The story focuses on the life of Sabhapathy. He is the football-crazy son of an alcoholic and lives in the slums. However, he lives a comfortable life and plays football with his mates as he completes his college career. He meets Meera and develops a liking for her. He slowly starts to love her but is afraid to express his love since she is rich and would react hastily. However, he later does confirm his love to her, and she accepts. When Sabha leaves for a football match with his college, he promises he will propose to her as soon as he gets back. Sabha returns from his match to only find out that Meera has died. He slips into a psychotic depression, travelling with Meera's dead body. To make matters even worse, the police are after him. The film ends as he commits suicide after killing Meera's uncle Kasirajan, who murdered her in order to gain her wealth.
Sridhar in a special appearance in the song "Naaka Mukka"
Production
Nakul, who was one of the heroes in Boys made his comeback through this film and he has reduced over 20 kilograms to play the lead role in the film. A stunt sequence was shot in Mettupalayam and Nakul performed it without any dupe. The film was shot at locations in Chennai, Ooty, Thalakkonam, Mudumalai, Pollachi, Valparai, Masinagudi, Gudalar, Udumalpet, Coimbatore and Kodaikanal. The film marked the foray of the Sun Network into film distribution through their newly founded production company Sun Pictures.
Soundtrack
The soundtrack has nine tracks, composed by Vijay Antony except track "Unakena Naan" by the director himself. The lyrics were written by Thamarai, P.V.Prasath, Nepolian and Priyan. The song "Nakka Mukka" met with tremendous response from the youth and was on everyone's lips. The soundtrack met with critical acclaim and made Vijay Antony famous. The song "Naaka Mukka" would eventually go on to be featured in the Bollywood film, The Dirty Picture. "Unakkena Naan" is based on Rihanna's "Unfaithful".
Release
The film was lying in the cans for one year and Sun Pictures bought the film making it their first film. The film opened alongside Sakkarakatti at the box office on 26 September 2008 with the media hyping that it was a battle of two films with debutants and successful soundtracks. The success of the film led Nakul and Sunaina reunite again in Maasilamani which too was promoted by Sun Pictures and became successful. PV Prasad started another project "Eppadi Manasukkul Vanthai" for he was held in cheating case and the film was finally released in 2012.
Critical reception
Rediff wrote: "Kadhalil Vizhundhen achieves at least in part, what other love-stories fail to do -- to bring a genuine lump in your throat at times". IndiaGlitz praised the director writing, "with a lesser known star cast, director Prasad has managed to weave a sequence of some interesting and catchy sequences...the end product, through gory and violent, leaves an impact with the audience." Behindwoods said overall the movie "deals with a regular theme in a refreshing manner", and the director of the film "understood perfectly the requirements of the script" and "has taken quite a few cinematic liberties but has handled all of them well which keep boredom or ridicule well at bay".
