South's siren of yesteryears, Vijayalakshmi aka Silk Smitha , is back to set the silver screen on fire again. 'Thangathamarai' (Golden Lotus), her last movie in Tamil is all set for a gala release later this month, 11 years after she committed suicide.

The film had completed shooting in 1995, but financial problems prevented its release. A year later in 1996, she killed herself by hanging after losing money trying her hand at production.

Silk, whose real name was Vijayalakshmi, was born in Eluru in Andhra Pradesh. Burdened by poverty, she left home and landed with her aunt in the then Madras, the hub of south Indian cinema. Vijayalakshmi then assumed the name Smitha She got her first major break in 1979 in Vandichakram' (wheel).

The film brought her not just critical acclaim, but a new title Silk after the name of the character she portrayed in the movie. That was the birth of Silk Smitha, south's first original sex siren. The item girl continued her dominance throughout the 1980s and acted in close to 200 films in Malayalam, Tamil, Kannada and Hindi languages.

"Those were the times when an item number from Silk was a must recipe for box office success," remembers an industry source. Another notable performance of the star was in the Tamil film Moondram Pirai, remade in Hindi as Sadma starring Kamal Haasan. The story, screenplay and direction of the new film Thangathamarai is by Tirupati Rajan, who introduced Silk to the cine world.