Film maker, Natraaj Maharshi a.k.a MAHA is about to bring a rare Indo-English film with a fresh-off -the boat concept for today's niche audience. The profound name in the South- Indian film industry is soon coming up with "Drawing Blood", his first feature film in English itself is a canvas in-making that portrays a flow of deep emotions through a story of an artist whose life revolves around the hunt for fulfilling petty desires that leads him to lose out on what he already had. Not to forget his brilliant work on "For U"(2007)- a Hindi short film based on true story of a tsunami victim that clad upon Tamil Nadu coasts during 26th December, 2004 won him plenty of accolades and utmost appreciation in metro cities like Kolkatta, Chennai, Hyderabad and Mumbai with theatrical release that grabbed a lot of eyes and newspapers talking about it. Following were shorts like "Shabd" (2007)- a Hindi short film giving out meaningful morale on a missing link between children and parents that was an initiative under an organization to create awareness on the communication gap in today's time. And his last (but not the least), "Godse loves Gandhism"(2010)- a short film in Telugu on the negative image embarked upon the name Godse, that prevents from accepting the person's spirit of Gandhism, had a nation wide release and was widely talked about.
And now to make his next move "Drawing Blood"- an Indo-English concept movie is set to release in JUNE 2013.

Q. This being your first feature film, what makes you choose a concept on an artist's life?

- As we look into life of painters/artists, they are free birds of imagination and creation and they tend to picture moments that they experience or envision onto their canvas. If unsatisfied with their paintings, they can erase them and re-make them. But they cannot design their own real life incidents nor can they erase them or dispose them as they wish just as with paintings. Though they make colourful paintings but many in real life many artists lead a pale life. Thus this thought triggered my mind and i tried understanding some artist's lives and i realized, that if they haven't felt or experienced "pain", they cannot make "paintings". Hence i decided to create- DRAWING BLOOD, a film based on a colourless life of a painter.


Q. Are you trying to spread a meaningful message through this story?

- I have not made this film to spread a certain message to the world or receive one. Cause PAINTING itself is a message. It is a language of expression, and speaks a thousand words with one. There is a strong relation between Life and Painting. And i believe in a saying :
At birth your life is a plain canvas,
Your potential is the colours,
Your choices are the strokes on the canvas,
At death, this canvas will either be a treasured masterpiece or an unnoticed scribbling.
That would be the judgment day on how good a painter you were in painting your LIFE.


Q. Keeping the expectations and the demands of Indian cinema in mind, what reactions do you expect from the audience for a concept film like Drawing Blood?

- No matter how big or small budget film it may be, if the audience does not like it, it would be rejected. This film is made not only for Indian audience, but for world audience to reach out on a larger platform. And speaking of the concept, we are human beings and technology should not be dominating our feelings. In today's time, the gigantic influence of technology has made our mentality to be highly manipulative and robotic in nature. Due to this we are losing touch with our soulful senses. This concept is for every human being to re-discover the originality and the importance of emotions, feelings and values in only life we got.

Q. So why not implement a bigger star cast to present such a film to World cinema?

- My aim is to highlight the concept to the people, and would like to earn the credit based on the efforts put in with simplicity. That would not be possible with prominent film stars, or the focus would be lost. I auditioned many performers and actors for this script, but no one really tried to reach up to my expectations and my vision to play the lead character, Yogi. Hence, i took up the challenge and did it myself. The world cinema is more acceptable to fresh ideas and concepts, thus it matters more that the artists present the story well and do justice to the script.