In our movies, the villains on screen are a cliché. One frame in and everyone knows they are evil, and are there to make things difficult. Typically, a villain will lie, kill, rape, backstab and hurt while the hero saves the day.
The new-age cinema is rewriting some of these rules, but in the old guard, Radha Ravi stands tall, having made life difficult again and again for many leading artists, especially Rajinikanth, in films such as Lingaa , Padayappa , Annamalai , Panakkaran , Uzhaippali and Muthu .The reality of meeting him, though, was an anti-climax. When he smiles, a lovely dimple appears, which makes anyone want to smile back. And behind those smiles is a sharp mind with remarkable storytelling ability.
Not such a cliché, after all. What spoke to me most were his eyes — small, powerful, and very expressive. This became the focus of the shoot, and as I tried to capture their intensity, the wrinkles and the crinkles told me how much he smiled in his life. In the pre-shoot conversation, he spoke a lot about his father, the principled man that he was, and how he was particular about treating people right. I was expecting a tough and difficult person. When asked why he was perceived in such a manner, he smiled and said “My avatar depends on how the other person behaves.”
