A candid view of today's society

Gandhinagar Grapevine

Jarasandha is a demon in the Mahabharata. It is said that Jarasandha is immortal. Shashank has cashed in on this and drawn a parallel between the character Jarasandha and the underworld.

Shashank has talked about problems that plague the society such as corruption and the presence of the underworld in every growing City is one thing that Shashank has dealt with extensively in this film. “I can’t give away too much about the film but all I can say is that I have used the character Jarasandha to portray something that’s happening in our society. Corruption, rowdyism and bloodshed are deep-rooted problems and it is almost impossible to weed them out. This is the crux of the story,” Shashank, the director tells Metrolife.

Duniya Vijay plays the role of a body builder and actress Pranitha essays the role of a model in the film. “The best part about the film is that the viewer will not know who the real Jarasandha is until the end. The film is woven around an incident of crime that takes place. There’s love, action and drama — all woven into one to give the viewer plenty of edge of the seat moments. I am trying to make a statement through the film,” observes Shashank. He points out that he’s trying to challenge a popular belief in society and the movie is an attempt to justify that challenge.

What’s also interesting about the film is its music — four of the songs are written by Shashank and one has been written by Yograj Bhat. Music director Arjun Janya has made sure that the beats and rhythm are original. Yograj Bhat has written and composed the song in Hubli style. Another song is sung in folk style and yet another piece
has been written and composed on an youngster’s obsession with the telephone.
Shashank says that he’s made sure each of the five songs have an identity of its own. One of the songs, set in rap mode, has African dancers grooving to desi beats alongside Indian dancers. This has been shot in Bangkok.

Another song has been shot in the backdrop of an old fort in Bidar.

Vijay, who plays the role of a body builder, is thrilled about his character. He says he’s never attempted anything like this before. “Connecting a mythological character to reality is an arduous task. You have to be really creative to do something like that. I have played a lot of roles that appeal to the masses but here I was really impressed with the subject,” says Vijay. 

Vijay further says that he plays two shades of a character. “There’s action, humour, sentiment and romance, all woven into one. I could switch from one role to another without much difficulty,” says Vijay. He also said that he had to work really hard on maintaining his weight at a certain level. “There were times when I had to reduce weight and at times, put on some more. There was a continuous alteration of weight. That was tough,” he adds.

The movie has a lot of graphics, “I don’t think any Kannada cinema has been made with so much graphics. I have spent more than Rs 50 lakh only on the graphics,” says Shashank.

The Hubli style music has caught the fancy of many and the audio cassettes are already selling like hot cakes.