Baba
File:Baba (film).jpg Baba DVD cover.
Directed by	Suresh Krishna
Produced by	Rajinikanth[1]
Screenplay by	Rajinikanth
Story by	Rajinikanth
Starring	Rajinikanth Manisha Koirala Goundamani M. N. Nambiar Ashish Vidyarthi Sujatha Vijayakumar Riyaz Khan Karunas Shayaji Shinde Amrish Puri
Music by	A. R. Rahman
Editing by	V. T. Vijayan
Release date(s)	11 August 2002
Running time	179 min.
Country	‹See Tfd› India
Language	Tamil
Box office	20 crores

Baba (Tamil: பாபா) is a 2002 Tamil fantasy-action film starring and written by Rajinikanth and directed by Suresh Krishna. The film's cast included Manisha Koirala, Vijayakumar, M. N. Nambiar, Goundamani, Sujatha, Karunas, Ashish Vidyarthi, Amrish Puri, Sayaji Shinde and Riyaz Khan. Guest roles and special appearances were performed by Ramya Krishnan, Sarath Babu, Lawrence Raghavendra, Prabhu Deva, Radha Ravi and Nassar. Soundtrack and background music were composed by A. R. Rahman.

The film's story is about a carefree young atheist, Baba, who is a reincarnation of a failed saint from the Himalayas. After several twists and problems caused by corrupt local politicians, Baba is taken to Mahavatar Babaji, whom Baba was a follower of in his last life. Baba gets tested by the deity and is given seven chances of wishes; the test is that if he uses any one of the wishes for his own personal desires, he would have to take many more births for him to get rid of the karma.

Plot[link]

The film opens with the birth of Baba (Rajinikanth), who is a 'baba amsa sambhootudu'. Baba grows up as an atheist, hot-blooded guy and a Good Samaritan. His life style includes consuming alcohol, smoking beedi, chewing paan parag, His mother (Sujatha) and his maternal uncle (M. N. Nambiar) are ardent devotees of Mahavatar Babaji (the Baba who is supposed to be of 2000 years old and who live in Himalayas). Chamundeswari (Manisha Koirala) stays in the neighborhood of Baba and they fall in love.

Baba involves in a physical feud with the son of a state minister Ippo Ramaswamy (Ashish Vidyarthi). Ramaswamy demolishes the colony of Baba. When Baba is about to go to fight with Ramaswamy, Baba's mother urges him to maintain calm and rebuild lost colony it by working hard. Baba joins as a labor in a shop and earns money. Chamundeswari tells Baba that she is not willing to marry a daily labor. Then Baba realizes that so far he has been only answerable for his mother. And if he gets married then he has to live for wife and kids. And he would become answerable to them. He would not be able to help for the society as he might become selfish after marriage. He feels that prema (love) is maya (illusion). At that time, a weird looking sadhu comes to him and tell him that its time for getting enlightened. Baba is taken to Himalayas where he meets the real Baba. He gets frightened by the atmosphere and wishes to return back to Chennai. Then real Baba grants 7 wishes to Baba. He can use any of these wishes anytime he wishes to utilize. Baba is sent back to Chennai. Baba still could not believe that he went to Himalayas met real Baba. He uses that mantra to test the power by wishing a flying kite to come and fall in his hand. He waits for a few seconds and decide that it was all his illusion. Later the kite follows him to his house and falls on his hand. He feels that its coincidental and tries the mantra again to a different kite and wishes it to fall on his lap. He goes into his house and closes all the possible entries in the house. But the kite makes its way and falls on his lap. That is where he realizes that Baba is real and God exists in the world. He still has five more wishes left. And the minister Ramaswamy comes to know about it. They call a tantrik (Amrish Puri) to foil Baba's magic powers.

Baba spends 3 more wishes for trivial things. The sixth wish is used to revive a patient fighting for his life. Ramaswamy's boss Purushottaman wants to become the permanent chief minister of the state using Baba's boons. He also tries to kill Baba but this attempt fails due to the blessings of Babaji. The final wish is then used to install an unselfish chief minister for the state. Once his wishes are used up, Baba has the choice of living with Babaji at the Himalayas or returning to his life in the material world. But when Baba is just about to ascend to the Himalayas, the villains kill the loyal chief minister. Baba turns back and the film ends with the tag "To be continued...." .

Cast[link]

• Rajinikanth as Baba and Mahavatar Babaji (voice only)
• Manisha Koirala as Chamundeeswari
• Goundamani as Annamalai
• M. N. Nambiar as Baba's maternal uncle
• Ashish Vidyarthi as Ippo Ramaswamy
• Sujatha as Baba's mother
• Vijayakumar as Chamundeeswari's father
• Riyaz Khan as son of Ippo Ramaswamy
• Karunas as Africa
• Sayaji Shinde as Divyananda Bharathi
• Amrish Puri as Guruji
• Ramya Krishnan as Neelambari (Guest appearance)
• Nassar as Suryaprakash (Guest appearance)
• Radha Ravi as MLA (Guest appearance)
• Sarath Babu in a special appearance
• Prabhu Deva in a cameo appearance
• Lawrence Raghavendra in a cameo appearance

Release[link]

The film was a commercial success and continued to top the year's charts profiting $5 million at the box office.^{[2][not in citation given]} In 2008, after the disaster of Kuselan, the exhibitors and distributors of Baba, who have declared the losses of the film 6 years ago, have surprisingly claimed the film as a super-hit as Rajnikanth himself settled the losses.^{[citation needed]}

Soundtrack[link]

The soundtrack consists of 6 songs composed by A. R. Rahman. The songs were recorded in 2002 June. Rahman had to record them online as he was in London with the works of Bombay Dreams.^[3] The soundtrack album was released on July 2002 in Chennai.^[4] According to Rahman, he has tried innovations with Baba, giving more than the jingoistic music that is a characteristic part of a Rajni movie.^[5] The songs, especially the tracks "Maya Maya" and "Sakthi Kodu", turned out to be big hits and were considered one of the highlights in Baba.^[6] Some of the songs were filmed from Europe.^[7]

A controversy regarding the soundtrack originated when lyricist Vairamuthu expressed dissatisfaction over the online recording. Rahman defended this saying, "Busy as I was with Bombay Dreams, it was simply impossible for me to be in Chennai. Sometimes it is inevitable, in a situation like this, where the reputation and money of somebody else is at stake."^[3] Rahman also faced criticisms from the film fraternity for not recording the songs in time.^[8] Another controversy was that Dravida Kazhagam objected to the lyrics of a song that had to be partially deleted from the film later. They have taken objection to what they have called unfair commentary on Periyar E. V. Ramasamy and Ramaswami's ideology.^[5][9]

Rahman introduced Reena Bhardwaj through the song "Kichchu Tha". This song was reused with different instrumentation and vocals in Swades (2004).

References[link]

External links[link]

• Baba at the Internet Movie Database

Look up baba, bába, bàba, babà, or babă in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

Baba and similar words may refer to:

Geography[link]

• Baba, Masovian Voivodeship (east-central Poland)
• Baba, Mogilno County in Kuyavian-Pomeranian Voivodeship (north-central Poland)
• Baba, Rypin County in Kuyavian-Pomeranian Voivodeship (north-central Poland)
• Baba, Greater Poland Voivodeship (west-central Poland)
• Baba Mountain, Macedonia
• Baba Mountain, Serbia, a mountain in Serbia
• Baba mountain range, also known as Koh-i-Baba, in the Hindu Kush of Afghanistan
• Baba Budangiri, a mountain and eponymous range in the Western Ghats of India
• Cape Baba, a cape in Turkey
• Baba Canton, a canton in Los Ríos Province, Ecuador
• Baba, a village in Horea Commune, Alba County, Romania
• Baba (Hungarian: Bába), a village in Coroieni Commune, Maramureş County, Romania
• Baba River (Ghelinţa), Romania
• Baba River (Putna), Romania
• Baba River (Macedonia), in the Republic of Macedonia, noted for Kolešino Waterfall

People[link]

• Baba (name), people with the given and surname
• Baba (honorific), an honorific used in several South Asian and Middle Eastern cultures

Folklore[link]

• Baba (goddess) or Bau, a Sumerian goddess depicted with the head of a dog
• Baba (Egyptian god)‎ or Babi, an Egyptian god in the shape of a baboon

Films[link]

• Bàba or Father, a Chinese film
• Baba (2002 film), a 2002 Tamil film
• Bába (2008 film), a 2008 short Czech film

Other uses[link]

• Baba (nickname), meaning father in Pakistan, Indian(Marathi/Maharastra), Middle Eastern, and African cultures & grandmother in Ukrainian, Macedonian, Serbian and other Slavic languages
• Baba (Alevism), an Alevi religious leader
• Babá, Brazilian politician
• Baba (cake) or Babka, a Polish yeast cake
• Baba (yacht), a line of yachts built in Taiwan
• Baba (Pillow Pal), a Pillow Pal lamb made by Ty, Inc.
• Baba (The Kite Runner), a character in The Kite Runner media
• Baba (Dragon Ball), a character in Dragon Ball media
• Baba (F-Zero), a character in the F-Zero universe
• Paopi or Baba, the second month of the Coptic calendar
• Baba, a character in Redbeard comics
• "Baba", a song by Alanis Morissette from Supposed Former Infatuation Junkie

See also[link]

• Babaji (disambiguation)
• Bhabha (disambiguation)
• Babai (disambiguation)
• Babar (disambiguation)
• Babu (disambiguation)
• Ali Baba, a character in Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves
• Baba clan (disambiguation)
• Baba O'Riley, a song by The Who
• Baba Yaga, a witch-like character in Slavic folklore
• Gül Baba (operetta), an operetta by Jenő Huszka
• Standing Baba, a Hindu who has vowed to stand
• Baba Yetu, Lord's Prayer and song by Christopher Tin
• Baba ghanoush, a Middle Eastern eggplant dish
• Rum baba, a cake saturated in rum
• Guru Nanak or Baba Nanak, the universal enlightener
• All pages beginning with "baba"
• All pages with titles containing "baba"

This disambiguation page lists articles associated with the same title. If an internal link led you here, you may wish to change the link to point directly to the intended article.

The year 2002 in film involved some significant events. The first significant releases of sequels took place between The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones, Men in Black II, Analyze That, Spy Kids 2: The Island of Lost Dreams, Stuart Little 2, Blade II, the 3rd installment Austin Powers in Goldmember, the 10th installments Star Trek Nemesis and Jason X. 2002 is the only year in which a Star Wars and a Star Trek film were released in the same year.

Top grossing films[link]

These are the top grossing films that were first released in 2002. The top ten films of 2002, by worldwide gross in $USD, as well as the US & Canada, UK, and Australia grosses, are as follows:

These numbers are taken from Box Office Mojo, including their 2002 Yearly Box Office Results.

2002 produced fifty-one films that have grossed more than $100 million. Seven films grossed more than $400 million.

Events[link]

Years in film
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2000s
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2010s
2010 • 2011 • 2012 2013 and beyond

• May - The Pianist directed by Roman Polanski wins the "Palme d'Or" at the Cannes Film Festival.
• May 3–5 - Spider-Man is the first film to make $100+ million during its opening weekend in the US unadjusted to inflation.
• May 16 - Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones opens in theater. Although a huge success, it is the only Star Wars episode not to be the highest grosser of the year.
• Amélie directed by Jean-Pierre Jeunet wins the 2002 César Award for Best Film, Best Director, Best Music, and Best Art Direction. Amélie also became the highest-grossing French-language film in the United States ever.
• Another French-language film Brotherhood of the Wolf also became the second-highest-grossing French-language film in the United States in the last two decades.

Awards[link]

Palme d'Or (Cannes Film Festival):

The Pianist, directed by Roman Polanski, Poland

Golden Lion (Venice Film Festival):

The Magdalene Sisters, directed by Peter Mullan, U.K. / Ireland

Golden Bear (Berlin Film Festival):

Spirited Away (Sen to Chihiro no kamikakushi), directed by Hayao Miyazaki, Japan

Bloody Sunday, directed by Paul Greengrass, U.K. / Ireland

Notable deaths[link]

Wide-release films[link]

In the film industry, a wide-release film is a film that studios believe will appeal to a broad spectrum of the public and that shows in at least 600 theatres in the United States and Canada. The following films meet these criteria: Dates given are U.S. and Canadian release dates.

Films released in the United States in 2002 include:

• W: wide release (600 or more theaters)
• L: limited release in select cities (fewer than 600 theaters)
• R: re-release of previously released film

January - March[link]