The Siddharth Mahesh and Srinagara Kitty starrer Garuda to hit screens on January 21

Garuda is a film that has been ready for a while and should have released before the pandemic. It was, after all, started way back in 2017 and was delayed several times during its making. After the delay back then, which they say was largely due to the time taken to digitally create an eagle that is an important part of the narrative, as well as fighter jets and warships, the team, led by actor Siddharth Mahesh, has been looking for a good window to release the film without having to worry about competition from too many other Kannada or Tamil/Telugu/Hindi films.

While Siddharth was eyeing a mid or late -December window earlier, the sudden announcement of as many as 6-7 Kannada films in the last two weeks of the year had him reconsider plans. “Early January has the Telugu biggie RRR, which will be followed by a plethora of Tamil and Telugu releases for Sankranti. So, we’ve decided to release Garuda a week after Sankranti, on January 21, which, as of now, only has director Prem’s next, Ek Love Ya in contention,” says Siddharth.

According to the actor, Garuda has him play a character with four different shades, two of which have not been revealed yet. Garuda is Siddharth’s second film after his debut Sipayi. The film also stars Srinagara Kitty, Ashika Ranganath, Aindrita Ray and Kamna Jethmalani in pivotal roles. The film has music by Raghu Dixit, who, we hear, has also done a cameo in it.

The team had earlier released a celebratory song called Ee Seethege, which featured all the main cast for the engagement of Siddarth’s character with Ashika. Sung by Raghu and Sruthi VS, the song, we are told, comes at a crucial point in the narrative.