Vadivelu and I plan to work together again: 'Eli' director

Director Yuvaraj Dhayalan, who has teamed up with actor-comedian Vadivelu for the second time in forthcoming Tamil comedy "Eli", says they plan to collaborate again, but not immediately.

"Vadivelu sir has asked me for another film. Both of us are interested to work again. While working on our first film 'Tenaliraman', we had discussed a few story ideas. We plan to make one of those ideas into a project, but it will take time as I've started the script work for my next project," Yuvaraj told IANS.

Yuvaraj's second directorial "Eli" releases in cinemas on Friday.

"Out of the few story ideas I had in mind, Vadivelu sir personally liked the story of a spy. He also liked the title 'Eli', which means rat, and he felt it was apt to the story," he said.

Vadivelu plays a spy in "Eli", which is set against the backdrop of 1960's Madras.

According to Yuvaraj, action sequences in the film will thoroughly entertain viewers.

"Vadivelu sir possesses several characteristics of a rat. When four people in a room decided to hunt down a rat, it will surely cause lot of damage to themselves. Such things have inspired the action sequences in the film," he said.

"The idea of creating a lead character with the traits of a rat gave us the freedom to innovate and infuse humour in the script, especially in action scenes," he added.

Talking about working with the ace comedian, the director said that he capitalised on the actor's comic abilities to the fullest.

"When we worked in 'Tenaliraman', the lead character had its limitations. Since it was inspired by a real character, we couldn't change much. The general feedback was that why didn't we make the film funnier," Yuvaraj said.

"In 'Eli', we've made the best use of comedian Vadivelu. There are instances where we've also done justice to the actor in him," he said.

Asked if recreating the 1960s era was challenging, he said: "It wasn't really difficult because we shot mostly indoors in sets. The script didn't require us to shoot outside, so we didn't have to worry about recreating the old era".

One of the highlights of the movie, according to Yuvaraj, is a Hindi song featuring Vadivelu and actress Sada.

"We have shot a duet featuring the classic number 'Meri sapno ki rani' from 'Aradhana'. In this song, audiences will get to see Vadivelu do something he hasn't done before in his career. Ita¿ll be funny and at the same quite special," he said.