Focus was to make a easy movie: Vinothraj PS on Koozhangal’s choice as India’s Oscar entry

For debutant director Vinothraj PS, it’s a surreal second to have his first movie Koozhangal signify India on the 94th Academy Awards subsequent 12 months. The Tamil drama follows an alcoholic abusive husband who, after his long-suffering spouse runs off, units out together with his younger son to search out her and produce her again.
After being a pageant favorite and travelling to a number of worldwide film galas like Shanghai International Film Festival and Indian Film Festival of Los Angeles, Koozhangal was introduced as India’s official entry within the worldwide characteristic movie class on the Academy Awards by the Film Federation of India on Saturday.

Starring newcomers Chellapandi and Karuththadaiyaan, the characteristic titled Pebbles in English has beforehand received the Tiger Award on the International Film Festival Rotterdam in February 2021.
Vinothraj PS mentioned he’s overwhelmed with the love coming the movie’s manner and expressed gratitude to the jury members who chosen his movie from among the many 14 different motion pictures.
“It is like three years of effort are paying off now. We didn’t count on the movie to be recognised at this degree so we centered on making an sincere and easy movie. We didn’t have any expectations even like being appreciated at festivals together with Rotterdam.
“I am overwhelmed and so is everyone in the team. We are all excited and emotional. The actual journey has started now. We need to make sure we create enough chances to be in the final nomination. We have started discussions and are planning out things,” the 33-year-old director informed PTI over telephone from Madurai.
Born in a village close to Melur city of Tamil Nadu’s Madurai district, Vinothraj mentioned his love affair with movies started after he began visiting units of a number of motion pictures that had been shot in his native place.
“I wanted to be in the chair of the cinematographer. That’s how I developed interest in films,” the writer-director mentioned.
But the powerful instances throughout childhood pressured him to start out working at an early age. He did a number of odd jobs, together with working as a salesman in a DVD store in Chennai, the place he was launched to world cinema.
“I’d see world cinema movies virtually every single day of Majid Majidi, Stanley Kubrick, amongst others and I understood what pure cinema is.
“I worked at that shop thinking it would help me to get some contact points in the industry and then I can assist someone and start working. Soon I joined director A Sagunam and worked on a couple of his films. Then after some time I started writing the script (of Koozhangal).”
In 2018, Vinothraj started engaged on the movie, produced by Tamil actor Nayanthara and filmmaker Vignesh Shivan.
The film stems from the director’s private experiences: one among his youthful sisters was chased by her husband from his village to hers for 14 km after a quarrel ensued between the couple, he mentioned.
“… People here have so much frustration in their lives because of the drought and lack of opportunities. It is reflected in their families and relationships. The male patriarchy existed very severely because of this frustration,” he added.
The movie is ready in a village referred to as Arittapatti close to Melur and the director began filming within the scorching warmth of May 2019, he shared.
Vinothraj PS, who appears as much as veteran administrators Balu Mahendra, Satyajit Ray and Adoor Gopalakrishnan, mentioned the situation and timing of the shoot for Koozhangal was as essential because the story of the movie.
“The film has three characters – one is father, the child and the landscape. All these terrains were well off with agriculture. There was no problem with water. Later it succumbed to drought and led to huge social imbalance in the life of these people. This is what we wanted to address,” he mentioned.
But taking pictures in actual places got here with its personal set of challenges.
The director recalled how the cameras would typically get jammed as a consequence of excessive warmth and the way all the crew needed to stroll barefoot to get the heartbeat of the story proper.
The film was partially full earlier than the Covid-19 pandemic struck however the workforce wanted somebody to take over all the manufacturing.
In their seek for a collaborator, they knocked on the doorways of the NFDC Film Bazaar, a platform created and organised to encourage collaboration between South Asian and worldwide movie communities.
“The NFDC had invited director Ram, who won a National Award in 2013 for his movie Thanga Meengal, as a guest for one of the lectures. We met him and told him about the film, which he loved. Then Vignesh Sivan and Nayanthara saw the film and they took over the production as they believed in it,” Vinothraj mentioned.
After having a pageant run of a few 12 months, the director mentioned they had been toying with the concept of releasing Koozhangal round December. However, the movie would possibly get an early launch.

“We believe with Koozhangal releasing theatrically, we should be able to create a market for other such films. This (Oscars) is something huge. The pressure is not much though as we are glad to be recognised. It is a good feeling,” he added.