Dhanush's next film, with Karthick Naren, titled Maaran; poster released on birthday

Actor Dhanush’s upcoming Tamil film with director Karthick Naren has been titled Maaran, it was announced today on the star’s birthday.

The film’s makers took to Twitter to announce the title and release the first-look poster.

The project marks the maiden collaboration between Dhanush and Karthick Naren.

The poster features Dhanush smashing someone’s face into a glass tabletop while holding a knife in one hand.

The film also features Malavika Mohanan as the leading lady. It will be Malavika's first film opposite Dhanush.

The project, which is tipped to be an action thriller, is slated for release later this year. The film has music by GV Prakash Kumar.

Dhanush was recently seen in the Netflix film Jagame Thandhiram (2021) in which he played a gangster from Madurai.

The film, which also stars Joju George, Aishwarya Lekshmi, Kalaiarasan and James Cosmo, was originally planned to be released in theatres last year. But that plan was scuppered by the pandemic and the streaming rights were eventually sold to Netflix.

Dhanush will soon begin work on an upcoming trilingual project with filmmaker Sekhar Kammula. The project, which will go on the floors in August, also stars Sai Pallavi.

The film will be produced on a grand scale by Narayan Das K Narang and Puskur Ram Mohan Rao under the banner of Sree Venkateswara Cinemas LLP (a unit of the Asian group) as Production No 4.

Sekhar Kammula is known for films such as Godavari (2006), Happy Days (2007), Leader (2010) and Fidaa (2017). He is currently awaiting the release of the Telugu romantic drama Love Story, which stars Naga Chaitanya and Sai Pallavi.

Dhanush also has Aanand L Rai’s Atrangi Re in the pipeline. He recently completed shooting for Netflix’s international film, The Gray Man.