His last film was Huliraaya in 2017 and now filmmaker Aravind Kaushik is back with a brand new project titled Steel Paatre Samaan. A multi-starrer, the idea of the flick was born when Aravind was having a conversation with his school and college friends over Whatsapp and Facebook. “Going back in time, all those silly things and crazy stuff we did when in college came back to me and some of the incidents really made me laugh out loud. I thought these incidents and characters are like Steel, Paatre and Saaman, who are three friends in the film, and I wanted to bring these characters to the screen. Many of the incidents that now find a place in the film actually were true incidents that I’ve seen and been a part of during my college life. So, this movie is going to be a tribute to my own school and college life,” reminisces Aravind.
A breezy comedy that stars Shravan Narayan, Jayanth P Bellur and Manojavam, the film revolves around the ‘coming of age’ of the trio. “The flick is also a take on how we all have become - we’re always running a race, trying to earn that extra buck, trying to be smarter, faster, stronger, earn lots of money and are always looking at climbing up the social and professional ladder very fast. But this film has characters who just want to be who they are - not very ambitious, smart or outgoing. There are people like that too who just want to live a normal, not-so-ambitious life without being aggressive about being updated.” The three blokes in the film, are kind of in a time warp, where they suddenly realise that they’re still stuck in their own world while the real world has moved on. “So, they begin to run a ‘running race’ with life, trying to catch up,” adds Aravind.
As for the cast, the director made his pick from social media. “I noticed their talent, their ability to act, their intelligence and their creative abilities, which were on display in the short films they had acted in. They also looked the roles. And so, my wife Shilpa (one of the producers of the film) and I, spoke to them and took it ahead.”
Ask him how this film different from the previous films he’s made, and he responds, “It’s different because this is a film which is a lot more ‘realistic’ than the others I’ve made because it’s narrated with a lot of inherent comedy in it. In terms of writing, this is the closest I’ve come to reality in terms of dealing with characters.”
With Kannada cinema seeing a lot of script-oriented films that are not just massy, is he trying to cater to the new breed of audiences that appreciates good scripts? “
“Our audience has always been encouraging towards strong and contemporary content. It’s heartening to see that the response for content-based cinema has increased in the recent past. But in my case, I’ve always catered to or tried to cater to an audience that’s not the typical mass and masala crowd. I’ve always believed that the envelope must be pushed with respect to bringing newer and contemporary stories onto screen.”
