Two Shoots In Two Days: What’s With South Indian Films And Georgia?

Let’s be honest – you don’t go to Georgia and expect to see Indians right off the bat. I mean, it’s still a relatively undiscovered location even within Europe. The tiny country, though, surprised me on the very first day when I walked right into a South Indian movie set while crossing the Peace Bridge at Tbilisi. That’s not all. On my second day, I decided to tour the ruins of Uplistsikhe and saw another movie with Tamannah Bhatia being shot. What was going on here!

Hyper

I was completely sleep-deprived when I landed in Tbilisi. My flight arrived at 2.30 AM and a mix-up with my pickup meant that I reached my hostel more than an hour late. By the time I could sleep, it was already 5 AM and I was up and about at 10 AM. After walking around the city a bit, I retraced my steps to Freedom Square and found the tourist information centre in a corner. Here I met Levan who organises free walking tours of Tbilisi that lasts from 12 PM to 3 PM.

This was perfect for me. I was getting an introduction to Georgia beyond my guidebook and from someone who could answer questions I had. Levan began by talking about Georgia after its independence from Russia and walked our little group through tiny alleyways until we reached the main road and Peace Bridge.

Now, over an hour into the tour I was feeling really hungry. Worse, sleep was clouding my senses and eyes. So when Levan casually looked at me and said Bollywood, I strained to understand what he was talking about.

And lo and behold, indeed a movie was being shot on the famous Peace Bridge. I caught sight of umbrellas over someone who looked like an actress and checked if I knew her. Now, I have worked for over three years covering the Hindi film industry and been a part of film award shows so I knew I would recognise even if the actress was not an A-list star.

Sadly, I didn’t know who she was so I had to ask a technician if she was the actress and indeed she was.

“Raashi, famous actor,” he beamed at me.

“Sorry, who?” I had to ask again.

“Raashi Khanna, very famous South Indian actress,” he said with a slight annoyance in his voice.

So it was a South Indian film. I wasn’t so sleepy as not to recognize a known actress. I dared to ask the name of the movie.

“Hyper,” the technician replied, clearly looking for a way out.

I was about to ask him if he understood what I had asked when he added that Hyper was indeed the name of the movie.

Upon returning to India later, one fine day I actually found the trailer of the movie in the India Trending section. So Raashi was clearly famous I thought.

Here’s the YouTube trailer of the movie. Pay close attention to the shot at 38 seconds to see the Peace Bridge shots.

 Okkadochadu

I thought that watching the shoot of Hyper on my first day was just simple coincidence. So on my next day, I decided to go from Georgia’s current capital Tbilisi to Uplistsikhe, one of its ancient capitals. I noted that a signboard outside the ticket counter said that organizing picnics inside the ruined fort-cum-archeological centre was forbidden. Despite the sign, a feast was being prepared when I walked in. My guide didn’t seem to mind so I let it pass.

When we reached mid-way through the ruins of Uplistsikhe, my guide commented that a music video was being shot. I looked up and saw four women dressed in black walking past. Paying no heed to it, I was about to continue when a local man stopped our group from going any further because the shoot had commenced.

The music started – and I thought I heard what sounded like an Indian song. Some music video this would be, I thought. And then I saw Tamannah Bhatia at a distance. What! One more movie! At least let this be some Bollywood movie that I could share with friends on Facebook.

We walked up after the shot was done and later I asked what movie this was only to get confused about the name. It appeared on my YouTube feed a few days ago with the exact costume Tamannah was wearing which is when I realised the name of the South Indian movie – Okkadochadu. I have no idea what it means so please feel free to enlighten me on the topic.

Here’s the trailer of the song called Hridayam Hridayam. Check the scenes from 22 seconds to 32 seconds to see the shots from Upliftsikhe.

You can also check the movie trailer here –

I shook my head and continued my tour just hoping that this was the final movie shoot I was seeing in Georgia. I mean sure it’s a pretty country, but did I really want my tour ruined by watching movie after South Indian movie being shot in Georgia? No, not really.

Thankfully, I didn’t come across any movie shoots thereafter on my two-week journey through Georgia but I was curious about how ingrained Bollywood and Indian movies were in local peoples’ minds. The older generation raved about Raj Kapoor songs and Mithun Chakraborty’s Jimmy Jimmy while I saw posters of Aishwarya and Shah Rukh Khan outside beauty shops in Kutaisi.

How It Began

Upon researching, I found that Billa 2, the 2012 movie starring Ajith had opened the doors for South Indian filmmakers to Georgia. The immense success of the movie opened producers to the scenic beauty of Georgia in 2012. Since then, the number of movies being shot in the Caucasus country has only gone up. This year, Sridevi was seen shooting for the upcoming movie Mother in mountainous Mestia, about the furthest region you can get to while in Georgia.

The Georgian government has also started offering a rebate of up to 25 per cent who shoot movies in the country to entice producers.

Hyper and Okkadochadu shows that the initiative is clearly working.

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