The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Chennai News : For Mahesh, it's time to call the shots

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Jul 11, 2006

Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu - Chennai

For Mahesh, it's time to call the shots

N. Venkateswaran

After directorial debut with "Naalai," he is now into his second film

Director Mahesh (right) with actor Richard on location during the shooting of "Naalai."

CHENNAI: He started his career in the chemical industry — but realised his passion was for cinema. After a couple of years selling chemicals used in the tanning industry, he decided to take the plunge and took a position as an assistant to film director B.R. Vijayalakshmi. And there was no looking back.

Today, Udhayabanu Maheshwaran, better known as Mahesh in industry circles, has made his debut as a director with "Naalai." The film has found favour with the audience and also made the distributors happy.

Mahesh is not too worried about the stiff competition his film will face from others of the genre. "Though Naalai is also a gangster film, it focuses on the friendship between two characters. That makes it unique, and I am happy that this aspect has come out very well in the film," he says.

He built his career slowly but steadily, working on scripts with Sangeeth Sivan, and as an assistant director for films such as "Thalattu," "Paattu Paadava," "Sundara Purushan" and "Iraniyan."

Seeking to expand his horizons, he moved to Mumbai in 1997, and worked on ad films directed by Shoojit Sarkar. And when Shoojit decided to make a feature film, Mahesh was roped in to write the story and screenplay along with scriptwriter Sabapathy. "Shoojit wanted his first film to be a patriotic film. He wanted to do something for the country," says Mahesh.

And thus, "Yahaan" was born. Though it told the tale of an Armyman, played by Jimmy Shergill, and a Kashmiri girl, played by Minissha Lamba, "the focus was on Kashmir," he says. The love story was not given priority; it was just the backdrop. "What happens in Jammu and Kashmir is not known to people in other parts of the country. We wanted to show that the people there are also Indians; all of them are not Pakistan supporters."

But portraying this was easy compared to the hardship they underwent for shooting in the State. To begin with, the story and screenplay had to be cleared by the Defence Ministry. "It took more than four months for them to okay it. And then we were given permission to shoot for only six days. So all the time we were there, the camera kept rolling."

But Mahesh thinks the trouble was worth it. "The movie came in for a lot of praise. After watching Yahaan, director Rajkumar Santoshi called and asked me and Sabapathy to work on a script for him."

The duo are now busy working on the story and screenplay for Shoojit's next, "Amarjeet," which stars Lara Dutta and Vivek Oberoi.

The movie is based on the proposed ban on on-screen smoking. "We are going to defend the ban. We will attempt to convince the people with proper evidence and data about the harm caused by tobacco. We have done research for more than four months now, and it is still continuing even as we work on the script."

In the midst of all this, Mahesh has also begun work on "Asan," his second movie as director. He is retaining G. Ramesh as the cinematographer, and Karthik Raaja will be in charge of music.

"Asan," he says, will be very different from "Naalai." While his first was a gangster film, the next will be an edge-of-the-seat entertainer. "It is basically a mind game among six characters."

He has begun casting for the film, which is scheduled to go on the floors by the end of July. "I don't want established actors and faces in my film. I want to see only the characters on the screen. That is why I am thinking of bringing down theatre actors from Mumbai and Delhi, and I am also looking to meet theatre actors in Chennai," he says.

A promo for "Naalai" says, "The truth is we don't know what is going to happen tomorrow," but for Mahesh, the future sure does look rosy.

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