School Master (1958 film)

School Master is a 1958 Indian Kannada-language film produced and directed by B. R. Panthulu. The film stars Panthulu himself in the lead role along with Dikki Madhava Rao, M. V. Rajamma, Udaykumar, Sivaji Ganesan, Gemini Ganesan and B. Saroja Devi in key roles. This was the first Kannada film to complete a silver jubilee. The film features a children's dance drama in Gevacolor, filmed by cinematographer W. R. Subba Rao. It was later remade in Telugu, Tamil, Malayalam and Hindi in spite of it being dubbed in Tamil and Telugu as Engal Kudumbam Perisu (transl. Our family is big) and Badi Pantulu respectively.

In 1959, ALS Productions remade it in Hindi as School Master which was also directed by Panthulu. The film was remade in Malayalam in 1964 as School Master by Puttanna Kanagal, in Telugu in 1972 as Badi Panthulu and in Tamil in 1973 as School Master.

School Master was the first Kannada film to be remade in four languages and also the first Kannada film to be remade in three other South Indian languages. The movie is based on 1937 English movie Make Way for Tomorrow which has been adapted multiple times including in Japanese as Tokyo Story (1953), in Marathi as Oon Paus (1954), in Tamil as Varavu Nalla Uravu (1990), in Pakistani as Samaj (1972) and twice in Hindi as Zindagi (1976) and Baghban (2003).