During a recent episode of Jayammu Nischayammu Ra, hosted by Jagapathi Babu, director Sandeep Reddy Vanga took a moment to reflect on his inspirations, filmmaking approach, and the highly anticipated Spirit starring Prabhas.

Sandeep joined Ram Gopal Varma, whom he described as “my mentor in many ways.” He elaborated, “Watching his films, I learned many things. I watched Satya more than 60 times and learned editing from it.” 

Talking about interval scenes in films, Vanga cited Baahubali 2 as a game-changer. “The interval block of Baahubali 2 is the highlight. After watching it, I returned home and watched Arjun Reddy’s interval block and had doubts whether viewers will love it or not. Rajamouli proved that interval blocks should also be impactful,” he reflected. 

When asked about Spirit’s runtime, the director broke into a light-hearted promise, “I’ll make sure the runtime doesn’t exceed 3 hours, sir.” A cheeky nod to his last film Animal, which ran over three hours, this time Vanga aims to keep things punchy.

Vanga also revealed that around 70% of Spirit’s background score is ready. “It’s easier to shoot a film when the BGM is already playing on set. We can instantly sense when to call for a cut,” he explained. Drawing from experience, he added, “During Animal, 80% of the BGM was done beforehand, and now for Spirit, we have 70% ready. It saves five to six production days.”

On working with Prabhas, Vanga shared, “Prabhas is very transparent and very sweet to work with. Though he is a big star, he doesn’t flaunt it. We will start the shoot soon.” As for Spirit, it’s touted as a high-octane cop drama with Prabhas playing a sincere police officer set to dismantle a drug mafia, while Triptii Dimri plays the female lead.