The name of director Shankar Shanmugan may not immediately come to mind for Hindi cinema fans. But whoever has seen his films will hardly be able to forget him. You must remember Anil Kapoor starrer ‘Nayak’, Kamal Haasan’s ‘Hindustani’ or Vikram’s ‘Aparichit’ (original Tamil title ‘Anniyan’) and ‘Aai’.
Rajinikanth’s three biggest films – Shivaji: The Boss, Robot and 2.0; These are Shankar’s films only. Now Shankar’s new film is coming – Game Changer. ‘RRR’ star Ram Charan is its hero and the trailer of the film is going to be released on Thursday. This will be the first big Indian release of 2025. But the stakes on this film are very big and it is also very important for Shankar. How? Let us tell…
Visionary Director Shankar
Director Shankar, coming from the Tamil film industry, actually came to become an actor. But very soon he realized that he did not have acting talent, so he started trying his hand at filmmaking and met two big Tamil directors S. A. Became assistant to Chandrashekhar and Pavithran. In 1993, Shankar debuted as a director with the film ‘Gentleman’ and his very first film was more expensive than the average Tamil films. The reason was that from the very beginning, Shankar laid great emphasis on new techniques of filmmaking, which were being tried in Hollywood.
In his second film ‘Kaadalan’ (1994), Shankar used graphics and special effects in such a way that the audience was stunned to see such visuals in Indian films. Prabhu Deva starrer, this film was released with Hindi dubbing with the name ‘Humse Hai Muqabla’. ‘Muqabla Muqabla’ and ‘Urvashi Urvashi’ are the songs of this film and the wonder of special effects is visible in these songs only.
The process of using special effects and new techniques in his films started by Shankar from here continues till date. Six of his films have received National Awards for special effects. Shankar made India’s first big budget science-fiction film ‘Robot’ (original Tamil title – Enthiran) whose visual effects were discussed even in Hollywood. The same happened with its sequel ‘2.0’. Shankar also experimented a lot in stunts, special effects and make-up in ‘I’ and ‘Indian’.
The plots of Shankar’s films can be summed up in one line – a middle class common man has trouble with powerful people and he sets out to change the system. It can be ‘Shivaji’ or ‘Gentleman’ also. But in his films, Shankar creates such magic on the screen that the public’s attention does not deviate. On the contrary, after watching the film even a common man feels powerful. And then the dose of message always remains with you.
Shankar’s car went off the hit track
After ‘2.0’ released in 2018, Shankar started work on ‘Indian 2’, the sequel of Kamal Haasan’s film ‘Indian’. This film was released last year and flopped miserably. Since then, questions are being raised on Shankar’s career and his power as a director. Shankar, who has been entertaining the public for more than 30 years, is one of those directors who have made a major contribution in increasing the scale of Indian cinema.
‘Jeans’, ‘Anniyan’, ‘Robot’ and ‘2.0’ are Shankar’s films which were the most expensive films of Indian cinema at the time of their respective making. And all these films not only did good business but were also included in the biggest films of that year. ‘Bahubali’ fame director S. S. Long before the rise of Rajamouli, Shankar was the director whose films were considered the most ‘grand’ films of India and no one could even come close to his box office records.
‘Game Changer’ is also an expensive film, trailer is coming
Shankar’s film ‘Game Changer’ with Ram Charan is also very expensive and its budget is reported to be Rs 400 crore. After RRR, Ram Charan’s next film ‘Acharya’ (2022) flopped badly. Shankar himself is coming after giving a big flop. Shankar, who has given many films to Tamil cinema, is also making his Telugu debut with ‘Game Changer’. In such a situation, everyone’s eyes are on the next film of one of the biggest directors of Indian cinema. Only the public will decide whether ‘Game Changer’, which is going to be released on January 10, will be a blast.
