'Baron' of the box-office
SREEDHAR PILLAI
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Director Shankar has always scored with his entertainment extravaganzas. Will ‘Sivaji,’ starring Rajnikanth, prove to be yet another feather in his cap?
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Right from his debut film, ‘Gentleman,’ the creations churned out by director Shankar’s dream factory are meant to storm box-offices as they are entertainment extravaganzas that appeal to the masses. His movies are commercial masalas, with larger than life characters and a message-oriented, sugar-coated story.
Shankar makes expensive films and uses state-of-the-art techniques that appeal to the youth. All this has made him the ‘baron’ of the box-office, as he has never tasted failure. Now the spotlight is on Shankar once again as he is teamed up with the superstar of the industry, Rajnikanth.
High expectations
Sitting in his aesthetically done up new office in T.Nagar, Chennai, Shankar says: “A lot is riding on ‘Sivaji,’ as it is my first film with superstar Rajnikanth. The expectations are high, because the audience expects a certain kind of film from us. We decided to take a middle path — the story has to move forward keeping the star’s image in mind.”
For Shankar it was the biggest challenge in his life, as the mix had to be right. Says Shankar: “ ‘Sivaji’ is basically a very simple story about a man who wants to do something good for the society, which is steeped in corruption. Our man cleans the system in his own way. There is also a very relevant message.”
The director says that his films are issue-related fantasies and in ‘Sivaji’ he has packaged it with all ingredients that one associates with a Rajnikanth masala entertainer — punch lines, comedy, romance, dream songs, huge sets, sentiment, powerful villain, fights and finally good triumphing over evil.
Adds Shankar: “We cannot ignore the image of Rajnikanth and do a film with him. ‘Sivaji’ Sivaji is a well-balanced concoction of this image, heroism and the narration. In fact during the dubbing of the film, Rajni used to say that it is going to be a super hit and AVM Saravanan, the producer after seeing the final copy, told me that they are very happy with it.”
WITH GRANDEUR AND STYLE: Rajnikanth in Sivaji directed by Shankar.
The highlight of any Shankar film is the music and the picturisation of songs.
In fact the ‘mind-blowing’ song sequences and the breathtaking sets were so impressive that Abirami Ramanathan paid a whopping Rs 6.5 crores for the Chennai city rights.
Shankar says that he and Rahman sat together for days working out the tunes.
Adds Shankar: “There are five songs in the film and all of them have turned out to be chartbusters. I think our combination ( Rahman-Shankar-Rajnikanth) has clicked as I’m told that the combined sales of ‘Sivaji’ albums in Tamil and Telugu have created a new all India record, even before the release of the film!.”
The talkie portion of the film took only 65 days to shoot, while the songs and fight scenes were choreographed in about 160 days!
Shankar is all praise for his team of actors such as Shriya, Suman and Vivek and technicians, cinematographer K.V.Anand, art director Thotta Tharani, editor Antony, action choreographer Peter Haynes and costume designer Manish Malhotra.
Says Prabhu Deva, who has choreographed the hit number ‘Style…’ in the film: “We shot the song against the backdrop of Spain’s great architectural wonders, something nobody has done before. I made Rajni and Shriya do difficult steps and the whole song has been enriched by some awesome computer graphics. People are going to go crazy about it.”
Shankar signs off by saying: “A lot of hard work straight from the heart has gone into ‘Sivaji.’ There will be a repeat audience for the film which has no blood or gore in it, it is a family entertainer for which the censors has given me a clean ‘U’ certificate. What more can I ask for?”
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