Simple Suni
Credit: Special Arrangement
Simple Suni, best known for his 2013 directorial, ‘Simple Agi Ondh Love Story’, is all set to release his latest, ‘Gatha Vaibhava’. It will release on November 14.
Primarily a love story, it is a period drama spanning three distinct eras — contemporary, historical, and mythological. “It’s on the same lines as ‘Simple Agi Ondh Love Story’ — the hero and heroine meet and each has a flashback revealing their past. But in ‘Gatha Vaibhava’, their past dates back to their previous births,” Suni tells Showtime.
One of their earlier lives is set during the time of Samudhra Manthana (Ocean Churning), a chapter from the Vishnu Purana in Hindu mythology. The second takes place in Portugal during Vasco da Gama’s explorations of India, while the third unfolds in the early 20th century, reveals Suni.
“Most films dealing with the concept of rebirth stay within a 30-to-40-year timeline. I wanted to go further and explore Hindu mythology. That’s when I came across an interesting episode in the Samudhra Manthana chapter. At the same time, pirates are not explored in Kannada cinema. So I have explored that with a hint of comedy,” he says.
Why has he shifted from rom-coms to period and supernatural dramas? Suni explains that audience tastes have evolved. After ‘KGF’ and ‘Kantara’, Suni says, the audiences are looking for larger-than-life movies. After the advent of OTT, audiences want to come to theatres only if a film is mounted on a grand scale. Recalling his 2024 rom-com ‘Ondu Sarala Prema Kathe’, starring Vinay Rajkumar, he adds, “It was a slice-of-life romantic comedy. It was received better on OTT than in theatres.”
At the same time, Suni says his next two projects, ‘Moda Kavida Vathavarana’ and ‘Devaru Ruju Madidanu’, will be simple, realistic dramas.
Reflecting on other changes in the industry, he notes that back in the day, producers were keen on having an action sequence or an item song in a film. “Now they want songs that can go viral as reels. We usually make songs based on the film’s narrative, but with reels becoming a priority, we have to step out of the art form,” he says.
He also laments that despite many talented young Kannada singers, most audio labels prefer popular singers from Bollywood such as Armaan Malik, Sonu Nigam, and Shreya Ghoshal.