Mollywood to Tollywood: A visual with an all-India appeal

Film: Drushyam (2014)

Starring: Venkatesh, Meena

Directed by: Sripriya

Remade from: Drishyam (2013)

For an actor who was almost rejected for his debut role and later fitted in as an antagonist in the Malayalam film 'Manjil Virinja Pookkal' 42 years ago, Mohanlal has travelled the distance in style. Starting off as a bad guy, he has been the best onscreen person to go to in many of his 400-odd films he has been featured in. He has so many records to his credit, some of whom are tough to match even by leading names in other film industries.

'Drishyam', his 2013 release was one such. It did not just have the record of having been remade in seven languages, which included Chinese and Indonesian but also made it to the top of Malayalam cinema releases over the years when it grossed Rs 50 crore, roughly a decade ago.

The film was remade in other southern languages, given the strong pull it enjoyed at the box-office back home. So 'Victory' Venkatesh made a return to his comfort zone, the remake one. The film- 'Drushyam'- was jointly bankrolled by his producer brother D Suresh Babu and the Tamil actress Sripriya, whose husband was named the producer and she turned in as the director. By then, this popular heroine of the 1980s who had been paired with the young heroes like Kamal Haasan and Rajinikanth in Tamil and seen in a few Telugu films which starred heroes like Krishna had directed five films including one in Kannada.

The thriller film, which was all about how a youngster goes missing and how despite the needle of suspicion continuously pointing out to the hero and his family they manage to stay ahead of the long arms of the law was an engrossing watch. No wonder, it grossed good money at the cash counters and was rated one of the top hits of the year in 2014. The original film had a sequel released directly on OTT last year which was followed by the Telugu version too.

No less than the 'Universal Actor' Kamal Haasan and action hero Ajay Devgn reprised the role played effortlessly by Mohanlal in Tamil and Hindi respectively. While the Hindi version is readying up for a sequel scheduled to be released on November 18, the Tamil film industry is yet to go for it.