How do you get a normal actor to look as menacing as Bobby Simha did in Jigarthanda? This was the quandary that enveloped first-time short film director M Thalapathi Raja, who eventually used the low-angle shot to capture dark, strong and powerful visions of his characters — in his short film, Thanal, that had a private screening at Chennai's Prasad Labs. The story is a gangster saga where a son avenges his father by murdering the kingpin who did him in. The 29-minute film isn't all violence, as the necessary mother-son sentiment is also thrown in. "My film is not about sending a message. Simply put, it is the turn of events that leads to the hero finding his father's killer and avenging his death going against the wishes of his mother," says Thalapathi.
Shot on a Canon 5D camera, Thanal's cinematography is comparable to that of low-budget feature films, says the Commerce grad who followed his love for the camera all the way to a television channel where he worked as a cameraman. The film, featuring newbie actors, who have cut their teeth in Koothu-p-pattarai, follows a linear narration, except for a flashback at the end. Sound editing has been done on a normal two channel mixer. Thalapathi also says that there was a conscious effort to keep the dialogues of the film clean given the genre, "Everything was simple and there was no make up or fancy costumes," he adds.
As with any other film, short or motion picture, the shoot was tedious explains Thalapathi. "We shot for 10 days in a kuppam in Triplicane, for which we had to obtain permission from the cops after a formal request was made to the Commissioner of Police. We had already begun shooting though the permission hadn't come through. The cops landed up on set and asked us to stop! Also, scenes involving the aruvaal (sickle) frightened some of the residents, before we calmed them down and convined them that it was just cardboard. There were also requests from people to let them appear in some scenes. We reasoned with them somehow," shares Thalapathi about the funny and the not-so-funny encounters the team faced during the shoot of the film.
This Chennaite spent Rs 80,000 on the feature film with plenty of his friends coming to his rescue by pitching in for production work like cinematography, editing, background sound and so on. Thalapathi who has been trying his luck in Kollywood for three years now derives his inspiration from directors Bala and Ameer and would like to assist them in the future. Unlike Balaji Mohan or Karthik Subbaraj who chose the short film route to success, Thalapathi is not keen on showing Thanal to other directors, "My immediate goal is to assist someone and learn the ropes of filmmaking," he explains assidiously.
The low angle shot
Think Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho and you can warm up to a low-angle shot a little. Images on screen involve shots from a camera angle positioned low on the vertical axis, anywhere below the eye line, looking up. It is believed that low-angle shots give characters a larger than life makeover
canon 5D
This DSLR has a 12.8 megapixel digital single-lens reflex. The camera is noted for being the first full-frame DSLR with a standard body size as opposed to the taller, double-grip professional camera body style. The 5D has nine autofocus points plus six invisible assist points available only during continuous-focus tracking