A positive response

Director Dinesh Baboo is a happy man. His latest venture, ‘Priyanka’, has hit the screens and one of the earliest feedback that he has been getting is that the movie has managed to hold the interest of the audience till the end. “A lot of people have said that the trailers and the initial clips triggered a lot of curiosity among people. Many find it interesting because the movie is based on a true story and the characters involved are real people. This is also one of the reasons why the movie ran into packed houses on the first day itself,” says Dinesh, the director of the film.

 
Dinesh confesses that one of the biggest challenges before him when he set out to make the film was to make the real characters appear filmy. “Since the story and the characters involved are all drawn from a real incident that took place in Bengaluru a few years ago, the toughest part was to tell the story in a convincing way. I had to justify why I wanted to work on this story,” he adds.
 
Every actor has been hand-picked to suit the characters. It is not only their capacity to emote that Dinesh has taken into account but he says that he wanted the actors to resemble the description of the character. Talking about his choice of Tejas for the role of the young man in the movie, Dinesh says, “There’s a certain innocence in his eyes. I didn’t want someone with villain-like eyes. I first saw him in ‘Oggarane’ and it is Prakash Raj who introduced me to him. I was particular that the character of the young man must be younger to that of Priyanka’s and that’s exactly what I found in Tejas. He has done complete justice to the role.” 

Another striking character is that of Prakash Raj who plays an investigating officer in the movie. “Prakash is a phenomenal actor and it’s very easy to work with him. He has the ability to blend into just about any role with ease and perfection,” says Dinesh. 
  
Actor Priyanka Upendra doesn’t work on too many projects at a time but she says that she found the character offered to her in ‘Priyanka’ very interesting. “We have been getting positive reviews about the movie. I’ve watched the movie more than three times and I am happy that it has shaped up really well,” says Priyanka. 

Dinesh recollects that he usually never gives the actors a copy of the script but he chose to give one to Priyanka. “I gave her a copy of the bound script well in advance because I believed that she would not only be able to understand her character but understand how her character is important in the light of all the other characters,” says Dinesh.   
He also felt that the discussion between Priyanka and him about her character and the others characters involved added a lot of new
dimensions to the product.