Railway Guard is a big budget, pan-Indian film: Deepu Karunakaran

In his signature style, Prithviraj recently announced his next project

Railway Guard

that will tell the “story of a barely known hero” who keeps watch in "the scorching heat, freezing cold and darkest nights" in the barren terrains of north and north eastern India.

The film, scripted by Unni R, will also have “a few real-life incidents weaved into the plot”, says its director Deepu Karunakaran. “It’s a movie that needs a lot of research that we are currently busy with. Most of the story will be set in the Eastern railway corridor, which has the greatest freight traffic,” he says.

The “realistic” movie has a massive scale and will be shot across North India, he informs. “We have conceptualised The Railway Guard as a big budget pan-Indian film much like KGF,” Deepu says. “Because the protagonist is a railway guard, there are a lot of shooting limitations due to the terrain which we are trying to figure out right now. We will fix the shooting dates soon; currently because of the rains, the rail tracks in many places are submerged or misaligned.”

Deepu had previously worked with Prithviraj in Teja Bhai and Family. “We wanted an actor who could understand the sensibility and scale of the project. Prithviraj is someone who is able to do that and also respond accordingly. When I told him the script, he said, ‘He had expected a movie similar to Teja Bhai but this is a matured film’,” says the filmmaker, adding that their plan is to shoot the movie at the earliest.