Exclusive! Bandhana 2 will go on floors only after we perfect the script: Aditya

Aditya, the son of veteran director Rajendra Singh Babu, is quite excited about collaborating with his father on what he calls will be a prestigious project. “We are making a sequel to the 1984 superhit film Bandhana, which had the late Vishnuvardhan, Suhasini and Jai Jagdish in pivotal roles. The film ended with Suhasini’s character Nandini leaving her husband, Balu (Jagdish) and setting off with her new-born child. We are looking at exploring what happened to them and their now grown-up kid. That is the basic thread that we are developing, but that is where it is at now. The intent is clear – to make a sequel – but it will go on floors only after we perfect the script. Bandhana was such a big phenomenon back in the day that we cannot afford to do anything less than that. It will be a film high on sentiments. Right now, my father is busy with his next, Veera Kambala, a film about the tradition of making buffaloes run through slushy paddy fields, which will be in production in October-November, the season for these races. Once he wraps that up, he will concentrate on the script of the Bandhana 2,” says Aditya.

The actor adds that he has a few commitments to complete before he can devote time to the film with his father. “I have just finished my film with S Narayan sir, the suspense thriller 5D, and two schedules of my next with Om Prakash Rao, called Ilakhe (Department), in which I play a cop. There are few other projects in the pipeline, some with completely new technical teams, which look promising. But I want to be sure about these scripts before I come onboard,” he maintains.

For the longest time, Aditya has been stereotyped in the underworld thriller genre, something he has been trying to break free from. But his grouse is that Kannada film producers are not the most forthcoming to back experimental subjects. “For instance, there is a guy who came to me with a fantastic script that was devoid of the regular tropes of commercial cinema, but the minute producers get to know that there won’t be any songs, punchlines or other larger-than-life heroisms, they ask, ‘How do we do a film like this with you?’ My question is, when are these guys going to change and make a film that will keep audiences glued to their seats? Viewers are actually rejecting the big commercial films with A-list heroes, but stakeholders are refusing to accept this. They only want to do sh*t films with a handful of actors and call them pan-Indian projects. They should learn to make quality Kannada films first,” he says, adding, "Nobody wants to do multi-starrers either: Hollywood thrives on it and even Bollywood is warming up to it, but they won't do it in Kannada cinema."

What Aditya is now looking at doing in the meantime is being a part of web series. “I have been offered two Hindi shows, both of which will be dubbed into south languages as well. I am not officially on board yet, but it should work out soon. I am quite thrilled about one of these shows, as it revolves around a true crime that happened in Bengaluru. It has a fantastic premise, which they are looking at developing into a 10-part show,” Aditya elaborates.