Award-winning filmmaker Salim Ahamed made an announcement regarding his next film on New Year’s Day. The title of his new film is Praayam and that is all the detail we have as of now. The first look poster that Salim posted contains the words: Blooming, spreading, falling, melting with the breeze Prayaam (Age).
He wrote: “What is a better time to reveal such a title?” after making the post half an hour past midnight, when the New Year had just dawned.
It may be noted here that Salim Ahamed’s last release And The Oskar Goes To premiered at the Alberta Film Festival in Canada and won critical acclaim and four awards – Best Actor, Best Film, Best Supporting Actor (Woman) and Best Director. Anu Sithara shared screen space with Tovino Thomas in this entertainer and it had a very talented technical crew with Bijibal roped in to score the music, Madhu Ambat for cinematography and the Oscar-winning sound engineer Resul Pookutty for sound mixing and designing. A major portion of the film was shot in the US and Canada.
Tovino, who played the male lead in And the Oskar Goes To… played a struggling film director in it, modelled on the lines of Salim Ahamed’s experiences making his first film Adaminte Makan Abu. Tovino’s character it is named Issak Ebrahem. Veteran actor Sreenivasan played the role of Aravindan in the film.
Adaminte Makan Abu was Salim’s first film and won four national awards. It was also sent to the Oscars as India’s entry for the Best Foreign Language Film category. Actor Salim Kumar who played the lead in the film won the National Award for Best Actor (Male) for his performance in the film.
In And The Oskar Goes To, Salim appears to tell a large part of his own experience, taking his first film to the Oscars. In an earlier interview to TNM, the director said that at least 50 per cent of the film is his own story.
Salim has after that directed two Mammootty starrers Kunjananthante Kada and Pathemeri.
(Content provided by Digital Native)