Kasinadhuni Viswanath

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Padma Shri Kasinadhuni Viswanath, popularly known as K. Vishwanath, is a Telugu movie maker whose contributions have been significant to Indian films from the Telugu film industry. He was born in the South Indian city of Vijayawada in 1930.

1 Career
2 Awards
3 List of all movies made by K.Viswanath
4 External links

[edit] Career

He began his career as a technician in a studio at Chennai and later assisted Mr. Adurti Subba Rao in direction and made a debut as a director with Aatma Gowravam, starring Akkineni Nageswara Rao [1]. But, his full film prowess flowered with an acclaimed movie Siri siri muvva.

Mr. Viswanath's favorite theme is to tackle the relevance and influence of "Indian music/culture/art in the modern era", brilliantly brought onto the screen with his critically acclaimed movie Sankarabharanam ("The Jewel of Shiva"). He made a series of such classical oriented movies all showcasing the bliss in Indian art forms. The list includes Saagara Sangamam ("Tryst with the infinity"), Sruthi Layalu, Sirivennela ("Golden Moon light"), Swarna Kamalam ("Highest Offering"), and Swathi Kiranam ("Ray of Talent").

He also made a significant contribution on the social front with movies like Saptapadi ("The seven steps" -- on the Indian caste system), Swathi Muthyam ("Rare Gem", who fights the society to give a new life to a widow), Swayam Krushi ("Attitude towards work" -- hardwork and dedication make a good fortune), Subhodayam ("Good Morning"), SubhaLekha ("Wedding Invitation" -- a fight against Indian dowry system), Aapadhbhaandhavudu ("Savior"), and Subha Sankalpam ("Good Will").

Swathi Muthyam has been India's official entry to the Oscars in 1986. Viswanath was also awarded the Padma Shri by the Government of India for his contributions to Indian film.

His films mirror the erosion of cherished values of Indian culture yet he remains critical of those morals that make one stand against his fellow human. For example, in his movie Saptapadi, Mr. Vishwanath brilliantly fixes up certain loopholes in an inadmissible cultural system like intercaste marriage. A temple chief-priest gets his daughter’s daughter married to his son’s son – unaware that she is musically fused to a flutist who is a Dalit (one of a lower caste, but of a higher humanness.) Later, as the priest sees the marriage falling apart, he comes to know the heroine’s erstwhile bonding. It takes the priest intense introspection to realise how nasty it is to look down upon a fellow human because of getting imprisoned in caste. He could now anchor his judgment of someone in the “content of character” rather than caste. Across numerous other films, Mr. Vishwanath has reechoed similar social concerns that still resonate in the audiences’ minds.

All his movies have award-winning music mostly from Swara Brahma K. V. Mahadevan or Maestro Ilayaraaja. Vishwanath has also worked with artists like Hariprasad Chaurasia, Kelucharan Mohapatra and Sharon Loven for some of his films. Vishwanath has been a mainstream actor for the past few years.