Sanu Varghese

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Sanu John Varughese ISC
Born
Sanu John Varughese

Kottayam, Kerala, India
Occupation(s) Director of photography, Director, Writer
Years active2003–present
Known for Vishwaroopam
Wazir
Take Off
Jersey
Malik

Sanu John Varughese ISC is an Indian cinematographer, who has worked in the Hindi, Malayalam, Tamil and Telugu films. After beginning his career as a technician in DD News, commercials and documentaries, he worked on Hindi, Tamil and Malayalam films. He won acclaim for his work in Kamal Haasan's spy thriller, Vishwaroopam (2013). [1] [2] [3]

Contents

Career

Sanu Varughese attended College of Fine Arts Trivandrum and upon graduation went on to join the Sarojini Naidu School of Arts and Communication at University of Hyderabad, before beginning work with DD News. [4] He became acquainted with Ravi K. Chandran and assisted him on a couple of ventures and documentaries, before making his debut as an independent cinematographer with Main Madhuri Dixit Banna Chahti Hoon (2003). He continued to work on commercials, filming over six hundred, before getting opportunities to work on the Hindi film Karthik Calling Karthik (2010) and the Malayalam psychological thriller, Elektra (2010). During the period, he also began work on Kamal Haasan's historical Tamil film, Marmayogi, but the film was shelved after pre-production. [5] [6]

In early 2010, Kamal Haasan called Sanu to work with him on the production of his bilingual spy-thriller Vishwaroopam (2013). The film subsequently was in production for two years, with Sanu working extensively on travelling the globe to find locations to shoot. He won acclaim for his work in capturing the terrain of Jordan, which was shown as Afghanistan in the film, and the technical brilliance of the film was noted by his peers in the film industry. [5] [7] The team of the film also shot for significant portions of a sequel during the making of the first film, though Varghese's busy schedule meant that he was unable to join the team for further schedules of the sequel. He also later collaborated with Kamal Haasan during the making of the bilingual Thoongaa Vanam (2015) and A. R. Rahman for videos in his album, Raunaq . [8]

Filmography

As cinematographer
YearFilmLanguageNotes
2003 Main Madhuri Dixit Banna Chahti Hoon Hindi
2006 Fight Club – Members Only Hindi
2010 Karthik Calling Karthik Hindi
Elektra Malayalam
2013 Vishwaroopam Tamil
Hindi
David Hindi
2014 Hasee Toh Phasee Hindi
2015 Thoongaa Vanam
Cheekati Rajyam
Tamil
Telugu
2016 Wazir Hindi
2017 Take Off Malayalam
2018 Vishwaroopam II Tamil
Hindi
Badhaai Ho Hindi
2019 Jersey Telugu
Android Kunjappan Version 5.25 Malayalam
2020 Lootcase Hindi
2021 Mālik Malayalam [9]
Shyam Singha Roy Telugu
2022 Ariyippu Malayalam
2023 Shastry Viruddh Shastry Hindi
Hi Nanna Telugu
2025 PonmanMalayalam [10]
HIT: The Third Case Telugu
As director
YearFilmLanguageNotes
2021 Aarkkariyam Malayalam [11]

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References

  1. Decoding a spy thriller – Sanu J Varghese on Vishwaroopam
  2. "Movie review: Kamal Haasan's Vishwaroopam". NDTV. 25 January 2013. Retrieved 13 January 2019.
  3. Anandraj, Shilpa (12 April 2021). "Sanu John Varughese: The camera is an extension of my personality". The Hindu. ISSN   0971-751X . Retrieved 14 October 2023.
  4. "Interested in a career in cinematography? Read this". Rediff. Retrieved 14 October 2023.
  5. 1 2 "In love with the lens". The New Indian Express. 15 February 2013. Retrieved 14 October 2023.
  6. "The BIG picture". The Hindu. 28 June 2012. ISSN   0971-751X . Retrieved 14 October 2023.
  7. "Art of deception". The Hindu. 23 March 2013. ISSN   0971-751X . Retrieved 14 October 2023.
  8. "'Kamal's silence is appreciation'". The Hindu. 19 September 2015. ISSN   0971-751X . Retrieved 14 October 2023.
  9. George, Vijay (19 March 2020). "I accept only scripts that resonate with me, says cinematographer Sanu Varughese". The Hindu. ISSN   0971-751X . Retrieved 14 October 2023.
  10. Madhu, Vignesh (18 January 2025). "Release preponed for Basil Joseph's Ponman". Cinema Express. Retrieved 18 January 2025.
  11. "Sanu John Varghese to make his directorial debut in Malayalam". The Times of India. 19 September 2020. ISSN   0971-8257 . Retrieved 14 October 2023.