Kaavalan

Bhoominathan idolises Muthuramalingam, a rich powerful landlord, and at the request of his parents, he accepts to work for Muthuramalingam as his bodyguard. There enters Muthuramalingam's rival, who has lost his daughter since she committed suicide, the reason being rejection by Muthuramalingam's son. While Bhoomi protects Muthuramalingam, his rival threatens the life of his daughter Meera. No one accepts Bhoomi and he fuels this when he thinks that Meera’s brother is a thief and attacks him making him get fired. Bhoomi saves Muthuramalingam from an attack and they together fights the attackers off. Muthuramalingam finally hires Bhoomi back.

Bhoomi is sent to college along with Meera and her friend Madhu to protect them from the threat. Bhoomi joins the same class where Meera studies, as he has previously discontinued his education. Meera does not like Bhoomi following her as a bodyguard, and therefore plans to divert him. Meera calls Bhoomi over his mobile phone from a private number and introduces herself as "Ammukutty". Initially, Bhoomi hates the mobile call as it will disturb him but later on develops a liking towards Ammukutty and slowly love blossoms for Bhoomi without knowing that it is Meera herself. He saves Meera from an attack from Muthuramalingam’s rival.

At one point, Meera too feels herself becoming attracted to Bhoomi and expresses her desire to meet him in person without revealing her identity. However, due to circumstances they are not able to accomplish this, and she decides to elope with Bhoomi for which he agrees, unaware it is Meera. However through certain means, Muthuramalingam gets to know that Bhoomi and Meera are going to run away and sends his men to stop Bhoomi. Bhoomi beats them up easily but her Muthuramalingam beats Bhoomi. Meera overhears her father's plans and decides to save Bhoomi by lying that he is in love with some other girl and has planned to elope with her. Muthuramalingam spares Bhoomi, believing that Meera is not his lover, but sends his men to the railway station to find out Bhoomi's lover. He also instructs that Bhoomi should be killed if there is no one in the railway station.

Meera, in a desperate attempt to save Bhoomi, comes up with a plan. She requests Madhu to go to the railway station and pretend to be Ammukutty, so that Muthuramalingam's men will spare Bhoomi believing Madhu to be his lover. Meera also gives a mobile phone to Madhu and informs to give it to Bhoomi when she meets him (as Bhoomi's phone is broken) so that she can reveal the truth to Bhoomi. Madhu agrees and leaves to the station. Over there, Bhoomi gets surprised seeing Madhu in the station and believes that it is Madhu who was pretending as Ammukutty so far and hugs her. Muthuramalingam's men see this and leave the place, believing that Meera is not Bhoomi's lover.

Suddenly, Madhu gets a call in the mobile given by Meera. Madhu understands that the call is from Meera and she wants to speak to Bhoomi. To everyone's surprise, Madhu throws away the phone from train, following which it is revealed that Madhu also likes Bhoomi, and she decides to marry him by betraying Meera. Meera understands that Madhu has played a trick.

Several years later, Bhoomi, now a top-ranking government official, now returns to Muthuramalingam's village to visit him along with his son Sidharth. Muthuramalingam's condition is ill. It is revealed that Madhu has died a few years back due to some medical ailments, but she has written all the truth in a diary and gives it to Sidharth to read it after her death. Sidharth has learnt all the truth. Madhu has also mentioned in the diary that this truth should never be disclosed to Bhoomi.

Meera stays with her father, and Bhoomi gets shocked to know that Meera still remains unmarried. When Bhoomi and Sidharth are about to return home, Sidharth asks Meera to come with them and expresses his wish to call her as mother. Bhoomi berates Sidharth for his suggestion and apologises to Meera and Muthuramalingam, but Muthuramalingam also insists Meera to go with Bhoomi.

Now Bhoomi, Meera and Sidharth leave together from the village. Just the before the train starts, Sidharth runs out to throw the diary containing the truth in a dust bin and comes back, but Bhoomi takes back the diary from the dust bin without Sidharth's knowledge and reads it. Upon reading the diary, Bhoomi is shocked knowing that it was Meera who loved him in the name of Ammukutty. In the end, Bhoomi also whole heartedly accepts Meera.

The soundtrack album is composed by Vidyasagar, collaborating with Vijay for the 8th time, after Coimbatore Mappillai, Nilaave Vaa, Thirumalai, Ghilli, Madhurey, Aathi and Kuruvi. The soundtrack consists of five tracks, with lyrics written by Yugabharathi, Pa. Vijay, Viveka and Kabilan. The audio launch was held on 8 December 2010.[14]

Behindwoods gave the album a rating of 3/5, and stated that it is fresh and youthful.[15] Sify gave the album, rating 4 out of 5, and stated "The album is youthful, and make sure it is an instant hit." MusicAloud.com rated the album 8 out of 10, stating "After a completely subdued soundtrack for Mandhira Punnagai, he creates another out-and-out commercial score in Kaavalan. A sureshot musical hit for Vijay!"[16] Rediff rated the album 2.5 out of 5, stating that "Kaavalan would be a throwback to the star's earlier, romance-heavy movies, notably Friends. It looks like Vidhyasagar has followed the same mission directive. It's a relief to see less of hero-overtones and more soft numbers."[17]

The trailer was released worldwide on 16 December in Northern California, marking the first time a Vijay film trailer was launched outside India.[18][19][20]

Due to the failure of Sura (2010), theatre owners faced huge losses, and asked Vijay to compensate 35% of the loss amount.[21] However, Vijay did not give any response. A week before the film's release, Tamilnadu Theatre Owners Association, had announced that they will not give any other co-operation to Kaavalan, and the actor's other future projects.[22] As a result, two shows were cancelled on the opening day, 14 January 2011, and went ahead with matinee shows.[23]

Moreover, it was rumoured that significant industry stakeholders from Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam pressurised exhibitors to stall the film's release,[23] since Aadukalam, which was distributed by Sun Pictures, was slated to release on January 2011, and also majority of the theatres were controlled by the party supremos. In order to have a smooth release, Vijay sought help from J. Jayalalithaa, from All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam, which was the opposition party at that time, as a result the film opened to 450 screens, on 15 January 2011.[24]

Originally slated to release on 17 December 2010, Kaavalan was released on 15 January 2011. The film was selected at the 14th Shanghai International Film Festival in the panorama section. SIFF issued an invitation to Vijay as guest of honour.[5] The film was later dubbed in Hindi as Main Hoon Bodyguard.[25]

• Official website
• Kaavalan at IMDb