Maduri Dixit, Arvind Swamy
in a trilingual

Madhuri Dixit who has turned down several offers from South Indian filmmakers, has finally accepted a South Indian film, a Tamil-Telugu-Hindi trilingual titled Engineer, opposite Arvind Swamy. Produced by JS Ramachandra Rao and directed by debutant Kanthi Krishna, the film will be launched on January 23.

Said Krishna of the casting coup, “Madhuri said she was reluctant to sign South Indian films as her knowledge of the four languages was bad, and very few South Indian directors spoke either Hindi or English. She said the experience of working with Adhiyaman in Aap Mere Hain Sanam, was an eye-opener. As soon as I’d narrated the story to her, she flashed her famous smile and asked me who her hero would be. When I told her it would be Arvind Swamy, she readily agreed.” Krishna added that he would have dropped his plans of making the film if Madhuri had said ‘no’, as the role was conceived with her in mind, and only she could do justice to it.

A former associate of director Shankar’s, Krishna was a key figure in the making of Gentleman, Kathalan and Indian. He had even participated in the discussions for Jeans, before quitting to start his own film. It was during the shooting for Kathalan in Rajahmundry, that producer Ramachandra Rao, who had bought the film’s dubbing rights for Andhra, asked Krishna to direct the film. Rao had earlier bought the dubbed versions of Kunjumon’s Kathalan, Kathal Desam and Ratchagan as well as the Rajnikanth-starrer, Muthu. Ratchagan’s dubbing rights were sold for Rs 6 crores, a price unheard of for a dubbed film and the highest for a Nagarjuna starrer. The film however bombed.

About the film’s storyline, Krishna said, “Nothing in this world works without an engineer. Even to stitch a shirt, you need an engineer to make the needle. And Arvind Swamy plays an engineer.” The film has music by AR Rahman, cinematography by Jeeva and dialogue by Sujatha.