Mullankolli is a rustic remote village in northern Kerala. Velayudhan is an orphan who came floating during floods and he was brought up by Valiya Nambiar a do-gooder and a feudal landlord of the area. Velayudhan grows up into a riff-raff, drunkard and a local rowdy with a good heart. He hates injustice and has set his own rules for the villagers who are scared of him including local moneylender and politician - Member Kurup and Gopinathan Nambiar, son-in-law of Valiya Nambiar who wants to rule over the village in his own way. When Velayudhan plants a staff, it means that it has his stamp of authority. The only man who he listens to is Valiya Nambiar and to a certain extent Kelappan who looked after him as a child. The villagers including Kurup and Gopinathan regularly bring goons from outside the village to eliminate Velayudhan but they fail. There are three women in his life - a prostitute Kunnummel Shantha old flame Janaki and Kelappan's daughter Leela. But things turn bleak for Velayudhan due to the machinations of Gopinathan which leads to the climax.
Naran was initially the title given for a project starring Mohanlal, directed by Joshiy and written by Renji Panicker and a pooja ceremony was held for the film but was cancelled before beginning filming. Joshiy adapted the title of that film. The film is set in a village in a hilly area. It was shot at Hogenakkal village in Tamil Nadu. Mohanlal performed stunt scenes in the river in Hogenekkal. One day, Mohanlal spend an entire day in the river. It was after filming that the crew was informed that there was a crocodile in it.
Soundtrack
The film features original songs composed by Deepak Dev, lyrics were by Kaithapram Damodaran. The soundtrack album was released on 1 July 2007 by Manorama Music. Before that, a single, Ponnaryan, was released on 1 January 2005, composed by Sunny Joseph, written by O. N. V. Kurup and sung by K. J. Yesudas. The film was scored by Ouseppachan.
Naran performed well at the box office. It became the top grosser among the Onam releases at Kerala box office, outperforming Chanthupottu and Nerariyan CBI. Including print and publicity, the film was reportedly made on a budget of ₹2.55 crore. From the first two weeks itself, it collected a distributor's share of ₹1.69 crore from Kerala. Naran was one of the highest-grossing Malayalam films of the year. It ran for more than 100 days in major releasing centres.
Critical reception
stated the film is a "paisa vasool" and wrote that "veteran director and his script writer Ranjan Pramod uses Mohanlal's larger-than-life image and blends it with the milieu, successfully in this action adventure film laced with sentiments. It is old wine in a new tetra pack with hardly any story or twists but the great man simply lights up the screen with his sheer presence."
