The retired commercial tax officer didn’t learn the basics from any director or producer. “I did my diploma on Film Direction in Telugu University and made a few short films,” says Prabhakar.
His Amma Neeku Vandanam impressed everyone. “The film was about surrogate mothers, it got the Bharata Muni Arts Academy Award,” says Prabhakar.
He also studied online film direction from London School of Filmmaking. “I decided not to do regular commercial cinema for money. I want to make films that are close to reality. Telugu films have not been getting any big awards of late, I want to make films that will get national awards, I will also send the films to festivals,” says Prabhakar.
He has chosen the popular novel Ampasayya, written by Naveen, as his subject. “The novel has been translated into 25 other languages, so the film can be dubbed into any other language,” says Prabhakar.
Naveen, who has received the Sahitya Academy Award, is popularly called Ampasayya Naveen. “A few filmmakers tried to make this novel into a film, but they dropped it. Now I have taken up the challenge and have worked on it for a couple of years. Naveen is also my friend and I discussed it with him.”
The story is based in the Osmania University of 1960s. “I wanted to shoot the film at the OU Campus as Naveen has studied there. I struggled a lot to get permission for the shoot.
“The VC gave permission on condition that the students agreed. I spoke to the students’ unions and then the police and other higher officials. Finally everyone agreed and my film is the first one to be shot at OU,” says the director. He shot for nearly five days in the varsity.
“I explained the film to the students and how the protagonist had studied in OU in the 1960s. Only then did they agree,” he explains. Shyam Kumar is being introduced as the lead actor and Pavani as the main actress. Prabhakar’s wife Vijayalakshmi and a few NRIs friends are funding the film. “I am releasing the film in Tamil and Malayalam. I want to release in June.”
He added that the present generation was not keen to know the meaning of Ampasayya, so he titled the film as Campus, with the tagline Ampasayya. The novel was translated into English as Bed of Thorns, which is the exact translation of the Telugu title. Apart from OU campus, the film was also shot in Warangal and Narsapur. “It took me 35 days to complete the film.”
