Pencil is a 2016Indian Tamil school-based mysterythriller film written and directed by debutant Mani Nagaraj and produced by S. P. Ragavesh. The film is based on South Korean film4th Period Mystery released in 2009. The film stars G. V. Prakash Kumar and Sri Divya, with the former also composing the film's music. The film was released on 13 May 2016.
Plot
Shiva is the best student at his school. His rival Nithin, the son of a leading film star and a spoiled brat, takes any and every opportunity to knock him down both verbally and physically, and the two are known enemies amongst the other students. One day, Nithin burns Shiva's thesis, and when Shiva finds out, he assaults Nithin in front of the whole school until the school management intervenes. Later, Shiva returns to his class to fight Nithin once again, but this time he finds him dead, with his neck stabbed repeatedly with a sharp pencil. Shiva removes the bloody pencil from Nithin's neck just as his classmate and love interest, Maya Srinivasan shows up, catching him in a most incriminating position. Fortunately for him, she not only believes his innocence, but also offers to help him to solve the mystery and catch the real killer – a task made particularly urgent by the fact that in 40 minutes, the rest of the class will return and the body will be discovered. The suspects are many: the school driver with whom Nithin has a fight over an open wall behind the school; a local goon who enters the school through the open wall to meet his girlfriend, only to be driven out by Nithin; the chemistry teacher Sridhar, whose romantic relationship with his colleague Nandhini ends after Nithin secretly records an intimate video of the two and blackmails Nandhini with that video to do what he says; and Nithin's ex-girlfriend Indhulekha, whose 8-year-old friend Divya is accidentally killed by Nithin when she tries to break up with him and is constantly harassed and blackmailed by Nithin not to report to the school management or the police about the murder. In the end, Maya and Shiva catch the real killer, who is also a staff at the school and father of Divya. It is also shown that Maya and Shiva are united.
In October 2013, it was announced that music composer G. V. Prakash Kumar would make his debut as an actor with Mani Nagaraj's Pencil, a school based thriller film. The team initially approached Samantha and then Priya Anand however both were unable to sign on, due to their busy filming schedule, and subsequently Sri Divya was recruited to portray the lead female role. Shariq, son of actors Riyaz Khan and Uma Riyaz was announced to make his acting debut with a supporting role in the film. Director Mani Nagraj, who was a friend of Riyaz Khan offered the role of Nithin to his son Shariq Hassan, after seeing his photos on Facebook. Still photographs from the film's initial photo shoot were released to the media in November 2013, earning positive reaction from critics.
Soundtrack
composed the soundtrack, which consists of 8 tracks including 4 songs, 3 karaoke tracks and 1 reprise. The album was released on 19 February 2015 in Suryan FM. Sify wrote, "Pencil is not an engaging album on the lines of Darling & is likely to work when viewed along with the visuals".
