Rajinikanth saga: From Bengaluru bus conductor to Tamil cinema superstar

FRIDAY, 12 December was a special day for millions of Tamil movie fans. It was the 75th birthday of popular Tamil cinema actor Rajinikanth. The evergreen filmstar has in a film career spanning fifty years, acted in 172 films. He is currently working on his 173rd movie.

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Despite exposing his “real looks” as opposed to his “reel looks” publicly, the superstar continues to retain his charismatic hold on his adoring masses

Even as Rajinikanth fans celebrated the actor's diamond birthday on a widespread scale, they were in turn provided with a special treat by their idol. A remastered version of the star's 1999 film "Padayappa" was re-released 26 years later on 12 Dec. The 1999 film was a blockbuster produced by Rajinikanth himself under the aegis of Arunachala Cine creations. The rereleased 2025 film is reportedly a hit movie running to packed houses both in India and overseas.

What is remarkabout able Rajinikanth is the fact that he continues to act in lead roles despite being a septuagenarian. Only Hindi cinema's Dev Anand kept acting in lead roles even as an octogenarian but many of Dev Anand's films were failures in commercial terms. What is noteworthy about Rajinikanth is that his movies continue to be hugely successful at the box office.

"Super Staaru Yaarunnu Kaettaal, Sinnakuzhandhaiyum Sollum" is a hit number from the Rajinikanth film "Raja Chinna Roja" released in 1989. What the opening lines say is that even a small child knows the answer to the question of who is the super star? What the words mean implicitly is that Rajinikanth is indeed the super star of Tamil films. One is adjudged super star on the basis of being a box office draw and amount of remuneration received.