Season of the showman

THERE'S NEWS that would double the joy for Kamal fans. Nandakumar and Vijaykumar will clash for public viewing, most probably by September 21. Nandu and Vijay if you didn't know yet, are Kamal Hassan's latest avatars in `Aalavanthaan'.

The seasoned showman has put in more than double the efforts for his dual role-putting on weight and shaving his head for the epitome of evil, Nandu. Given that the film is a good guy Vijay versus bad guy Nandu clash, it was quite a challenge for the Visual Effects Producer N.Madhusudhanan, popularly known as Madhu.

Did you know that there are more than 210 shots (of more than 25 minutes) of special effects (costing over one and half crore), most of them with both Nandu and Vijay in the same frame. ``The beauty of special effects is when you can't tell which of the shots are special effects,'' Madhu says.

Earlier, it was Australian company Cutting Edge that was roped in. But as Kamal's faith in indigenous talent increased, Cutting Edge's role in the project was cut down, as desi special effects company, Til Studios edged out the Aussies, with the significant part of the total visual effects used in the movie.

``When the project began, Cutting Edge was supposed to do most of the visual effects of about 25 minutes and we were supposed to do effects of around 3-4 minutes. But then, as Kamalji was comfortable working with us, the roles were reversed,'' says Madhu.

`Aalavanthaan' even has 2D animation clips thrown in to bring out evil Nandu's perspective of childish violence. ``There's nothing funny or light about these scenes,'' Madhu informs, displaying the detailed storyboarding and sketches done by the company.

Madhu roped in George Merkert, a visual producer who has to his credit projects including Virtuosity, The Net and Starship Troopers, apart from local talent Krishnakanth (also trained in Hollywood) and Dhanasekharan (who did the story-board for `Maruthanayagam' and `Hey Ram') for his team.

``We are in no way inferior to Hollywood. Any Indian company is capable of doing work that is on par with Hollywood. Today, if there are price wars, we will soon have quality wars,'' says Madhu, singing praises of Kamal Hassan for his dedication and understanding of the technology. ``His involvement, the risks he took for the project, were all inspiration for us''.

Watch out for the thriller of a climax involving hot- air balloon stunts!

By Sudhish Kamath

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Section  : Entertainment