‘Play of light, colour and sound is what amplified the thrills in Evaru’

With its gripping twists and turns and edge-of-the-seat suspense, debut director Venkat Ramji’s Evaru is currently the talk of the town. Apart from the unpredictable plot twists, what’s captured the viewers’ imagination is the film’s technical brilliance. A remake of Spanish film Contratiempo (The Invisible Guest), Evaru banks on the conversation between its lead actors — but the real story lies in the little details.“the blood red ring, the butterfly on Regina’s kaftan, the Buddha in the background, the window overlooking the city — every element is placed in a way that it reveals something. Art director Avinash Kolla, cinematographer Vamsi Patchipulusu and the rest of the team knew what was needed and gave it their all,” says director Ramji. Even to the untrained eye, it is clear that Evaru runs on a colour scheme from the beginning to the end. Many key scenes in the film also include mirrors and reflections — a metaphor for the ‘Roshomon effect’, which stands for the notorious unreliability of eye witnesses. “Everything in the film is a reflection; we just made it more literal by using mirrors because nothing is as it seems,” Ramji explains. Agreeing, art director Avinash adds, “The suite, where most of the story takes place, is a carefully designed set. But we also made use of natural light for the key scenes in Coonoor so that it looks realistic. We don’t expect the audience to notice all these details, but they do add to the overall effect of the film.” Like any good thriller, Evaru makes use of both silence and sound very diligently. “The idea was to keep it quiet and suddenly amplify the music for impact. However, this film doesn’t have any scary moments that make you jump or any deyyalu, bhutalu (ghosts, spirits) driving it visually,” says Adivi Sesh, adding, “The fact that we simultaneously worked on sound mix and colour correction, along with the background music, made the film a bit more tense.”Sricharan Pakala, who scored the background music, says this was one of the trickiest films he has composed for till date. “The moment I listened to the narration, I knew it would not be easy, because I had to help connect the dots with sound. I had to create sounds for specific things like hair flying! The intention of the sound was to create the mood for the story, and I’m glad the effort paid off,” Sricharan adds.
Produced by PVP under PVP Cinema, Evaru is running successfully in theatres.