High time that I moved away from making controversial movies: Saamy

Ahead of the release of Akka Kuruvi this Friday, director Saamy meets us for a casual chat. He speaks to us in the middle of last-minute release work. Akka Kuruvi is an adaptation of the legendary Iranian director, Majid Majidi’s 1997 award-winning film Children of Heaven and received a letter of appreciation from the director himself. “We were watching the movie in my house and that is when my sister told me about how I should make such light films as well,” begins Saamy. His previous films like Uyir, Sindhu Samaveli and Mirugam dealt with controversial topics. “I wanted to move away from such topics. So, I believed that the Tamil adaptation of Children of Heaven would be a good watch. I mailed Majid Majidi asking for the remake rights. It was then I learnt that Priyadarshan had remade the film in Hindi as Bumm Bumm Bole. So, we got it through him,” adds Saamy.

The director says that the Tamil version too is set in the 90s and not in the present day. The story revolves around two young siblings who lose a pair of sneakers and the troubles that they undergo to retrieve it. Today, sneakers have become affordable than it was in the 90s. Hence, I wanted to retain the same timeline. For this we shot the film in a village called Poombarai in Kodaikanal. We had to recreate the 90s backdrop in the village and there were a few camera angles we needed to work on to refrain from showing the mobile network towers. Also, the story stresses on the importance of education where a struggling family sending their kids to a convent,” the director reveals.

He also adds that this is why he wanted maestro Ilaiyaraaja on board as the film’s composer. “To make the movie palatable for our audience, there is a romance segment in the movie and Raja sir’s music plays a huge role. There are no romantic dialogues between the pair. But the love is conveyed through his songs. Ilaiyaraaja sir’s background music for the film will be another highlight,” he remarks.

Talking about working with children, Saamy laughs. “My ADs told me that the children were scared of me for the first couple of days. Then I bought them pastries and chocolates so they would warm up to me. It was a delight to work with them,” he opens up. Akka Kuruvi is director’s fifth film while three more films were stalled. “They were shelved only because of production issues and not because of my temperament issues. In fact, I had to pledge my land and other assets to release a few of my films,” he concludes.