Director Gautham Menon known for his refreshing romance flicks and stylish cop thrillers celebrates his birthday today.

After working as an Assistant director to Rajeev Menon, Gautham made his directorial debut with 'Minnale' that released in the year 2001. The film had a different love story that clicked well with audience and turned out to be a huge hit and it is still considered as the most favorite film under the romance genre for many people.

The film also announced the arrival of Gautham Menon-Harris Jayaraj the director-music composer combo which would go on to rule the music industry for years to come with so many chartbuster songs and almost all the music albums from this duo have been phenomenally successful.

From then on Gautham has churned out a trilogy of cop thrillers with 'Kaakha Kaakha', 'Vettaiyadu Vilaiyadu' and 'Yennai Arindhaal' all the three films dealing with three different police men of different age dealing with different set of criminals.

He continued his tryst with romance in the film 'Varanam Aayiram', 'Vinnaithandi Varuvaya' and 'Neethane En Ponvasantham'. The first in this list is also a take on the rather unexplored father-son relationship. VTV can be easily termed as one of the best romance films in Tamil cinema ever while NEP despite becoming a box office dud is admired by critics for its matured handling of love.

'Pachaikili Muthucharam' dealt with extra martial affair of a middle aged man and how it endangers his life and 'Nadunisi Naaigal' a film without music strongly registered the dark fact of child sexual abuse and how it turns a victim as a threat to the society. Both these films backfired at the box office but they stand testimonials for Gautham's penchant to experiment.

Gautham's unique way of handling urban romance and presenting it in the most adorable way has got a huge number of fans for him. This delectable attribute of the director has been evident even in his cop films. He is also considered as one the rare category of filmmakers who has created strong and respectable female characters on screen.

Gautham also evinces a brilliant taste for music as the albums of all of his films have been super hits. His teaming up with music legends A.R.Rahman (VTV) and Ilaiyaraja (NEP) also resulted in eternal super hit love songs for Tamil film music lovers. The stupendous success of 'Thalli Pogadhey' single for Gautham's yet to be released 'Achcham Yenbathu Madamaiyada' in which he has teamed up with 'Rahman again would speak volumes of this unique facet of Gautham's a filmmaker.

The much loved director of the current generation is currently directing 'Achcham Yenbathu Madamaiyada' and is expected to team up with Dhanush and Jayam Ravi in near future. We can expect these first associations to bring us two fantastic Tamil films that will be worth waiting for.

Before that we wish Gautham Menon a Very Happy Birthday.