Old Monk release update: Director-actor MG Srinivas pushes film ahead by two weeks

When actor-director MG Srinivas teased a few release date options for his film Old Monk, which had been announced for February 11, many assumed it was only in jest and that he would stick to his original plan. But with the government yet to announce relaxations to allow 100% occupancy in theatres, Srinivas has decided to push the release of his film ahead by two weeks.

Incidentally, in his earlier post, Srinivas had mentioned that if Kiccha Sudeep’s fantasy action-drama Vikrant Rona is postponed, he would release his film on that date. Last week, Vikrant Rona was indefinitely pushed ahead, opening up the last week of Friday for other takers and Srinivas has jumped at this opportunity, in the hope that theatres will be fully functional by then. In the last few days, the state government has not only called off night curfew (weekend curfew was removed even earlier), but also allowed pubs and restaurants, among others, to function at full capacity. However, there was no word on movie halls, and filmmakers are hopeful of a change in status quo soon.

Old Monk, written and directed by Srinivas, pairs him with his Ranganayaki co-star Aditi Prabhudeva and has Sujay Shastry, Ram Manjjonath and Naaz Shaikh in pivotal roles. The film is a fictionalized account of mythology, involving Krishna, Rukmini and Narada muni, which then pans out in modern day. The story, according to the filmmaker is that when Rukmini walks out on Krishna after a fight (for which Narada is responsible), the latter ends up cursing Narada to a life on earth. The curse can be broken only if Narada manages to fall in love and have the girls’ family accept him as well. But to make matters worse, he is sent into a family that does not approve of love relationships. Will he be able to break his curse and return to Devaloka forms the crux of the story.