But what made the movie what it is was Murugadoss' attempt at something different. Harris Jayaraj's music was also a big plus, especially the BGM's for the Dong Lee character. Chandran has some of the best visuals to come out of a tamil cinema in the last decade or so. The film also saw Shruti Hassan's debut in tamil cinema, with her career taking off from there. Since he's a martial arts expert, he made for a pretty intimidating villain, having the ferocity and explosiveness to make for a good foe. What also worked for the movie was the villain Dong Lee, played by Johnny Tri Nguyen. Though the rest of the film is great, the amount of intrigue, style, creativity, and story telling ingenuity shown in the Bodhidharma portion of the film is what makes this movie one of my favourite tamil films of all time. This film has probably the best opening 20 minutes in tamil cinema history. More interest was brought to him through the films exposure to that person, and because of Suriya's excellent portrayal of the character. Bodhi Dharma and his history has been something that got a huge boost in popularity through the film. For a tamil movie that's 9 years old to be a trending top on twitter says something. Ironically though, as many films that are ahead of their times or under appreciated when they first released, 7am Arivu has enjoyed a huge resurgence of popularity (mainly due to the coronavirus pandemic). Though the film made money, it didn't end up being the blockbuster that Ghajini was like at the box office. I loved the film from the first time I watched it, and still love it to this day. I remember lining up to watch the film at theaters in Toronto, going to the first showing. Murugadoss and Suriya reteamed after Ghajini to deliver 7am Arivu, a well hyped and anticipated film before it released.