The intensity of the subject of Blessy's 'Pranayam' hits you as you talk to the director.

"For so many years I have been carrying the subject in me as a writer, journeying with it as visuals and words. I have now transferred that to the characters. It's like letting go of something that was your own till now. And that is painful," says the man who, in his words, has not gone through Pranayam himself.

But then he hastens to add, "Even if I held Pranayam in me, no one came to know of it."

He directly goes to Gracy, the character played by the very beautiful Jayaprada. “You will see the woman in her different facets in ‘Pranayam’. A wife, a mother and the thousand emotions that a woman goes through. You will find the intricacies of a poem unfurling here, as the woman meets the two men in her life, who have known her completely, physically as well as emotionally at two different phases of her life.

“Perhaps, Gracy is one of the strongest characters Jayaprada has played so far,” Blessy says with confidence. Blessy is proud to have ‘Gracy’ portrayed by an actor who was once described as the most beautiful woman in the world by the great Satyajit Ray. Even Jayaprada has acknowledged that ‘Pranayam’ is indeed a milestone in her career.

Every movie from the time the very seed of the story sprouts is a pilgrimage for a director, a very deep personal journey especially for a director like Blessy who took lessons in film-making from legends like Padmarajan and Lohithadas.

“There is an invisible spark that flashes just seeing the look or a smile of a person and when the beauty within him is revealed to you. You don’t need to see a bio-data or wade through his past work. You just connect with him,” explains Blessy on his decision to hand over the camera to a novice like Satheesh Kurup.  The cinematographer has proved Blessy right and has captured exactly what ‘Pranayam’ needs through his lens.

For this gifted director it was an added catharsis to make two senior artists, not used to the culture of the land, to do two strong characters in a Malayalam cinema. Anupam Kher and Jayaprada. “But then I got more than I asked for. It was unbelievable. They gave me an incredible performance,” Blessy vouches. Anupam Kher who plays a key role in the movie seems to agree as he divulged in a recent press conference in Kochi, that his role in ‘Pranayam’ is one among the seven best characters that he cherishes so far in his acting career! So, Blessy now has a fine feather added to his cap.