Film-maker-comedy-artist-turned-journalist Amani Venkata Subrahmanyam (popularly known as AVS) finds fault with Film Chambers of Commerce for not doing enough work to curb piracy of movies and songs as is being done several other neighbouring states.
This kind of lack of initiative, either from the Film Chambers or the Government agencies, was dealing a death blow to small-budget films in the State, forcing producers and directors to either shelve their projects or to be content with what they get in the first few days, AVS told The Hindu on Friday.
On the sidelines of a meeting organised to announce the Ramineni Foundation Awards presentation function that has been shifted out of Hyderabad for the first time after 11 years, the comedian gives credit of his coming into film industry to Bapu and Jandhyala with ‘Mr. Pellam'. “The quality of humour or comedy in Telugu Movies is definitely going down, but the audience will automatically reject such double-entendre and a correction take place,” he opined.
The Censor Board has the mandate to cut such scenes and ensure that clean movies reach the large audience and if they do not do their job properly, it is transparent as the names of board members is also displayed on the certificate to make people understand who had okayed such things. With 135 comedians in Telugu Cine industry, there was a healthy atmosphere prevailing and compared to any other film industry, the quality of humour tracks was far better and their length has been increasing in the recent days, he observed.
Busy with two of his directorial ventures – Seethammathalli and 3 Idiots (not finalised) – he is also acting in 15 movies, which is his first love. “Acting on any given day is my first choice and that is what brought recognition to my talent,” AVS said. He was also busy directing a comedy reality show on a Telugu entertainment channel in addition to making two telefilms.
Comedy and sentiments were the two aspects in movies that are evergreen, and close to his heart. Though he had not thought of producing any movie, he said that he had enough freedom from all the producers and four out of five of his directorial ventures had got Nandi Awards.
