Popular Tamil director Gautam Vasudev Menon (GVM) recently spoke about his upcoming action-spy-thriller film ‘Dhruva Natchathiram: Chapter One – Yuddha Kaandam’ which stars Chiyaan Vikram as a special ops commando.
Speaking to popular Tamil TV actress Dhivya Dharshini in an interview, GVM spoke at length about Chiyaan’s character.
He said: “Vikram plays a character called Dhruv/John, of an underground covert team that works to protect the country.
“A team of intelligence covert commandos, on call to protect the country, and they travel the world. They have a military background, and have emotional baggage.”
“This secret team has been existing for 15 years for protect their country. The star of this team is Dhruv, who leads the team.
“He is in his 40s and needs to be off the radar, and there is a strange love story where he, much to his reluctance, ends up falling in love. Now there is some unwanted emotional baggage for him, and it’s not like he can just throw it away.”
Talking about the film, he said: “I’m very happy we managed to pull it off. The film had got stuck and was almost shelved, so I’m happy I managed to pull it off.”
The ‘Vaaranam Aayiram’ director added: “I think there is a lot of scope for a second part of the film. There is a lot of action in the film, it is larger than life, very realistic stunts and I’m very happy with the way the action has come out.”
Director Gautam Menon, talking about his collaboration with the Tamil superstar said: “It was a great experience working with Vikram sir. It is so easy to work with him, and the rest of the cast. I think I was lucky, I chose the right actors and they gave me their best. Vikram sir gave a beautiful performance, and he looks so good.”
He added: “We were ‘very lucky’ that Vikram got on-board for this, and over the phone too, He was in the middle of two other films when I called him. After I spoke with him, he said I want to do this, and told me ‘Lets go ahead’.”
“We shot several promos in New York among a bunch of other foreign locations, and what he did for the character, his looks are really cool. He wears different get ups, and has a lot of style and suave, which made the performance look so easy.”
GVM is known for his experimental and in-depth approach to filmmaking which has made him one of the most eclectic directors in Tamil cinema.
In addition, he is also known for using more complex themes in his filmography, so much so that sometimes he has failed to get distributors, or his projects are heavily edited in order to make them more mainstream.
As for Chiyaan, he was most recently seen in Mani Ratnam’s Tamil epic-drama film ‘Ponniyin Selvan 2’ and will next be seen in ‘Thangalaan’ which has completed its filming apart from ‘Dhruva Natchathiram’. The movie will hit theatres on November 24, 2023.