Kazhugu (1981 film)

Kazhugu
Directed by	SP. Muthuraman
Produced by	Meena Panju Arunachalam
Written by	Panchu Arunachalam
Starring	Rajinikanth Rati Agnihotri Sumalatha Cho Ramaswamy Thengai Srinivasan Y. Gee. Mahendra Suruli Rajan Ramanathan Sangili Murugan Senthamarai Ramadas Vanitha
Music by	Ilaiyaraaja
Cinematography	Babu
Edited by	R. Vittal
Production company	P. A. Art Productions
Distributed by	P. A. Art Productions
Release date	6 March 1981
Country	India
Language	Tamil

Kazhugu (Tamil: கழுகு, English: Vulture) is a Tamil film directed by SP. Muthuraman, starring Rajinikanth in the lead along with Rati Agnihotri and Sumalatha as the heroine. The film was a Hit at the box office and later became a cult film among Rajini fans in the 1980s.

It's an unofficial remake of the 1975 American action horror film Race with the Devil.

Satyamoorthy is a wealthy diamond business man and a widower living with his younger brother Raja (Rajinikanth) and two daughters Radha and Chitra. Satyamoorthy is a great devotee of saints and priests trusting all of them to be genuine whereas Raja is a happy go lucky guy just opposite to his brother who does not trust any of them. Satyamoorthy once invites a priest to his home to perform rituals to drive away all evil surrounding his house not knowing that the priest is a fake and member of a robber gang. Satyamoorthy takes him to his treasury room where he had stored his huge wealth and tells him the secret of unlocking his lockers. The fake priest pretends to give a sacred sheet and instructs to place it inside the locker which shall protect the stuffs. As Raja suspected, the priest sends the robbers at night to loot the wealth but Raja wakes up and fights with them and restores the looted property. Raja's repeated attempts to prove that the priest is fake goes vain as Satyamoorthy believes strongly that Raja protected the wealth only because of the divine power of the sacred sheet.

Raja once enters a ladies toilet by mistake and is caught by a girl who screams that Raja has come to misbehave. Raja wants to revenge for her behaviour with him and goes to her father Sivaraman and lies that he is the lover of his daughter Hemavathy (Rati Agnihotri) aka Hema. Sivaraman believes him and stops all of the Hema's outing. Hema gets angry and goes to Raja to reveal the truth to her father. Hema explains that once a man came into the ladies toilet and tried to rape her and that is the reason for the behaviour with him that day. Understanding Hema's situation Raja tells the truth to Sivaraman. This brings Raja and Hema together and both fall in love and marry.