Argha Deep Chatterjee, the director of Jojo (2018), is all set begin work on his second psychological thriller, titled Rhododendron. The film will feature Payel Sarkar, Anindita Basu, Pujarini Ghosh, Rajesh Sharma and Sumit Samaddar in important roles.
Rhododendron is a beautiful flower, primarily grown in the north of India. While its juice is consumed in various regions, some species of the flower can also be poisonous to grazing animals. Keeping with this idea, Chatterjee’s film explores the idea of 'danger behind beauty' with three separate stories that are connected by a mansion, named ‘Rhododendron Villa’, in the hills.
In one story, a girl gets betrayed by her lover and darkness prevails in her life. The second story revovles around the sudden emergence of an unknown drug in the city, circulated only for men. The third begins with the decomposed body of a girl, found by a valley in North Bengal. While the girl's bag contains an identity card, investogators discover that the girl in the card is alive and living in the city.
The director has presently decided not to disclose much about the characters, fearing it might hamper the essence of the thriller. Moreover, he says, the characters are meant to baffle the audience until the very climax.
The film will be mostly shot in Kolkata and at various locations in North Bengal.