Director Sujeeth talks about the thrilling aspects of putting together the Prabhas-Shraddha Kapoor starrer that opens this Friday
Rachana Dubey (BOMBAY TIMES; August 28, 2019)

Anyone who has seen the trailer and songs of Saaho, starring Prabhas and Shraddha Kapoor, would know that the trilingual film is high on slick action scenes, filmed both in India and abroad. What not many would know is that every set of stunt sequences was shot by a different team of action choreographers. A heady mix of top-notch international names were brought on board to ensure that the film offers an edge-of-the-seat experience to the cinegoers.

Given that Saaho took two years in the making, it would be interesting to learn what went into crafting its action sequences. Director Sujeeth told BT, “We had hired four different concepts and each one took us hours of creative discussion with the action directors and the direction team. We chose one form of action for every sequence, which required a lot of prep, actortraining and rehearsals.”

When asked why the team chose to have different stunt teams and directors, escalating the budget of the film, Sujeeth replied, “The script demanded different kinds of action sequences for different episodes. For example, Kenny Bates was approached, as he is a tried-and-tested name in action involving cars, bikes and chase sequences. When it comes to gunfights, we preferred Bob Brown. Likewise, when the scene required Prabhas to be involved in a fistfight, we had to hire Peng Zhang, as he is good in Chinese martial arts. Moreover, we wanted to add a comic flavour to the fight and Peng Zhang was the right choice as he usually collaborates with Jackie Chan. Considering that we also like masala action, we roped in Dhilip Subbarayan, Ram Lakshman and Stunt Silva to add the required desi touch.”

For a crucial action scene in the film, the stunt team locked down a highway in Abu Dhabi for a few days. The sequence is believed to be one of the highlights of the action-thriller. Elaborating on it, Sujeeth said, “This particular chase sequence, which the audience had a glimpse of in the trailer, comes in the pre-climax part of the movie and is an integral part of the narrative. So, the whole team was of the opinion that it should be a high-octane one. We used 70 specially designed cars and three huge custom-made trailer trucks. The bike used by Prabhas was also specially designed and imported from the US — it has safety gear and upgraded horsepower as a special requirement given to us by Kenny Bates. To shoot such an enormous sequence, we required a huge stretch of the road, and we zeroed in on a couple of roads in Abu Dhabi to get the whole act right. The government of Abu Dhabi supported us by cordoning off the road for our shoot.”


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We did more than 100 set-ups-Sabu Cyril

While Saaho thrives on action scenes, it also employs a great deal of set-designing, which is another highlight of the film. For instance, the villain’s den shown reflects a crooked, evil mind. Talking about it, production designer Sabu Cyril told BT, “The villain is very dark and eerie. So, we wanted to go with a colour palette that would compliment that. The idea was to define the space, and yet defy it with odd sculptures, murals and furniture. Since we did more than 100 set-ups, it was important for us to define the characters. We had a particular colour and material pallet for each character. Apart from that, the entire film had an overall colour and material palette. The war set that we see at the end of the teaser, with Prabhas and a bunch of people running towards him, was another challenging set. It was an outdoor one on five acres of land. With the help of VFX, we were able to achieve the scale needed for that place.”

He added, “Apart from building so many sets, we also made a lot of special properties. The two black trucks were built entirely by our workers in Abu Dhabi, over 14 days. We also modified an industrial crane into an army tank in just 10 days. Prosthetics was another enjoyable aspect — we made silicone masks for body doubles and silicone arms for some of the action sequences.

When asked how the team had maintained the sets over a period of two years while the film was being shot at different locations, assistant production designer Sowmya Chakravarthula said, “We would have meetings with the director and the DOP, who would explain the scenario and the mood of the scene. We would then execute it over 15-20 days, depending on the complexity of the sequence. However, each set was required only for a few days, we would dismantle things immediately after the sequence was shot and finalised.”

Presented by Gulshan Kumar’s T-Series and Bhushan Kumar, a UV Creations production, Saaho is produced by Vamsi and Pramod. The film releases on August 30.