Kannada cine goers have a grouse that they seldom get an opportunity to watch films that bags awards at the State, national and international levels. Despite getting rave reviews from critics and accolades from juries, such films are not screened in the commercial circuit either. Viewers have to watch them only at film festivals or at screenings arranged by film academies.
However, independent filmmakers are now making efforts to screen their award-winning and critically-acclaimed films in the commercial circuit. Basically they are aiming at small towns and cities, before releasing them in Bengaluru in a big way. Venkatesh and Gururaj, producers of the State Award winning film Marikondavaru, are all geared to release their film on August 18 in 25 screens across the State.
The film, directed by Shivarudraiah, has been chosen as the second best film by the Jury of Karnataka State Awards. The film is an attempt to connect three stories of noted writer Devanuru Mahadeva — Marikondavaru, Grastaru and Dambaru Bandudu .
According to Shivarudraiah, it can also be viewed as Devanuru’s biopic. One of the prominent writers in the country, Devanuru depicts both suffering and resilience of Dalits. He makes readers realise that the exploitation of Dalits is not only economical, but also social.
This is not the first time Shivarudraiah is making a movie based on Devanuru’s stories. He earlier made Amasa , based on another short story with the same title in 2001. Besides being screened in the Panorama Section of the International Film festival of India (IFFI), Amasa also won the State Film Award.
So far, Shivarudraiah has made eight films including Chaitrada Chiguru, Meghavarshini, Bhagavathi Kadu, Magiya Kala, Amasa, Daatu, Moodalaseemeli and Marikondavaru . His films have so far bagged eight Karnataka State Film Awards, besides being screened at various national and international film festivals.
Shivarudraiah was assisted by noted people like writer Lakshmipathi Kolara (script), Shashidhara Adapa (art direction) Pramod Shiggaon (costume), Issac Thomas (music) Murali Krishna (cinematography) Suresh URs (editing) for Marikondavaru, which also has the tagline - Samanateya Kanasu Kanutta (dreaming of equality).
As it is a biopic, the director selected Sulile Kumar, who has done over 10 Tamil films for the role of young Mahadeva, as the actor resembles the writer. Sulile Kumar shares the screen with noted actors such as National Award winning artist Sanchari Vijay, Samyuktha Hornad, Sonu Gowda, Sardar Satya and Dilip.
“Besides making it a biopic, I have tried my best to contemporise the story by taking up the issue of illegal sand mining, which is rampant in the State,” says the director. The film has been shot extensively in and around Nanjangud, Chamarajanagar and Mysuru. And, the Nanjangud dialect of Kannada which is the kernel of Mahadeva’s writing has been employed in his visual narration.
This is precisely, why Shivarudraiah and the producers decided to release the film in Mysuru, Chamarajangar, T Narsipura, Kollegala, Nanjangud and Kolar, besides a few screens in Bengaluru.
“Though Marikondavaru was made in 2015, it took nearly 20 months for us to release in the commercial circuit. After watching the response, we are planning to release the film in more screens,” says Shivarudraiah.
