Director Vasan Bala has several credits in many facets for the film projects he’s worked on – namely in screenwriting and assistant directing aspects. For this, it was his 2012 crime pic, Peddlers, which set forth a pretty good precedent for his later work now leading up to a what looks to be a rousing world premiere at TIFF next month in Toronto for his sophomore outing, The Man Who Feels No Pain.
The official trailer emerged on Thursday featuring debut actor Abhimanyu Dasani in the title role, born with a congenitive disease that renders him painless upon injury, and a growing desire to fight crime and vanquish 100 foes. Joining Dasani is relative newcomer Radhika Madan with both showcasing their feats in the witty drama and comedy that cosign the action – the latter which comes with a delightful sweetner.
Following the Instagram hashtag, #MKDNH (short for Mard Ko Dard Nahi Hota) will reveal some interesting additions to the film’s stunt/fight action team in the past year, including Eric Jacobus and Dennis Ruel. For more than fifteen years, the two have seen their hard-earned efforts in the action genre progress slowly, but favorably from doing independent action shortfilms heralded under The Stunt People banner, to working on feature films and a variety of projects for other filmmakers and events.
Whatever the case may be, that Jacobus and Ruel get to work among the stunt unit’s team of coordinators and performers is an absolute positive, especially for Indian cinema in all its striking glory and practice when it comes to stunts. We don’t get to see too much of that in the premiere trailer above, but just enough to know that insofar, The Man Who Feels No Pain looks and feels as good as it hurts.
The Toronto International Film Festival kicks off from September 6 through September 16 with The Man Who Feels No Pain screening in the Midnight Madness section next to such titles as Shane Black’s The Predator, Sam Levinson’s Assassination Nation, Henry Dunham’s The Standoff At Sparrow Creek, and more.
Hat tip to ScreenAnarchy’s Josh Hurtado for keeping me on my toes this week!
