Comedy filmmaker Ramesh to direct thriller

Bangalore, Sep 30 (IANS) Comedy is known to be his forte but Kannada actor and filmmaker Ramesh Arvind is now trying his hand at making a thriller titled "Accident".

The director has earlier churned out hit comedies like the Kamal Haasan-starrer "Rama Shama Bhama", a remake of the Tamil hit "Sathi Leelavathi" and "Sathyavan Savithri".

Ramesh has borrowed the title from a 22-year-old Kannada film, which was directed by the late Shankar Nag. Apart from the title, there will be no similarity between Ramesh's and Nag's films.

Using the same title is apparently Ramesh's way of paying a tribute to Nag, who was responsible for making Ramesh, then an engineering student, an anchor in a TV programme. This paved the way into filmdom for the young actor.

The upcoming film starts off with an accident at an unmanned railway crossing, leading to investigations.

"The film will be a seat-edge thriller. My aim will be to hold viewers spellbound for over two hours," Ramesh said.

The shooting of the film has begun with a sequence featuring a few artistes including Ramesh.

A surprise element in the cast is another director, Dinesh Babu, who plays a police inspector. Babu has so far directed 24 films.

Rekha and Pooja Gandhi, the leading lady of "Mungaru Male", are the two heroines in "Accident". While Rekha plays a strong woman fighting injustice, Pooja features as a model.

The cast also includes Tilak, Mohan, Radio Jockey Balaji Manohar, writer Rajendra Karanth, model Rohan and Pati Iyer.

Ramesh is also introducing a new music director, Nicky Tej, in the film that is to have six songs.