“I feel as though I have submitted my papers and am awaiting the results,” says director Sailesh Kolanu, settling down for this interview soon after doing a final check of his Telugu film Saindhav, releasing in theatres on January 13. Headlined by Venkatesh Daggubati and starring Shraddha Srinath, child actor Ssara Palekar, Nawazuddin Siddiqui, Ruhani Sharma, Arya and Andrea Jeremiah, the action thriller and family drama is Sailesh’s biggest venture to date.
An optometrist-turned-writer-director, Sailesh debuted in Telugu cinema with HIT: The First Case (Homicide Intervention Team) and followed it up with HIT: The Second Case. He had intended to take a detour from the HIT universe and direct a romance drama with newcomers. However, things took a turn when Venkatesh, after watching HIT 2, called to share his appreciation. “When I went to meet him, our ideologies and outlook towards life matched and we hit it off instantly. I was surprised when he said he is open to working with a two-film-old director like me,” Sailesh recalls.
Sailesh had written the story of Saindhav during the lockdown, inspired by a boy who had knocked on his door to request funding for the treatment of spinal muscular atrophy. To his shock, Sailesh learnt that the medicine costs ₹17 crore!
“When Venky sir said he is open to collaborating, I went through my repository of stories and thought Saindhav would be ideal. Incidentally, it turned out to be his 75th film. I grew up watching Venky sir’s films and I was barely a few months old when his debut film Kaliyuga Pandavulu was released in 1986. Life has always given me things when I least expected. And it has been humbling to direct him in an emotional action thriller,” says Sailesh.
Fictional port city
Sailesh says Saindhav turned out to be a bigger film than his previous ventures, as the script demanded it. “The story involves ammunition, a drug cartel and the people involved are well placed in society. The protagonist wages a war against them to save his daughter, who is diagnosed with spinal muscular atrophy.”
The film unfolds in a fictional city named Chandraprastha. “We needed a port city with a harbour. In the Telugu states, that would mean Visakhapatnam. We all know Vizag as a laidback and peaceful town. In HIT 2, I showed how the police officers were chilled out and of the opinion that nothing sinister happens in the city. It didn’t feel appropriate to have a story about a drug cartel in Vizag. I did not want a Mumbai setting for a Telugu family story either. So we chose a fictional name for the city.” Venkatesh’s character name, SaiKo (abbreviated from Saindhav Koneru) is a spinoff of Sailesh’s nickname.
An actor like Venkatesh who has been in cinema for 37 years may tend to draw from his earlier experiences to portray his character. Sailesh’s brief to him was simple: “I wanted him to emote through his eyes rather than relying on physical histrionics. He plays a doting father who goes through an emotional shift when his child’s life is in danger. He communicates the tension through his eyes. It is tricky when a parent knows there is a chance of saving the child, at the cost of ₹17 crore instead of no medicine. He will go to any lengths to earn that amount.”
Not the ‘Baashha’ template
The trailer hints at Venkatesh’s character having a past, with others stating that ‘SaiKo is back’. Ask Sailesh if we are going to witness yet another Baashha template, where the hero lives in exile and is reminded of his past, a trope that was used even recently in Salaar, and Sailesh says, “SaiKo does have a past. Whether it is dark or not will be a surprise. I was conscious of not following the Baashha template since we have seen several mass stories in that format. I wanted to do something different. In Baashha, Rajinikanth’s character leads a mellow life until a peripheral problem is used to remind him of his past. In SaiKo’s case, there is an urgency to save his daughter. To cut away from this and go into a long flashback to explain his past would be a distraction. So I found another way to deal with this and I think it will be fresh.”
Nawazuddin Siddiqui playing the antagonist has added intrigue to the film. The actor has also dubbed his lines in Telugu. Sailesh explains that the actor plays a Dakhni-speaking character who is not too comfortable in Telugu. “His language barrier, as part of the characterisation, adds to the fun.”
This is the fourth time Sailesh has collaborated with cinematographer Manikandan following HIT 1, its Hindi remake, and HIT 2. Much of Saindhav unfolds at night and he says the visual palette is gritty with greys and shadows to create the eeriness required for the story.
For the music, Sailesh wanted a composer who could balance the emotional segments, mass moments and induce tension as the story progresses. “Santhosh Narayanan does this balancing act very well. In Kabali and Kaala, his score celebrates the larger-than-life protagonist. I liked his melodies in Vada Chennai. He can deliver an instant chartbuster like ‘Maamadura’ in Jigarthanda DoubleX and slow burners like ‘Unakku thaan’ from Chithha.”
Sailesh has often stated that while the creative part of filmmaking happens at the writing stage, the direction is more about people management and problem solving on the sets. Ask him what kept him focussed all through the film and he says, “The trust that Venky sir had in me. He was the force that kept me going.”
