Cinematographer Anandakuttan dead

Noted cameraman V.R. Anandakuttan passed away on Sunday. He was 61 and is survived by his wife Geethamani, son Sreekumar and daughters Neelima and Karthika.

He was ailing for a while and died after a cardiac arrest on Sunday morning at a private hospital in the city. His body will be cremated at Ravipuram on Monday at 10 a.m.

Friends recalled him as a man obsessed with the camera and between his first film ‘Manassorumayil’ in 1977 and ‘Doctor Innocentaanu’ in 2012, he wielded the camera for around 300 films, considered a record by film industry insiders.

He was born at Vazhappilli, near Changanassery, in 1954 and started his career as a camera assistant in Chennai and went on to work with famous cameraman K. Ramachandra Babu. As Malayalam film industry’s leading cameraman, he set a record of sorts in the early 1990s by wielding the camera for 12 films in a calendar year. Though film-lovers in Kerala associate him with his works with film-maker Fazil, Anandakuttan has worked with all the directors and lead players in the industry. He also worked in the Tamil and Telugu film industry. He was behind the camera for films such as ‘His Highness Abdullah,’ ‘Bharatham,’ ‘Kamaladalam,’ ‘Sadayam,’ and ‘Chronic Bachelor.’

In an interview with The Hindu in 2003, Anandakuttan recalled that he began his career in photography by taking a shot of the funeral procession of Mannathu Padmanabhan with a Click III camera. The picture was so good that a local studio enlarged and kept it on display at its lobby for a long while. At that time he was studying in Class VIII. He went on to seek formal training in photography after his pre-degree studies and one of his brothers-in-law was instrumental in getting him to Chennai.

The body was kept at his residence at Ambelippadam, near Vyttila. Film directors Sibi Malayail and Siddque were among those who reached his home to pay their last respects. – Special Correspondent