Making a period film calls for a lot of work, not just in recreating a lost era, but telling a story of those times most convincingly. Kayamkulam Kochunni, with actor Nivin Pauly, in the lead, is shaping up through different locations, telling the life story of a legendary highwayman who lived in the Kerala of the 19th century.
Nivin plays the Robin Hood-style ‘thief’ who steals from the rich and gives the poor. Mohanlal will be seen in an extended cameo.
The film was shot in different locations to re-create the era, to maintain originality and authenticity. Reports are that director Rosshan Andrrews and production designer Sunil Babu took nearly three months to finalise the locations. They had toured Kayamkulam and places near it to get to know the area where the highwayman lived and this helped them zero in on locations for shooting.
Some important portions of Kayamkulam Kochunni were shot in Udupi and Mangaluru. The team also shot some scenes including the climax in Sri Lanka. While it was planned to shoot a major portion in Sri Lanka, the filmmakers decided to keep only the climax there due to budgetary constraints. A lot of research has gone into selecting the locations so that nothing goes wrong in re-creating the early 19th century. It may be mentioned here that the director had created a miniature of every set he would be using for the film before going for shooting.
Directed by Rosshan Andrrews, Kayamkulam Kochunni is bankrolled by Gokulam Gopalan under his banner Sree Gokulam Movies. The cast also includes Priya Anand, Priyanka Thimmesh, Sunny Wayne, Babu Antony, Manikandan R. Achari, Thesni Khan, Shine Tom Chacko, Jude Anthany Joseph, Sudev Nair, Sunil Sukhada, etc.
Gopi Sunder is composing music for this film with Binod Pradhan cranking the camera and A Sreekar Prasad editing it. Kayamkulam Kochunni is getting ready for release on August 18th.
(Content provided by Digital Native)