Pingami


Pingami is a 1994 Indian Malayalam-language drama thriller film directed by Sathyan Anthikkad and written by Reghunath Paleri based on his own short story Kumarettan Parayaatha Kadha. It was produced by Mohanlal through the company Pranavam Arts, and stars himself along with Thilakan, Kanaka, and Jagathy Sreekumar. The music was composed by Johnson.

Plot

Captain Vijay is an army captain who is on his annual leave and has come to stay with his maternal uncle and aunt who raised him and his younger sister after the untimely death of their parents and their youngest sister. In a turn of events Vijay sees a social worker named Kumaran injured from an accident and crying for help. He takes Kumaran to a hospital but cannot save his life. There develops a strong bond between Kumaran and Vijay, which pulls him into finding out the accident was a pre-planned murder.
With the help of his friend Kutti Hassan, he starts on a trail to find out the mystery behind the murder and in the midst, he finds out the missing links of his own life. As the film proceeds it is revealed that Kumaran was murdered by the same people who killed Vijay's father. Vijay finally takes revenge upon his enemies in his own method. Meanwhile, he falls in love with Kumaran's daughter Sridevi. He gets his mentally ill mother and youngest sister who were believed to be dead but were in fact in a charity home. It is shown earlier that Kumaran took the baby girl to that home.

Cast

Pingami was based on Raghunath Paleri's short story Kumarettan Parayatha Katha. He also wrote the screenplay. Sathyan Anthikkad made a genre change with Pingami who was usually known for making comical family dramas.

Soundtrack

The film features songs composed by Johnson and written by Kaithapram.
TrackSong TitleSinger
1"Themmaadikkaatte Ninnaatte"K. J. Yesudas, M. G. Sreekumar
2"Vennilavo"K. S. Chithra

Release

The film was released on 27 May 1994. It did not performed well at the box office at the time of release. However, over the years the film has achieved a cult following among moviegoers. In a retrospect review in 2019, Kerala Kaumudi described Pingami as the most underrated revenge drama ever in Malayalam cinema.