Director S P Jananathan’s next film Purampokku, which has Vijay Sethupathi and Arya in the lead roles, and Shaam in an important character, is back in the news. Sources now confirm that while Vijay Sethupathi plays a railway employee with no ideology in the film, Arya plays a social activist who gets arrested at one point in time and Shaam, a cop.

They also inform that the director recently opted for a method, quite different from his regular style of filmmaking, to shoot a sequence involving Vijay Sethupathi and Shaam.

When Times of India spoke to director Jananathan, he confirmed the news saying, “Yes, I did opt for a different method to can a sequence between Vijay Sethupathi and Shaam. The sequence in question was a emotional one. Therefore, I allowed the actors to enact the entire sequence at one stretch and recorded it. It was a rough shoot. This way, I ensured that any improvisations that the actors had in mind were not missed out on. I then broke the sequence into shots and got exactly what I wanted by having the actors re-enact portions.”

But why has he titled his film Purampokku, which means wasteland, and he says, “Only now, Purampokku is used to refer to wasteland. What many don’t realize is that it originally was meant to refer to a piece of land that was common to all, like a lake or a graveyard. In other words, a piece of land that was useful to all was called Purampokku. My film too is also about a person who lives for others.”