Award-winning independent filmmaker Venkatesh Kumar’s upcoming flick Light Man reveals how precarious life behind the arc-lights is.
When a film gets released, everyone talks about the actors, nobody recognises the hard work that the technicians behind the camera puts in, says Venkatesh, who has converted his 50-minute documentary Kannadi Bommaigal into a feature film.
Talking to City Express about the lightmen being underpaid he shares, “Working for more than 13 hours a day they earn `500 per day. In fact, they are the most overused technician on the sets. Though there are associations, their wages have remained the same for many years.
This film will be a mix of fiction and what I had gathered from the interviews,” he tells us. Stating that there is a middleman involved in providing wages for the lightmen at a film set, Venkatesh adds, “For my film, I spoke to many senior light-men. I have documented the darker side of their lives.”
Starring Karthik Nagarajan and Jenifer in the lead, the film has music by Tony Britto. “Light Man is an intense film, and I am planning to get it released in theatres by next month. It traces a journey of an aspiring actor who ends up being a light-man,” he shares.