Three years after the release of the commercial hit Kirik Party, Kannada actor and filmmaker Rakshit Shetty returned to the limelight with the launch of the trailer of his next film - Avane Srimannarayana.
The launch of the trailer was held at the Shankar Nag Chitramandira in Bengaluru on Thursday. Speaking at the launch, Rakshit, who is the lead actor in the film, revealed that he had a single scene in mind before writing the film — his grand entry. “We began writing Avane Srimannarayana even before Kirik Party and today, I am happy that we are releasing the film just like how I wanted to make it,” Rakshit says.
The idea of a grand entry is in stark contrast to Rakshit’s filmography so far. He has typically portrayed roles almost contrary to mass-appeal constructs. “We have tried to balance both ideas - making a mass-appeal film and an experimental film. I have watched it over 200 times and it is a different kind of film in the way we have shot it and the way we have told the story,” he says.
Avane Srimannarayana is set in the 1980s in a fictional town ‘Amaravathi’ somewhere in south India. The trailer opens with Rakshit’s character Narayana entering a tavern in the town and introducing himself as a police officer to what appears to be a room full of gangsters. The four-minute-trailer shows glimpses of a hunt for a lost treasure complete with thrilling action sequences.
The film will be released in five languages – Kannada, Telugu, Malayalam, Tamil and Hindi - on 27 December. “I knew this was a pan-India subject and we have set the film in a fictional location in South India. It is, in a way, an ode to Malgudi Days, which is set in Malgudi, also a fictional town which anyone in South India will relate to. If you recall, Malgudi Days directed by Shankar Nag, was a huge hit in Hindi,” adds Rakshit. He further said that the 2018 release of Yash-starrer KGF gave his team the confidence that a pan-Indian Kannada film is possible.
The film stars Rakshit Shetty alongside Shanvi Srivastava and Achyuth Kumar, while Pramod Shetty and Balaji Manohar are the antagonists. “I was actually searching for gigantic men to cast in the film. I was sending selfies with tall men from various gyms to Rakshit. But one day, Rakshit said that I should be one of the two main villains,” said Pramod Shetty.
Rishab Shetty, who directed Kirik Party, makes a guest appearance in the film. The film is directed by debutante director Sachin Ravi and is produced by Pushkar Mallikarjunaiah and Prakash HK under the banner of Pushkar Films.