Anamika is about the world around us - Abraham Lincoln

Anamika is K.J. Abraham Lincoln's third film as a director. Since he has for years been working as a leading PR man in the industry, his name is not new to Malayalam Cinema. This younger brother of noted filmmaker the late Jacey, learnt much from his association with various film personalities.

His first directorial venture Mazha Peyyumbol made on a shoestring budget had a lot of shortcomings. The crew had to work without lights, cranes, trolleys and other accessories. The film told the story of someone who had gone to Pakistan prior to Partition and who comes back only to find he is neither here nor there.

His next venture was Krishnapakshakilikal, with Revathy, Narendra Prasad, Saikumar and others. His third film, Anamika, has Samvrita Sunil playing the lead role and Arun of For the People fame in an equally-important role. Produced under the banner of Cine Creations by K.P. Venu, Anamika also sees the latter teaming up with Abraham Lincoln to handle the directorial department. Jibu Jacob is in charge of cinematography and Rajesh Kalpaththoor does the art-direction. V. Jayakumar edits the film, which is at present getting ready for release. Abraham Lincoln and K.P. Venu were recently in the Chitranjali studios, Thiruvananthapuram giving final touches to the film. They spoke at length about their new venture to Unni Nair of nowrunning.com. Excerpts:

What is Anamika all about?

Anamika takes a look into the mind of a woman who has undergone abortion. Rachel and Louis are happily married and they have a child too, Eby, who is one year old. Rachel is again pregnant and she's ashamed of what others would say about having another child so soon. Louis comforts her and asks her to stop bothering about others. In the meantime, Rachel happens to meet a friend of hers who is ultra modern in her outlook and speaks of abortion as something very normal. Rachel goes for abortion, but after it is done she becomes gloomy thinking of the child that she had deliberately 'murdered' while in her womb. She feels a strong sense of guilt and even has some kind of a feeling of vengeance towards the doctor who did the surgery on her. This is the plot of Anamika.

What about the title?

Anamika, as we all know, means 'the nameless one'. This is the name that Rachel and Louis give to the child that they had aborted. Since the child doesn't exist anymore in reality after the abortion, the name would perhaps be most apt. The attachment that the couple share with the child who has got a name, but doesn't exist has been worked out in the film. It is based on a story of the same name by P.G. Johnson who also wrote the script for the film. Johnson had also done the script for my first film, Mazha Peyyumbol.

What made you choose such a subject for your film?

The thing that attracted us to this story was that it has a strong message to deliver. In fact Anamika is about the world around us. Everywhere we find people talking very casually about abortion, without ever according it the seriousness it deserves. In the film we do not make judgments as to whether abortion is right or wrong. But after seeing the film, you would be forced to ask yourself: "Isn't it actually an act of murder to kill a child in the womb?" The film evolves from our firm belief that life is actually God's blessing and hence none other than God has the right to take it away.

This time you are not directing the film alone. The producer of Anamika too is sharing directorial responsibilities with you. How do you feel?

Sharing the directorial responsibilities is of course a very good thing. And it tells upon the end-result too. I should point out that it was my good fortune to have come across a producer for whom making money is not the sole motive for making a film. It is rarely that we come across such producers, who have genuine love for art and don't see cinema merely as a means to mint money. Of course we know that most distributors won't be willing to take up such a film for distribution and so we are trying to get it released on our own.

Would you like to tell us something about those in your team?

Those in the cast have done their respective roles with all sincerity and dedication. Samvrita put her heart into the portrayal of the character of Rachel. Arun too spared no effort in giving life to Louis. All the others in the cast like Rajan P. Dev, Ponnamma Babu, Salim Kumar, T.G. Ravi, Shobha Mohan, Kozhikode Sharada etc have cooperated with all sincerity in the making of the film. The songs are penned by Jiji Thomson IAS and K.L. Sreekrishnadas and set to tune by noted music-director of yesteryears M.K. Arjunan. We are introducing a new music director Manu Ramesh, who does the background score for the film. He is the son of noted poet-cum-song writer S. Rameshan Nair.

So, the film is going to be a musical. Is it?

The film certainly has music in it. But the songs have been put in in such a way that they jell with the subject and the theme. There is even a Christmas song, but that too has relevance as far as the storyline is concerned.

Popular artists, good storyline, and music - this time you seem to be making a film with commercial ingredients?

I wouldn't say that we are making a film with commercial ingredients. We are attempting to say what we have to say using the commercial format. This is because the film should reach the masses and convey the message, loud and clear. To do that, we had to be a bit 'commercial' in our approach.

Click the Movie button below for more info:
Anamika