prithviraj Sukumaran, Mallika Kapoor, Jagathy Sreekumar, Jagadeesh and Indrans. The movie is about a mysterious island where all the men are dwarfs and all the women are of normal height. The men over there consider tall men as Monsters.
Albhutha Dweepu was released in 2005 and the remake rights were sold almost immediately to Hollywood director Ron Howard who was in India at that time. But later the project was cancelled. The film was dubbed in Tamil as Arputha Theevu with additional scenes reshot with Manivannan, Karunas and Vaiyapuri. Tamil version was released in 2007.
The film features Guinness Pakru as the dwarf prince Gajendra. He has made an entry into the Guinness Book of Records through this character for being the shortest actor to play a full-length character in a film.

Plot

The movie takes place on Athbutha Dweepu, an island inhabited by dwarves. All the men are dwarves, although the women are of a normal height. The ruler of the island, King invites various princes to his capital city of Vamanapuri in order to compete for the hands of his five daughters. Four of his daughters are successfully engaged, but the youngest princess, Princess Radha, has no wish to get married. Nonetheless, decides to have her engaged to Prince Gajendra, his nephew and heir, who is in love with Radha. In order to celebrate the engagements, the king orders a week of celebration.
Meanwhile, two men who work for the Indian Navy, wash up on the shore. They are killed by the island's inhabitants who see them as demons. Hari, Madhavan, Joseph and Indrans also work for the Indian Navy, and are also trapped on the island. They witness the death of their comrades and flee from the dwarves. They decide to take refuge in an old temple in the forest.
The princess go along with Mallika, their handmaiden to the temple of their god, Gandharva, in order to pray. Mallika is secretly the king's mistress although they are both terrified that the king's two wives would find out about the affair. On the way, the princesses and Mallika come across Devamma, a wisewoman. Devamma tells them about Gandharva. A thousand years ago, Gandharva fell in love with the king's daughter. The daughter's suitor came to know of this and planned to use black magic to kill Gandharva. However the daughter stole the magic and gave it to Gandharva. In his anger, Gandharva cursed all the men on the island to become dwarfs. In addition, he decreed that any man to step inside his temple would have his head explode. Out of gratitude to the king's daughter, Gandharva agreed to protect the island for a thousand years. Devamma cautions them that the thousand years has elapsed, making the island vulnerable once more.
When Mallika offers food as a sacrifice to Gandharva, Hari and his friends eat it without Mallika's knowledge, making her believe that Gandharva ate the offering. While exploring the temple, Radha comes across Hari in the temple and believes due to his height that he is the real Gandharvan. Both of them fall in love with each other at the first sight. Hari begs Radha not to reveal their hiding place. Radha agrees and comes by herself later with food. As Radha exits the temple she is caught by Gajendran. Gajendran asks why she is at the temple at such a late hour. To avoid being caught, Radha tells Gajendra that Gandharva appeared in one of her dreams and summoned her to the temple. She then feigns illness. The royal priest tells the king to host a puja in order to exorcise Gandharva.
Gajendra, angry at what he perceives as Gandharva possessing Radha, decides to enter the Gandharvan Temple to find out the truth only to be frightened by the disguised Hari. They kidnap the king when he finds out the truth and disguise themselves as Brahmachari saints, only to be found out and sentenced to death.
When the dwarfs are about to execute the death sentence they are attacked by Gigantic Cannibals who attack and kill most of the men. Hari and his friends manage to escape and fight against the Cannibals and succeed in defeating them, thus saving the kingdom. Madhavan forgives them and allows them to sail to their homeland with Radha.

Cast

; Tamil version
The Soundtrack was Composed by M. Jayachandran and Lyrics were written by Kaithapram Damodaran Namboodiri.

Release

Box office

The film received positive reviews from the audience. The film was a 2005 commercial box-office success.