Malayalam screenplays turn up as books

Thiruvananthapuram, April 17 (IANS) More and more Malayalam film screenplays are now coming out as books, with publishers admitting that the business of turning movie plots into novels is a roaring one.

"Film appreciation has become a hot subject for students on the verge of entering the film and television industry. We ourselves have in the recent past come out with a dozen such books," N.E. Balakrishnan, chief of the TBS Publishers and Distributors of Poorna Publications, told reporters here Tuesday.

Their latest books - priced at Rs.100 and to be released Wednesday - are based on the screenplays of two Malayalam blockbusters of yesteryears directed by ace Malayalam filmmaker Balachandra Menon.

"Unlike CDs or video cassettes, books will always remain on your bookshelf. You just wait and see, this is going to be a good business," Balakrishnan said.

"In the past, two of my films' screenplays came out as a book and now that number will go up to four. I have already started work on a book on the screenplay of my film 'Karyam Nisaram'," Menon, a Padma Shri winner, told IANS.

"I recently found out that the print of my first film 'Utrada Rathri' released in 1978 is damaged beyond redemption. So the only way to relive earlier films is through books based on the screenplay," said Menon, who has directed 36 films.

However, he said the act of reversing films into books was not without its share of problems.

In most cases, there were no pre-written screenplays because the plots were written just before the shooting.

"I have recently discovered that for many films it is only the manuscript of the dialogues that is there, so again that is a problem. Anyway, I will see what can be done," said Menon.