Mumbai : Vineeth Sreenivasan, Vipin Das, Ratheesh Balakrishnan Poduval, Ratheena, Dijo Jose Antony and Abhinav Sunder Nayak came together to discuss another exciting year for Malayalam cinema.
Beginning with a musical rom-com driving audiences to theatres, Malayalam Cinema produced several wonders this year, ending the stellar run with a dark comedy entertainer and a woman fighting back against domestic violence in style.
Bringing together the creators of many such wonderful films, the roundtable hosted by Vishal Menon featured Vineeth Sreenivasan, Vipin Das, Ratheesh Balakrishnan Poduval, Ratheena, Dijo Jose Antony and Abhinav Sunder Nayak.
2022 for Indian cinema has been about big spectacles and mass fights, but Malayalam cinema stands out with its content-oriented and celebrated films. And Vineeth Sreenivasan thinks not every film should be like Baahubali to be celebrated. “I’ve heard people from other industries say that only films like Baahubali will succeed from now on. I think that notion is wrong. I feel a film that can be celebrated will succeed. You need not do a film with a big budget either,” points out the Hridayam director.
For many involved in a film, bringing back people to theatres is what mostly mattered. Dijo Jose Antony opines that the quality of a film should convert to the number of tickets being sold. “For the producer or even for me, we find a lot of value in the number of people who saw the film in theatres. Whatever we do to keep bringing people into screens, is good.”
But what else do the filmmakers factor in while making films? Not the critics, quips Ratheena. “As we’re doing a film, we are not really thinking about critics. As we’re making it, our only effort is to make the best film we can.”
