Billa (1980)

Billa is a 1980 Indian Tamil-language crime film produced by K. Balaji and directed by R. Krishnamurthy. The film stars Rajinikanth, K. Balaji, Thengai Srinivasan, Manorama, Sripriya, Reena Roy and Major Sundarrajan. Billa was released on 26 January 1980, to commercial success.The movie was a remake of the 1978 Hindi movie Don and went on to inspire the 2007 Tamil movie Billa.

The film revolves around Billa (Rajinikanth), a feared Mafia don in Madras, who is fatally wounded during an encounter with the police. Wanting to uncover Billa's accomplices, the police commissioner Alexander (K. Balaji) trains a lookalike village bumpkin Rajappa (also Rajinikanth) to pose as Billa and infiltrate the gang. The rest of the film deals with how Rajappa learns more about Billa's gang, and tries to get all of them arrested.