The Tamil-language film industry has produced and released over 10000 films since the release of its first sound film, kalidas, in 1931. This is a master list of listings of films released from 1931 in the industry by decade of release.
Akkineni Laxmi Vara Prasada Rao, known professionally as L. V. Prasad, was an Indian film director, producer, actor, and businessman. He was one of the pioneers of Indian cinema and is the recipient of the Dadasaheb Phalke Award, the highest Award for films in India. In 1980, he was awarded the Raghupathi Venkaiah Award, for his contribution to Telugu cinema.
Bhakta Prahlada is a 1932 Indian Telugu-language Hindu mythological film directed by H. M. Reddy and produced by Ardeshir Irani of Imperial Film Company. It is the first sound film of Telugu cinema. It features Sindhoori Krishna Rao as the titular Prahlada, along with Munipalle Subbayya, Surabhi Kamalabai, Doraswamy Naidu, Chitrapu Narasimha Rao, and L. V. Prasad. No complete synopsis of the film is known to survive, but it is an adaptation of a play of the same name.
Hanumappa Muniappa Reddy, known as H. M. Reddy, was an Indian film director and producer, known for his works in Telugu cinema. He directed the first Indian multilingual sound film Kalidas (1931), shot in Telugu and Tamil. He then produced and directed the first full length Telugu sound film, Bhakta Prahlada in 1932.
AVM Productions is an Indian film production studio founded by A. V. Meiyappa Chettiar. It is one of the oldest studio in India. The filming studios are located in Vadapalani, Chennai. It has produced over 300 films in Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, Malayalam and Hindi cinema. AVM has introduced numerous actors in Southern industries, some of the prominent actors are Superstar Rajinikanth, Sivaji Ganesan, Rajkumar, S. S. Rajendran, Vyjayanthimala, Kamal Haasan and many more. The AVM Studios besides the shooting floors, has recording, dubbing and a preview theatre. The complex also houses facilities for production and post production processing.
Tamil cinema, also known as Kollywood, is the segment of Indian cinema dedicated to the production of motion pictures in the Tamil language, the main spoken language in the state of Tamil Nadu. It is nicknamed Kollywood, a portmanteau of the names Kodambakkam, a neighbourhood in Chennai, and Hollywood. The first Tamil silent film, Keechaka Vadham, was directed by R. Nataraja Mudaliar in 1918. The first Tamil talking feature film, Kalidas, a multilingual directed by H. M. Reddy was released on 31 October 1931, less than seven months after India's first talking motion picture Alam Ara.
Kalidas is a 1931 Indian biographical film directed by H. M. Reddy and produced by Ardeshir Irani. It is notable for being the first sound film in the Tamil and Telugu languages, and the first sound film to be made in a language from South India. It was based on the life of the Sanskrit poet Kalidasa; it featured P. G. Venkatesan in the title role and T. P. Rajalakshmi as the female lead, with L. V. Prasad, Thevaram Rajambal, T. Susheela Devi, J. Sushila, and M. S. Santhanalakshmi in supporting roles.
G. Dhananjayan (GD) is an Indian film producer, distributor, columnist, author of four books on Indian films, and founder-director BOFTA Film Institute. He has produced films in the Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam and Hindi languages, including Sankat City (2009), Kanden Kadhalai (2009), Mugamoodi (2012), Anjaan (2014) and Irudhi Suttru (2016), Kaatrin_Mozhi (2018), Kabadadaari (2021), Kodiyil Oruvan (2021) and many other films. He has won two National Film Awards.
Vidyasagar is an Indian composer, musician and singer who works predominantly in the Tamil, Malayalam, and Telugu film industries. After working with several composers as assistant and conductor, Vidyasagar made his debut as a film composer in the 1989 Tamil film Poo Manam and nicknamed as Melody King Working for over 225 feature films, he is the recipient of one National Award, multiple State Awards and five Filmfare Awards he frequently work with actor vijay which all of the albums were successful and is widely regarded as one of the finest and most acclaimed composers in the history of Indian Cinema.
Cinema of South India, refers to the cinema of the four major film industries in South India; primarily engaged in making feature films in the four major languages of the region, namely — Telugu, Tamil, Kannada and Malayalam. They are often colloquially referred to as Tollywood, Kollywood, Sandalwood and Mollywood, respectively.
Pride of Tamil Cinema: 1931–2013 is a book by the Indian film historian and producer G. Dhananjayan, detailing information about the production and release of 163 Tamil-language films that were released between 1931 and 2013. It was released on 21 November 2014 by Blue Ocean Publishers during the 45th International Film Festival of India and received widespread critical acclaim. The book won the National Film Award – Special Jury Award / Special Mention.