With newbies, you feel like a star: Suni

Director Suni, who had set off a fan frenzy with his debut directorial Simple Agi Ondh Love Story, which even gave him the prefix ‘Simple’, continues on his quest for fresh stories. His next, Operation Alamelamma, is one such and is releasing this week.

He says he thought of the story by reading just one line of a news report; it said that the police caught a kidnapper by holding on to a ‘fake kidnapper’. “My associate and I, while  discussing the possibility of a short story, were talking of a few funny kidnapping incidents. All of this led me to write the story of an innocent guy who suffers in the hands of the police, and how it affects his personal, family and love life,” says Suni, who is happy to attempt a new genre. 

“I started with a romance, then worked on a political drama, Bahuparak, and now Operation Alamelamma is a thriller,” he says.

Suni has written its story, dialogues and screenplay, one reason why it took a while for him to get this project ready. While Suni’s strength has always been his dialogues, the director says that this time he has focussed on the visuals, which will narrate the story.

“This time I started with the rerecording and had, with my team, created a story board that I kept referring to while taking the shots. These visuals were crucial to the making,” he says. “The film is a thriller, but it has humour woven into it, and this has been done using dialogues.”

Suni does not expect to replicate the success of Simple Agi Ondh Love Story. “I start with a hope that every film and subject is fresh,” he says. “I am glad that I am in the industry at a time when we have many new scripts, new directors and a varied kind of cinema coming out every Friday. Technicians, too, keep abreast of new developments. I am a producer as well, and so am happy that, with every new film, we add a new set of audience.”

In the industry, there are two kinds of directors - those who make safe bets with stars and big budgets and others who give a chance to fresh talent and ideas. Suni falls into the latter category, and was even okay working with a new producer Amarej Suryavanshi. The film also has actor Rishi making his debut, and Shraddha was just one film old with U Turn when she was chosen for this film. 

On the technical side, he brought in a debutant cinematographer Abhishek Kasargod, and the up-and-coming music director Judah Sandy. 

There is a happiness in making a movie like this, says Suni, “I also like to be a part of big budget films,” he says. “I start with a story and then choose the actors, and newcomers usually suit these projects. Also, among newbie actors, I feel like a star director because they value our suggestions. But I also want to work with stars.”