The director of Ramesh Aravind’s 100th film, Pushpaka Vimana, S Ravindranath’s qualification as a director has been to have watched Hollywood films from PUC days, roam around Gandhinagar, observing Sandalwood films and being friendly with B Jagannath, the producer of A.
Rubbishing rumours that his film is influenced by Tamil film, Deiva Thirumagal, Ravindranath clarifies that he was inspired by Hollywood films like Miracle in Cell No 7, Life is Beautiful and The Pursuit of Happyness. “Not even a line of the Tamil film will be seen in Pushpaka Vimana. When I was looking to portray a mentally disabled man’s character, I did my research. That’s when I saw Miracle in Cell No 7 and I realised that the character in my mind was very close to the film. The film helped me develop the character for Indian sensibilities. Taking inspiration or reference is different from copying,” he asserts.
In fact Ravindranath had clearly told to the makers that he was adapting the screenplay of Miracle of Cell No 7 to some extent. “I have completely changed the treatment to suit the expectations of our audience. The emotions of an Indian film, replete with music or cinematography as well as characterisation is totally different. It is a clean entertainer which talks about the relationship between a father and daughter, which is rare in recent times,” he says.
According to the debutant director, it was his hobby of making short trailers that won the confidence of Ramesh and the producer, Vikyath. “I used my experience with shooting trailers and when I approached them, instead of showing them a script, I showed them a video. The approach was liked by the producer and the actor,” he says while
adding that he considers himself lucky since his timing was perfect with the film being Ramesh’s 100th film.
On opting for Ramesh for his film, the young director says that he felt the actor suited the character which has plenty of emotional quotient. “People will realise how much he justifies the role. Not as a director, but as an audience, I have cried every time I watched Ramesh’s character during the post production work,” mentions the director who dropped out of engineering and later completed his graduation.