Sulle Sathya is an example of a new breed of filmmakers who are exploring varied possibilities of identifying a story without boundaries and turning it into a 40-minute movie, leaving no stone unturned. The aspiring director who has given shape to this new league of movie making is Akash Srivatsa, who has turned into a full-fledged director with the short film.
Having worked under popular actor and director Ramesh Aravind, Akash's directorial foray has a French connection. "I have been doing corporate films for a long time. I was planning to direct a fiction and that is how Sulle Satya came about. The film is based on a French short story, The False Gems by Guy De Maupassant. Bringing this 150-year-old story to present day Bangalore was a challenge," he said.
Sulle Satya aka The Real Lie is a gripping short film that chronicles the life of one man as he struggles to find answers to questions that plague him, day and night.
Having participated in film festivals that include Bangalore Roof Top Film Festival and Rolling frames and Short Film Summit, the director now plans to take it global. "Our aim is to present our film at international film festivals and make our language proud. We will be showing our film at the Short Film Corner, Cannes Film festival and TIFF Film Festival,” Akash revealed.
The film protagonist, Mahesh M A has also worked as an assistant director to Ramesh Aravind for the film Accident. "Apart from Mahesh, we have Harleen Rekhi, who hails from Mumbai and has acted in many short films. This is her first Kannada film. We also have Amitha Rao, who is already a heroine in two Telugu films - Chemistry and First Love. A student of Abhinaya Taranaga, Amitha comes from a theatre background. Veteran theatre and film actor Rajendra Karanth plays a pivotal role in the film," said Akash.
Though a short film, it took almost a year for Akash to complete the film. "This 40-minute film took a long time because we almost worked on it like a full-fledged film. We didn't want to fall short. In fact in the opening scene, Mahesh is seen standing on the edge of a building, and the shot was taken without ropes or any other safety equipment. Precariously perched at a height of 300 feet, shooting the scene was a challenge. Another challenging scene was where the hero meets the heroine for the first time. Refraining from using graphics, we made more than fifty actors go absolutely still at the same time and shot the scene. These are just a few examples which goes on to state that we did not consider any shot lightly because it was a short film," Akash said. The director managed to get an NRI producer, Ravi Kashyap, who is a software industrialist. "Being an entrepreneur, Ravi deeply appreciates and identifies with Kannada culture and cinema. Sulle Sathya is his first production. He plans to produce more films in the coming days," he said.
