Hyderabad: Manjummel Boys, a Malayalam survival thriller starring Soubin Shahir and Sreenath Bhasi, has been making headlines this year. However, this time not for the right reasons. R. Ilaiyaraaja, an ace music composer, has sent a legal notice to the makers of Manjummel Boys for "unlawfully" exploiting the song Kanmani Anbodu Kaadhalan from the Tamil film Guna in their film without his approval, permission, or licence.
Manjummel Boys, as previously said, is a survival thriller film that follows the story of a group of 11 friends planning a trip to Kodaikkanal. The picture takes a grim turn when one of the friends falls into a pit inside the Guna Caves, which is named after Kamal Haasan's 1991 film of the same title. The plot revolves around how the other characters battle against all odds to save their friend.
Throughout the film, the protagonists make many references to the Kamal Haasan film, which also serves as the main reason for the characters' excursion to the cave. Furthermore, the film's producers incorporated the song Kanmani Anbodu from the 1991 picture at a pivotal time in the film. Now, Ilaiyaraaja has sent a copyright notice to the creators as a result of this usage.
The renowned musician claims that the song has been used without his consent. Earlier, a YouTube journalist brought up a similar accusation against director Prem Kumar, who is best known for the 2018 romantic film '96, in March of this year. The journalist claimed that neither '96 nor Manjummel Boys had obtained permission to use Ilaiyaraaja's songs in their respective movies.
Prem Kumar, however, was quick to refute these claims, stating that the creators of both films had obtained consent to use Ilaiyaraaja's songs through Think Music and other record firms. He added that incorporating the Maestro's songs into their films was more of an homage to him because they had grown up listening to them. However, the copyright notice issued by Ilaiyaraaja suggests otherwise—at least with regard to Manjummel Boys.
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