With his first film Rocky, Arun established his sense of visual language. Characterised by brutal violence, long shots, double frames, and slower pacing, Arun Matheswaran’s films toe the line between art and mainstream cinema. He generously stylises his films with ultra-wide shots, black-and-white photography, aspect ratio changes, and unorthodox background scores for action blocks. But Captain Miller uses these tropes to a minimum and focuses more on the character played by Dhanush.
“The long shots and other staging elements were there right from the scripting stage,” he says. “While writing Captain Miller, I knew the span of the film would be great. I knew that I could not afford to go with the same visual language. So I took a call to not use my usual practices here. At the same time, I had to work around it to make sure that it didn’t go beyond my sensibility.”
Although he just directed a mainstream entertainer with a star, he still feels he’s an underdog. “I’m not a proven successful commercial director. I’m not a popular name. I like the tag of an underdog, the dark horse type of reputation, where the expectations of me are not high. I think that might just work for the film.”