Meera (1945)

மீரா

Meera, a zealous devotee of Lord Krishna, considers him to be her husband. She gets married to Rana Bhojraj, but follows her own way of living which is not acceptable to her husband and the society.

Date of release
1945-11-03
TMDB
9.0 / 10 (1)
Runtime
2h 16m
Genres
Drama
Director
Ellis R. Dungan, E. S. Tunda

Casting

Interesting facts

Meera is a 1945 Indian Tamil-language historical musical film directed by Ellis R. Dungan, produced by T. Sadasivam and written by Kalki Krishnamurthy. Based on the life of the 16th century mystic and poet Mirabai, the film stars M. S. Subbulakshmi as the eponymous character, a zealous devotee of Krishna, who considers him to be her husband. Despite marrying Rana, she follows her own way of living, which is unacceptable to her husband and his family.

Production

T. Sadasivam wanted to produce a film that would make his singer wife M. S. Subbulakshmi's music available to the average person, so he started looking for a good story. He had several discussions with friends like Kalki Krishnamurthy and was of the opinion that if Subbulakshmi was to act in a film, it could not be a mass entertainer, but would need to carry a universal and uplifting message.

While Subbulakshmi was cast as Meera, her stepdaughter Radha was recruited to play the character's younger version. To prepare for the part, Subbulakshmi decided to go to all the places where Meera had wandered in search of the elusive Krishna, and worship at all the temples where she worshipped. Honnappa Bhagavathar was the first choice to play Meera's husband Rana. Although he accepted the offer, he was ultimately not hired.

The husband-and-wife comedy duo N. S. Krishnan and T. A. Mathuram were supposed to have appeared in Meera. However, Krishnan was arrested in December 1944 as a suspect in the Lakshmikanthan murder case, and he was replaced by T. S. Durairaj, who portrayed Narendran; Madhuram did not remain on the project. T. S. Mani and M. G. Ramachandran shared the role of a minister named Jayamal.

Production began in 1944 at Newtone Studio in Madras, before moving to North India, particularly Rajasthan, for location shooting. According to filmmaker and historian Karan Bali, Dungan and Banerji "did a series of elaborate lighting tests on a specially created bust of [Subbulakshmi]. They shot the bust using different camera heights and angles with varied lighting schemes.

At Udaipur, Sadasivam required some royal elephants and horses for the shooting schedule. After Sadasivam made the request to the Maharana of Udaipur, the Maharana agreed to help the crew with whatever they needed beyond elephants and horses.

Read on Wikipedia · Text from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. Data from Wikidata.

Recommended