Prem's response to rip-off claims

Director Prem’s reply to claims that the latest poster from The Villain is a rip off of the poster of Face Off is to remain silent and allow the film to do the talking
Prem's response to rip-off claims

Director Prem has released the latest motion poster of his upcoming film The Villain on Sudeep’s birthday. It predictably became a rage online and also faced flak from a few. The critics said that the poster is a rip off of the poster for Hollywood blockbuster, Face Off. In the 1997 Nicholas Cage and John Travolta-starrer, the hero is forced to play the villain to save the city from a ticking bomb. Online discussion on The Villain centred around whether Prem’s directorial would follow the same storyline. 

The director, who is currently on the sets of the film at Chikkamagaluru, was reluctant to give his view. When we insisted, he says that he is never bogged down by criticism. “I choose to remain silent (in the face of these rumours) and will let my film do the talking,” he says. He cites an example to explain his case. “We address our mother ‘amma’, which is used by so many people across the world... does that mean that our call to our mother is a rip-off? In this particular poster, I wanted to show a persona inside a person and I thought this is the only way I could show it.”  

The director completed his shoot with Mithun Chakraborty on Saturday, and says that he hopes to complete Sudeep’s portions by September, followed by Shivarajkumar’s and Amy Jackson’s. “I should be completing the talkie portions of The Villain by November,” he says. 

Amy Jackson temporary camp at Chikkamagaluru
Meanwhile, Amy Jackson, who is making her Kannada debut with The Villain, is camping in Chikkamagaluru along with the rest of the team for the next ten days. Here, she will be shooting at the Malnad belt, and her portions with Sudeep will be shot in this schedule. The team will later shoot in Bengaluru and few other locations. 

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