Padmanabhaswamy temple has been in the news since treasures were unearthed from its subterranean vaults almost a year back. Besides the stories about the wealth and the huge public interest it created, the film ‘Padmavyooham’, directed by debutant Bijoy P I, tries to look into the complex defence structure of the traditional fane with a mix of fantasy and reality. “The film intends to pan camera on how king Marthanda Varma could have envisaged a complex defence mechanism in the temple in order to protect it by creating a ‘padmavyooham’ like structure in the epic. It is possible to see the temple either from the angle of devotion or as a place that houses immense wealth. Our point is that even the vaults would have some complex structure behind its construction,” says Bijoy. The film revolves around the death of a journalist who investigates and finds the so called complex defence mechanism in the temple. Unfortunately, he dies before revealing the findings. The film takes a twist here and moves into how Aditya Varma, the patron of the temple, sets out for an expedition to find the truth. The scripting was done after referring to available literature describing the history of the temple and from people who have a sound knowledge regarding the temple. Alongside, the film also adds fictitious elements to it. Though the script was completed before six years, the film could not be made owing to financial constraints. Instead, a short film 'The Myth’ based on the temple history was done.
The film was shot in locations at Attingal and Alappuzha. “We have consciously kept away from shooting inside the temple due to security constraints. To make it as realistic as possible, we constructed an 18-feet-long idol of Lord Vishnu reclining on the divine serpent Anantha just like in the temple for shooting the climax scenes.” The marquee structure was constructed by art director Ajayan V Kattungal.
The cast has a set of new comers who were selected after conducting screen tests and auditions. The lead role of Aditya Varma is played by Noby Tharian. Script, screenplay and dialogues were also written by Bijoy. The lines of Suku Maruthathoor and Aji Daivappura were set to tune by Sanjeev Krishnan. Shankar Mahadevan, Vidhu Prathap and Neha Nair were the singers.
Chandramohan is the production controller and assistant director is Kiran. Safdar Marva has done the editing. The 90-minute film produced under the banner of Megawave productions is set to be released by June end.