1 day Ago By Firstpost
Filmmaker Ravi Udyawar made a sensational directorial debut with Sridevi, Nawazuddin Siddiqui and Akshaye Khanna starrer Mom. He is now back in action after seven years with Yudhra featuring Siddhant Chaturvedi, Malavika Mohanan and Raghav Juyal. The film has garnered curiosity among cinegoers with its stylish trailer.
Ahead of the release, the director spoke about the casting process, comparisons with Hollywood films and others things in an exclusive interview with Firstpost. Edited excerpts from the interview: The trailer has garnered appreciation for its stylish action. Apart from that, the technical aspects including the editing skills of Anand Subaya and the camera work of Jay Oza look top-notch.
Were you personally involved in the selection of these technicians? Yeah. That’s how you do it as a director. There are 2 editors in fact and in every aspect of it, as a director, you must bring all of them together to get to your vision, what you want out of for your film.
So, yeah, that’s what they did. Not just even our direction and action. What kind of action? How raw? How real? How are you gonna make those unbelievable actions to look real? You have to bring all that together to bring your A-game in and good team in the entire star cast, even makeup and everything.
You have to handpick all of them, and that’s when you get what you want. And that’s the only way to get it done. And, I also designed my own actions.
I’m an artist, so I make my own, visual art, and I had done a previous where you do the entire action even before you go on to shooting. So I had done that. So everybody knew when they looked at that.
This is what we were supposed to achieve and did it. On impeccable supporting-ensemble So I make a sketch of that. I write down all on paper, and I draw images.
I bring all that character to life on paper first. Then I say, okay. Let’s find this character.
And that’s with each and every character, including the smallest character in the prison you meet. And,, all the other character you actually visualize them, you see them, then you start looking for them because there’s already a picture of what he looks like, then you start finding. And to me, casting is also about bringing in, actors who can emotionally play their part.
So that action yeah. It is style, but, there is no action without emotion. So action is actually the thrilling aspect of it, and emotion is actually you’re experiencing these characters going through the story.
And, like honestly, we wouldn’t have expected to go all out and do this free cash action. On Siddhant’s casting Actually, a lot Yudhra’s character is very internal. He carries all this anger, and it’s so much bottled up.
And I thought you need a character who can play that energy. And, Siddhant’s, first movie ( Gully Boy ), he portrayed, that as the rapper. He felt like none of us knew him, but it felt like he’s a rapper.
And he took that character. So I’ve realized that he has this ease about the way he plays characters, but it’s not easy. That’s a good sign of an actor who can play that character as well.
That’s his second nature. That’s who he is. So I wanted, somebody who can internalize this character’s emotion.
And I felt Siddhant would be the right because, obviously, he brought in a younger, character for this film, young villain, young hero. And it’s mainly designed for the young audience for action and the way we’ve designed it. So I think Siddhant fit that bill so well because there’s something about him.
His intensity is crazy, how he projects himself on screen. And, I knew that I would easily mould him into this Yudhra’s character, and he’s done a commendable job here. Casting of Raghav Juyal in a negative character This was done even before Kill came in.
We had shot with Raghva even before Kill. So Beauty is we’ve casted him. I like I loved him because he’s not, like, when you see him and compare, as a dancer, and the character that he played before he played, I thought he had it in him to play a crazy, wilder character while looking, a really cool guy and the way I’ve designed him.
The way he’s tied to his character is very unique. This character is full of himself and, he’s very territorial. A drug lord son.
I thought he will easily project that in an interesting way. On fresh and strong casting of Malavika Mohanan Yeah. She worked hard, and I knew who this character was.
And like I said, we had this space and I so this character is a very strong, women character we’ve written. Even though you always think that in an action film, we need a soft actress. Yeah, she is that soft and beautiful girl, but she’s very strong minded.
And, she knows what she wants, and that’s the character I’ve written. And also, her character shifts from being a young girl to a really smart, confident. And, also, I wanted an emotional maturity in that character.
And, it’s very difficult to bring those two elements, mature enough yet, glamorous enough. So I think she creates that part really well and she has that personality. And, with Siddhant, they look great as a couple as characters.
And, she’s literally compliments him as she does her personality is really like an Yin and Yang to Siddhant’s character. So that’s how I’ve casted her, and she’s done a good job. On comparison with John Wick & Kill, Mission Impossible So this was shot before Kill and this was shot much in advance.
This we had finished shooting. All the actions were shot then only. So, if you make a flick film, unfortunately, we don’t have a reference point.
When it looks cool, then we always go and say yeh bahar ka lag raha hai. But, most of the scenes, what’s important, it looks because it’s shot really well. It’s designed really well.
Then if all aspects come together, like, if you have a really good technician working for you, you’re making it look beautiful. I wanted to make a slick film because I’m a very stylized visual filmmaker. So, I’m very special about what colour, what colour and emotion in action and how we can use all that to create this, you keep saying fresh.
So there’s a reason why it feels like that because it’s designed like that. Because otherwise, you’re doing the same action and so you’re making it more rooted by this, having those dialogues and action, which more physical and, we’ve not seen that. So that’s why when you see it and say uski tarah lag raha hai Technically, they do it right.
That’s why we always, reference compare it to Western film. But I think this is on its own. It’s our film.
We are very good. We have great technicians there. We have good technicians, and we can do good products.
And, unfortunately, our lesson is only international to compare to that. I draw my frames, and I see the design before I go on to shoot. So what’s important is, yeah, we will never get those budgets.
But within the limited resources, how well you can make it? And, we’ve shot in Mumbai. Mumbai’s location looks beautiful because today’s Mumbai is very different. I’ve used what I did.
I consciously designed Mumbai as a new age. Like, Bombay has changed a lot in these 5 years. Bombay is very cool with those high-sky skyscrapers and flyovers, and I’ve used all that if you see all the biking scenes.
And, if you showed it well and if how we can tell the story in a stylish way, and get a good DoP and art you have to bring in good guys and within the limited time. And, they are really tight on shooting time. Sometimes you can’t stretch it.
You have only that many hours to shoot within one location. So you bring in, your A-team and you just go in and do it. And, when what you want, when you design, like, I previous the action because we’ve done the entire action even before the action guys came in.
I’m designing it. This is what I want. This is how I want the sequence to feel, which you storyboard it and you tell them, okay Let’s achieve this, and you go on and do it.
And, yeah, technically, that’s well made..
