Manikanda

Arjun plays a dual role, that of father and son. The film, which began production in 2002, went through more production, and was finally released in 2007, was promoted as Jyothika's "last release". It is a remake of the 2000 Telugu movie Jayam Manadera.

Manikanda
Poster
Directed by	Selva
Written by	G. K. Gopinath (dialogues)
Story by	M. Rathnakumar
Produced by	K. Dhandapani
Starring	Arjun Jyothika Uma
Cinematography	U. K. Senthil Kumar
Edited by	Raghubob
Music by	Deva
Production company	Malar Combines
Release date	23 March 2007
Running time	133 minutes
Country	India
Language	Tamil

Raja lives in Mumbai with his father. Mahalakshmi goes to Bombay to get the blessings of a godwoman but since she is unable to meet Mataji immediately, she is forced to stay in Mumbai for ten days and rents a guestroom among the many run by Raja. Love blossoms between Raja and Maha and when she returns to her village Maniyoor, he follows a few days later on her invitation. After he lands there, he discovers his own link to the village.

Selva who earlier directed Karnaa (1995) with Arjun announced the project in mid-2003. Jyothika was selected to play the lead role uniting with Arjun for second time after Rhythm (2000). P. Vasu, Pasupathi, Ashish Vidyarthi were selected to play villains. There were rumours that film's title would be changed as Nanba but later proved untrue. The film's story happens in a village called Keeripatti where elections were never held for so many years. Due to financial crisis the film was shelved for sometime and Selva and Arjun went on to do Aanai (2005). During the time, Selva shelved other projects like Mamu (with Sathyaraj and Sibiraj) and Thotta (2008) (with Jeevan and Priyamani which he later continued) and finished Nenjil (2006) with Navdeep. Project was restarted in 2006 with a change of storyline and it was finally completed.

Soundtrack was composed by Deva, with lyrics written by Piraisoodan, Na. Muthukumar and Kabilan. The song "Mama Mama" from Kumudham was remixed in this film.

The Hindu wrote the film "looks outdated" and added "It may not be a new storyline but with experienced artists and technicians it could have made an impression if it had been released on time".