The name Siddharth Lama may not ring a bell but ‘Unnikuttan’ of Yodha, the cherubic kid in the movie, will surely do. Siddharth Lama was just eight when he acted in Yodha, back in 1992. He is happy that Malayalis’ love for the movie and his character hasn’t faded with time.
Siddharth, who is in Thiruvananthapuram for the shooting of his next Malayalam movie Edavapathi directed by Lenin Rajendran, says he could feel that fondness on the shooting sets. “They come to me and call me Unnikutta. I am still a kid in their mind. I am grateful to the whole Yodha team for making me popular and cherish the sweet moments with the team,” says Sidhharth who is essaying the role of a monk in Edavapathi.
He is acting alongside Uthara Unni and Manisha Koirala in this movie. “It is a revolutionary character who is trying to go back to his homeland — Tibet. What happens to him and his journey makes the story.”
It was through a fan of Yodha that Sidhharath got an opportunity to start his second innings in Mollywood. He narrates that story which happened almost three years ago in Nepal. “I was working with Nepal Sports Council then. In Nepal, there is a Kerala Samajam. One day a guy called Santhosh Kumar, a Malayali living in Nepal, came to meet me and said that he was a great fan of Unnikuttan. He was, in fact doing an article on the locations in Nepal where Yodha was shot and the characters of the movie like me, during that time. He expressed his desire to write about me in his blog. Pradeep Kumar, another Malayali who was working as editor in a daily there, read this article. Pradeep knew Lenin Rajendran and thus we got connected,” says Siddharth.
One day Siddharth got a call from Lenin. “Lenin said, ‘I am a director in Mollywood. I am making a movie and I want you to act in that’. I agreed. Later, I listened to the script and liked it,” adds Siddharth who was never away from movies. He had acted in eight movies as a child. Later, he acted as a young hero in two Nepali films. His father Yubaraj Lama is a known director and producer and runs a production house in Nepal. “When I grew up, I became a part of the production house. So far, we have done 24 films,” he says, adding that he wants to do more movies in Malayalam. “Perhaps a sequel of Yodha. Once I had a talk with Sangeeth uncle. He was searching for a plot then. If he gets a plot, we will have Yodha 2.”
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