Vidyut Jammwal, one of the top 6 global martial art artists in the world, is all set to uplift the action standards in Bollywood with his next family adventure- Junglee. The action star, known for unprecedented agility will be seen performing never-seen-before daredevilry. Bringing animal flow on bring screen for the first time, Vidyut’s action is deeply inspired from his training in Kalaripayattu.
A special part of Vidyut’s training was mastering the ‘animal flows’ from Kalaripayattu, the ancient Indian martial art. To attain the physique and movement he needed for this film, Vidyut reduced his weight training and practised Kalaripayattu extensively for two years. Kalaripayattu believes that in one lifetime, one can experience many, by imbibing the qualities of other beings — a skill which comes from rigorous practice and discipline. Kalaripayattu helped Vidyut understand and learn from the movements of the elephant, python, scorpion, crab, horse, wild boar, frog, butterfly, and many more. These animals taught Vidyut a lot, who believes animals are superior to us because of their ability to feel other beings.
In this film the actor will be seen fighting poachers on moving bikes, cranes placed at great heights. In one of the scenes, Vidyut is seen fighting the cops with one hand handcuffed to the table. Adding to high risk action, the actor also shot with deadly Kalaripayyatu weapon Urumi and live wires in the film.
Credited for additional action choreography, Vidyut is set to deliver a treat for his fans with action packed Junglee.
He talks about series of sequences in the movie that made him push the envelop when it comes to his on-screen stunts.
Kicking while hand-cuffed
It was an unusual situation for me to fight off three baddies, hand-cuffed and I had to come up with an innovative solution to carry off the stunt. Since there was a table around, I decided to use it to leverage myself in the air and use the body of a man standing by me, to reach to the other, and then the third. The difficulty here was not to hit the guy too hard on his chest while using him to move forward. It required perfect timing and arm-leg coordination.
Back Flip from a car window
This action sequence was in car and since in the past I’ve got out of the car window in different ways, the only twist I could think was back flip. I’m proud I pulled it off. It was tough because you can’t see anything that’s there behind you as you wriggle out of the small hole. It required calculations and instinctive estimation. We did many takes from different angles, it wasn’t easy to get out.
Double play with swords
In Kalaripayattu it is important that you use your whole body. And if you can do something with your right hand well, you are supposed to be able to do it with your left hand in in exactly the same way. The idea here is that a human being can do the same thing with both sides of the brain. That’s the reason I have swords in both my hands and had to use them simultaneously.
30 takes for this one
There is this action sequence with me riding the bike when I am attacked by villain who is brandishing a nasty-looking sword. To ward him off, I had to do a back flip and land behind the bike. It was an important scene and required around 30 takes because sometimes the bike would fall and sometimes I would fall myself, to right or to left, as I tried a somersault that would help me land on my feet, at a right angle at the bike. Phew!
Third floor dive
I got injured during this sequence. I was wearing a safety harness but I miscalculated the jump from third floor and hit my head on iron rod. There was a sudden rush and I sensed blood dripping. I could see people gather on the floor below as I hung on for five minutes. Once I was back on feet, I was rushed to the hospital, I got stiches on my head and returned to the set to carry on from where I had left off.
Directed by Chuck Russell, Junglee is all set to take you to an adventure ride on 29th March with Vidyut Jammwal playing the role of a vet, Pooja Sawant as Mahavat and Asha Bhat as a journalist.
