Kadhal Desam

In the city of Chennai, a traditional rivalry has always existed between the students of Pachaiyappa's and Loyola colleges. Karthik (Vineeth) is a poor orphan who studies in Pachaiyappa's College, hobo in a rented room, travels by the bus, hangs out with a number of friends, and is the captain of his football team. He is also a good poet and daydreams about his dream girl. Arun (Abbas), on the other hand, comes from a rich and wealthy family, studies in Loyola College, drives his own car, hangs out with numerous friends, and is also the captain of his football team. In a nasty intercollege riot, Arun saves Karthik's life. So in return, Karthik lets Arun win in a soccer game because he thinks Arun can't take losses easily. Arun realizes that the victory is because of Karthik's sacrifice.

They become good friends, setting a good example of friendship to others in their college. Things go smooth until a new girl Divya (Tabu) joins the college. Both Arun and Karthik fall in love with her, but neither of them realizes that both are in love with the same girl. Following a sequence of events, when they realize that both are loving the same girl their friendship is strained and they fight with each other. The end of the movie shows whether Divya will fall in love with one of them and whether their friendship will be affected forever. At the end, Divya says that she likes them both but does not want to choose one, thereby losing the other and disrupting their friendship. Hence the film ends with Arun and Karthik regaining their friendship and staying friends with Divya.

The film went on to become a large commercial success.[9] The climax of the film broke a taboo in the Tamil film industry, where a love triangle would be decided with a happy ending.[10] Post-success, Abbas revealed that he felt that "Mustafa Mustafa" song catapulted him to stardom and enjoyed a strong female base after Kadhal Desam.[11] However, a critic from Indolink.com suggested that "Katheer's direction lacks the punch and innovation. The narration is slow, incoherent, and shaky", though mentioned there is "reasonably good acting by Vineeth, Abbas is OK for a newcomer and Tabu looks ravishing".[12]

The film won A. R. Rahman his fifth consecutive Filmfare Award for Best Music Director in Tamil.[13][14] K. V. Anand also received the Screen Award South for Best Cinematography for his work in the film.[15] The film was dubbed and released in Telugu as Prema Desam and became an equally big success.[1][16] The Hindi dubbed version, Duniya Dilwalon Ki, however, did not perform as well.[17]

The success of the film prompted Rahman to collaborate with Kathir again in Kadhalar Dhinam (1999) and Kadhal Virus (2002). As a result of respect for his first director, Abbas made a guest appearance in the latter film. The film triggered off a string of youth-based stories in films with Minsara Kanavu and Ullaasam featuring similar story lines.[18]

The soundtrack for the film was composed by A. R. Rahman, with lyrics by Vaali. The soundtrack was also released in Telugu as Prema Desam and in Hindi with the title Duniya Dilwalon Ki, with lyrics written by P. K. Mishra and Mehboob Kotwal.

Kathir revealed that first song to be recorded was "Kalloori Saalai", he wanted it to be a fast number, but wanted it to start the song "with a melodious line". Rahman asked for a dummy lyric for it which started with "Inbathai karuvakkinal penn", which Vaali liked and retained it for the final cut as well.[1]

For the song "Musthafa Musthafa", Kathir wanted a song on the lines of old song "Paravaigal Meethu" which was about friendship. Rahman gave him the tune during a flight travel which Kathir liked it.[1]

"Kalluri Saalai" and the instrumental theme of the song and flowers falling on the road was parodied in Thamizh Padam 2 (2018).[19]

• Kadhal Desam at IMDb