Local locations win over Foreign streets

In Telugu movies, it just takes the hero and heroine to lock their eyes to go abroad and dance for on a duet. Call it new phase in Telugu cinema or changing taste of the audience, the number of movies shooting songs within the country are up on the rise. Directors now prefer making their actors run around trees in ' Konaseema' to dancing on random streets in snow drizzling European streets.

While a few film makers claim they want to shoot in Kerala, Coastal Andhra or anywhere in our own country because it is 'realistic' for the story, a few others claim shooting abroad is only to suffice the ego of the director orthe hero of the movie. There are a few movies where the hero who is supposedly poor in the movie and the heroine who is a daughter of a rich father and yet they dance abroad for a duet.
Film makers claim that the current lot of 'aware' audience don't take such unrealistic songs. "I shot the song 'Nilampuri Gajula' for ' Mahatma' in Allepy on a boat.It doesn't make sense for a story where a local goon turns noble, to go abroad and romance his girl. Most of the songs in the movies I make are shot within the country. We have a huge topological diversity to exploit. Besides, I am comfortable shooting within the country because I know the culture, the colours, the locations here. People will laugh atmy movie if I go abroad and shoot a song for a story which has nothing to do with a foreign country" says director Krishna Vamsi.


Interestingly, last year, two movies 'Astachamma' and 'Gamyam' which were shot with exotic locales of Coastal Andhra became added advantage to these movies. Mahi the producer of ' Village Lo Vinayakudu' a movie shot completely in East Godavari district says shooting a song abroad only shows lack of content in the cinema.
"I don't see any reason why the songs should be shot abroad unless the story is something like 'Pardes' or about NRI community living there. If there is no content in the movie or to satisify the ego of the hero or director, they go abroad, show the locations and try to make up for it. Maniratnam who is the star director never went abroad to shoot any song and yet managed to bag the most number of superhits in his career. My movie is all about village. To make the village a little more pleasant and poetic, we shot it at Rajolu in our own state" .

Senior film maker Aswini Dutt says the current trend is a part of the cycle. His movie 'Banam' which released recently was completely shot in Araku Valley and admist coconut trees of Kerala.

"A few years Telugu film makers shot in Ooty, then there was craze forMahabaleswar. When they were bored of it, they moved to Kulu-Manali. Since the past 10 years shooting abroad has become rampant.Perhaps now the trend is to shoot in our own locations and it will stay for sometime. For a story like 'Banam' which we produced, it looks weird for a hero with limited means of income to romance a heroine on foreign locations. Audience have become intelligent and we can't take them for granted. If it is a mass hero, then we will shoot abroad as their huge fans might still want to watch it. We can take liberty on locations when it comes to big heroes. But now saturation point has come fordancing on foreign streets" he claims.

Interestingly, producers say it costs them lesser to shoot abroad than within our own country because if it is here, the whole crew of about 60 people need to travel, where as if it is a song sequence abroad, three songs can be shot in ten days with lesser number of people.

MohanVadlapatla, producer of ' Kalavaramaye Madhilo' says though it costs lesser to shoot abroad than within our own country, cost of productionis very low if we shoot in our own state as it doesn't cost much for travel.He says the stories that are being filmed these days don't require a foriegn travel which is also the reason for avoiding foriegn shoots. His movie Kalavaramaye Madhilo had songs shot in Munnar.


"Shooting in Kerala is expensive than shooting abroad. It costs a bombfor shooting location in Munnar, Kodaikanal etc. Shooting in foreignlocation is cheaper because we take lesser crew with us, there are tourpackages and shooting location is free of cost. However, there seems tobe an increase in shooting within because, dancing on the roads ofother countries doesn't go well with the theme of the stories being filmed these days. Shooting within AP is cheaper again. No other country can boost of greenery like us. I am going to shoot my next movie completely in Coastal Andhra districts and other parts of the state." says Mohan.