KOCHI: When you search Thiruvananthapuram on Google, everything from travel vlogs and a never-ending list of food bloggers will pop up. The city is famous for its beaches and architecture. Though the city is famous for its cultural heritage, the picturesque beaches and the British colonial architecture, there is a neglected side to it. This is what the content creator Alex Babu decided to show in his spoof video.
The youngster exposed the dire state of the city that is reluctant to change but is crying for a facelift. Through the eyes of a traveller along with the ‘Sancharam’ (Malayalam travel show by Santhosh George Kulangara) fame ‘Spulber Driver’, his video opens up a can of worms.
The 23-minute-long Sancharam spoof video has hit the trending chart. Alex’s humorous rendition mimics the voice of dubbing artist Anish Punnen Peter. The sarcastic script — highly contradictory to the visuals showcased — is aimed to strike a chord with the public.
“The video doesn’t target any political party. The content does not intend to cause any discomfort to anyone who is biased to a political faction. Instead, the humorous tone aims to make the public think twice. I didn’t want it to be like any other troll video,” says Alex Babu, a Thiruvananthapuram native.
The journey starts with driver Spulber. As the duo hits the ground, the shot of the rusty location hints at the dilapidated condition of the city. The sickening state of the polluted river is compared to the grandeur of the Nile river.
The footpath with a widening gap between slabs calls for an adventurous ride as one has to hop from one to another. The bus stops without a roof and often damaged seating arrangements are part of the video.
“What wrenched my heart was an elderly couple struggling to sit on a steel rod inside a bus stop. Another bus stop in Pattom, where many candidates come for job interviews and PSC examinations, barely had seats,” says Alex, who did the script, editing, sound, and direction for the video.
The accurate visuals are the result of his groundwork for two months. “It took that long as we also wanted to show the city drenched in the rain. The muddy roads are common during the monsoon. So we waited for the rain,” says Alex.
Instead of giving flak to the authorities concerned, Alex has highlighted the publics’ total disregard for the development. “There are many aluminium bins on roadsides. However, no one bothers to discard waste in them. Instead, they throw the waste in the general direction of the bin creating a huge mess,” he adds.
He says it was challenging to mimic the voice of the Sancharam dubbing artist Anish. “Since childhood, I have been a regular viewer of Sancharam. We recorded the voice inside the wooden cupboard in my house. I stacked the clothes to make it soundproof. To get the raspy bass voice of Anish, I used to wake up at 2 am,” says Alex.
Anish has shared the video on his social media page and personally congratulated Alex for his efforts. It is not always necessary for a video to be produced with high-end equipment to become viral, content matters more. The spoof video is a solid example.
“The entire video was shot on a mobile camera. Dileep S C who played the role of Spulber was behind the camera,” he adds. The video available on his YouTube channel Ryann Films has garnered around 196K views so far. His wife Reeja Alex also plays a vital role in his contents.