Odiyan director VA Shrikumar Menon: I am confident about helming Randamoozham

“I am now an average director. I have been preparing for this project. And I am confident that I will do a very good job directing Randamoozham,” he said at a press meet recently, while asking everyone to pray for his success.

VA Shrikumar Menon noted that when he and Mohanlal set out to make Randamoozham, Odiyan was not even on their minds. He said they decided to make this film as the pre-production process of Randamoozham was long and painstaking.

“This is an international film. 3 or 4 financial agencies have vetted this project. The financial vetting of the project was necessary to take it to the distributors. And that vetting process alone takes months together. A 50-member team did the pre-production work for more than three years. This film has been completely storyboarded and researched. We are at a stage now, if we start to shoot today, we can finish this film in 6 months,” he added.

The ambitious project is currently in limbo due to screenwriter MT Vasudevan Nair’s differences with the filmmakers. The Jnanpith-Award winner has withdrawn his screenplay from the project, expressing his displeasure with the filmmakers for not starting the project on time as promised. The acclaimed writer has even moved the court to prevent Shrikumar from using his screenplay, which is based on former’s award-winning novel, Randamoozham.

“MT Vasudevan Nair sir wants to play an active role in the project. And when the project was taking longer than expected, he got worried. I kept him in the loop about the pre-production work. But, due to Odiyan, I was not able to meet him for 3 or 4 months. During this gap, he developed some concerns. It’s my duty to rid him of his concerns,” Shrikumar said.

“It’s not like, after four years, MT Vasudevan Nair sir suddenly has doubts about my directing abilities. If that was the case, he has enough courage to say it openly,” he noted.