Thoppil Ajayan

Thoppil Ajayan Biography

Thoppil Ajayan is an Indian film director who has directed only one movie in his film career. His single Malayalam movie – Perunthachan received warm critics from audience and also both Indira Gandhi Award for Best First Film of a Director and Kerala State Film Award for Best Debut Director in 1990. The movie also won Kerala State Film Award for Best Popular Film in 1990. The movie was screened at different film festivals and received a nomination for Golden Leopard award at the Locarno International Film Festival in 1992. Ajayan is the eldest son of legendary film director and playwright Thoppil Bhasi. He has directed a few short films and documentaries also.

Ajayan, also known as Thoppil Ajayan is the first son of legendary playwright and director – Thoppil Bhasi. He holds a diploma in film technology from the Adayar film institute, Chennai. Ajayan started his career as a camera assistant with many film directors of Mollywood and later became an assistant under his father, apart from Bharathan, and Padmarajan to know the essence of film making. He got associated with film field in the late 1970s and worked as Associate Director of Rathinirverdam. Later he worked as associate director for Kariyilakkattu Pole and Koodevide in the 1980s. He also worked as a choreographer for a few Tamil movies in the 1980s.

As an assistant director he worked for the movies - Panchavadi Palam, Ente Upasana, Oridathu and Sarvakalashala. His debut full-length movie Perumthachan was released in 1990 and it was based on story of legend Perumthachan and his son. The movie starred Prashanth, Thilakan and Monisha Unni in the lead roles and is regarded as one among the best performances of Thilakan up-to-date. The movie also gave him Kerala state award for best actor for the first time.

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Updated: July 23, 2014