It was the simplicity of a short story that motivated TP Devarajan, a government employee, to take a stand behind the camera. Screams , a 30-minute short film directed by him, is based on a short story, ‘Ottapettavan’, written by PK Nanu.
“Although it was written some time ago, I felt it was still relevant. It is about the alienation of Dalits and Adivasis in society. I took the thread of that story to write my script about Raman, an Adivasi and his travails in present-day Kerala,” explains the first-time director. He is the scenarist of films such as Oraal and Praise the Lord and a couple of television serials.
Screams , says Devarajan, is about Raman’s sense of displacement in an urban setting and how people like him are driven to the margins of an unsympathetic society that seems to have no time or place for them. “There are several Ramans around us and I have always been disturbed by the side-lining and, eventual, erasure of the subaltern,” he adds.
To escape from his mundane and unfriendly surroundings, Raman tries to evoke memories of his past when he lived in communion with nature. Over time, the line blurs and Raman returns to the womb of the jungle.
Shot mostly in places around Thiruvananthapuram, Screams , a play on the famous painting ‘Scream’ by Norwegian artist Edvard Munch (1893), is on the angst and anguish of Raman, played by Indrans. “That was deliberate. In fact, the first poster I designed for the film was inspired by the colours in the painting. The title could be interpreted as a cry for justice or a scream of pain and anger against the oppression that we see every day around us,” he says.
Shehnad Jalal is the cinematographer of Screams , which has been produced by Ramdas Mini Narayanan.
A preview of the film will be held at 9.30 am at Nila Theatre on August 11.
