Hari (director)

Hari (born 26 December 1968) is an Indian movie director, best known for his action-masala in Tamil cinema. He made his directional debut in the movie Thamizh (2002).After this breakthrough, he gave many commercial success movies such as Saamy (2003), Kovil (2004), Ayya (2005), Thaamirabharani (2007), Vel (2007) and Singam (2010) movie. He has directed 15 movies.

Harikrishnan
Hari at the 62nd Filmfare South Awards
Born	Harikrishnan (1968-12-26) 26 December 1968 (age 56) Thoothukudi, Tamil Nadu, India
Occupation	Movie director
Years active	2002–present
Spouse	Preetha Vijayakumar
Children	3

Background

Hari was born in the Thoothukudi District of Tamil Nadu, India. His father, Gopal, is a vessels merchant.^[1] Later, his family moved to Chennai, where Hari graduated with a degree in Commerce.

Career

Hari first joined as an assistant, gaining experience by working with various directors; K. Natraj in Valli, Nassar in Avatharam and Alex Pandian. Later, he assisted K. Balachander in his film Kalki and worked as an associate director with Saran in the films Amarkalam, Parthen Rasithen and Alli Arjuna.^[2][3][4][5]

His first film, in 2002, was Thamizh, with Prashanth and Simran. Film critic Balaji commented that it was "one of the few movies in recent times where a lot of importance seems to have been attached to the script. In spite of the flimsy story and routine screenplay where a youth grows to be a "dada", the dialogs elevate the quality of the movie and make it very enjoyable".^[6] His second film Saamy, under the Kavithaalaya banner, starred Vikram. It was named the year's biggest hit,^[7] grossing ₹160 million.^[8] Its success led to remakes; in Telugu (Lakshmi Narasimha),^[9] Kannada (Ayya)^[10] and Hindi languages (Policegiri).^[11] His next two films Kovil, with Silambarasan and Arul also starred Vikram. In 2005, he made Ayya, starring Sarathkumar, which introduced Nayantara to Tamil cinema. His next film was Aaru, with Suriya in 2005. In 2007, he directed two films, Thaamirabharani with Vishal and Vel, with Suriya. In 2008, he directed Seval, with Bharath. Ayyappa Prasad from Nowrunning.com stated that Hari "panders to the taste of his rural audience all the way, but the movie is bound to disappoint city-dwellers, since neither the story nor its treatment appeal to anyone with high IQ .^[12]

In 2010 Hari directed his tenth film Singam, with Suriya, marking their third collaboration.^[13] although reviewers identified it as a standard masala entertainer.^[14][15]

Filmography

Year	Film	Cast	Notes
2002	Thamizh	Prashanth, Simran
2003	Saamy	Vikram, Trisha
2004	Kovil	Silambarasan, Sonia Agarwal
2004	Arul	Vikram, Jyothika
2005	Ayya	R. Sarathkumar, Napoleon, Nayanthara
2005	Aaru	Suriya, Trisha
2007	Thaamirabharani	Vishal, Bhanu
2007	Vel	Suriya, Asin
2008	Seval	Bharath, Simran, Poonam Bajwa
2010	Singam	Suriya, Anushka Shetty, Prakash Raj
2011	Venghai	Dhanush, Rajkiran, Tamannaah
2013	Singam II	Suriya, Anushka Shetty, Hansika Motwani
2014	Poojai	Vishal, Shruthi Haasan, Sathyaraj
2017	Singam III	Suriya, Anushka Shetty, Shruthi Haasan
2018	Saamy 2	Vikram, Keerthy Suresh, Bobby Simha
2019	Arun Vijay	Arun Vijay, Priya Anand, Sameera Reddy	Pre-Production

Lyricist

• 2004 Kovil
• 2005 Aaru
• 2007 Thaamirabharani
• 2007 Vel
• 2008 Seval
• 2010 Singam
• 2011 Venghai
• 2017 Singam III
• 2018 Saamy 2
• 2024 Radan