Romance is in the air in Tamil cinema, and through the year, we have been seeing a different facet of romance every other week. Nursing your emotional injuries and falling in love, once more, is what Arjun Das and Aditi Shankar say their upcoming film, Once More, is all about. "While Once More has me playing a courier of suffering, it also needed me to be a beacon of hope. I should neither let you leave the theatres sulking, nor unmoved by my character. If I don't do both, then I would say I failed as an actor. I have tried my best to achieve both," he begins.
For Aditi Shankar, on the other hand, Once More is a bid to penetrate into more households. "Once More is the kind of film I used to watch with my sister growing up. Unlike most households that discourage excessive film viewing, my home was the exact opposite. My father (director Shankar) used to recommend films to me, and it is these kinds of warm and emotional films that brought our family together," she says, expressing hope of entering homes by watching films together as a family. "I am confident that Once More will be that one film that is watched by families together."
As a kid who grew up watching stars up close, one could assume that Aditi would have gone numb to being starstruck. But she says she still had that feeling when interacting Arjun Das for the first time. "I did not get many opportunities to interact with him before Once More. We've met at a concert and a film event. Only after we began filming Once More did I feel happy, both as a co-star and a fan, to see him perform well in a romantic film. Swayed by the public perception about his voice and the kind of roles he was playing, even I had doubts about whether he would act in a film like Once More."
Adding to Aditi's thoughts, Arjun Das believes he is more than his voice, and Once More is an earnest attempt by him to make the audience look beyond it and appreciate him as a performer. "Though I am not consciously running behind an image makeover exercise with every film, I feel that the better I get with my script selection, people will start looking beyond my voice and begin appreciating me for the kind of performer I am. Even before Once More, I did films like Rasavathi, Bomb, and the recent Con City, but Kaithi's Anbu does have a long shadow over me," says Arjun.
Returning to Once More, both Aditi and Arjun agree that there is a fundamental difference in how various generations approach romance. Aditi says, "Yeah, each generation has its own perception and understanding of what love means to them. With our director Vignesh Srikanth being a die-hard Mani Ratnam fan, you can count Once More as a 90s emotion film," she says, as Arjun goes on to add that a well-made romance will be celebrated unanimously. "Not that the Gen Z audience doesn't like the 90s-style romance. Love is a strong and universal emotion. So if it is conveyed the right way, with all the emotional factors in place, everyone will love it. Though I don't want to box Once More in a category, for the sake of classification, I will call it a 90s-style romance film."
Not very often do films have over 10 songs. With a whopping 16 tracks, Arjun and Aditi describe composer Hesham Abdul Wahab as the soul of the film. Arjun says, "Hesham is the soul of the film. He is the perfect fit for Once More, a mature, emotional film. When Vignesh described the film as a musical love story, Hesham's name came to mind. You must listen to the OST; such a brilliant composer." Aditi confesses that all those involved in the film are huge Harris Jeyaraj fans, and that so much work has gone into the music. "We even have a line in this film where Raghu (Arjun) says he is a Harris sir fan. We all grew up with his songs, such iconic and memorable melodies. So music is a very big strength of Once More," they both sign off.
