Nayagan - all time 100 best movies

Nayagan has made it to Time Magazine's all time top 100 movies. The other Indian movies which made it to the list are Pyaasa and the Apu trilogy. Nayagan would have been my choice for the best Tamil movie ever made if not for its similarities to Godfather. Otherwise it is a near perfect movie - a flawless screenplay, excellent camerawork, wonderful performances and to top it all - great music.

Nayagan is Gnaani's 400th movie (according to the title credits) and it is one of his best efforts - songs and BGM. The songs were instant classics. Nila Adhu Vaanathu Mele is an anthem. Thenpaandi Seemaiyile was the recurring theme - I liked the one in Raaja's voice the best. Trivia - the tune of Nila Adhu was originally composed for the Thenpaandi situation. Musically the best song in the movie was Nee Oru Kaadhal Sangeetham, inspite of Mano. SPB's Telugu version is much superior I hear.

The background score of Nayakan is easily one of the best and probably the "densest" by Raaja in the sense that there are few frames without music. Though there were an abundance of motifs in the movie the one I like the most is the theme that plays when Kamal meets Saranya. I found a frame-by-frame write-up about this scene. The realaudio link does not work though :-(.