When Vinil Mathew turned cameraman for Haseen Dillruba

There is a key scene in Vinil Mathew’s Haseen Dillruba (2021) where the lead couple, Rani and Rishu, played by Taapsee Pannu and Vikrant Massey, go river rafting. The newly married pair are joined by their guide, the rugged Neel Tripathi (Harshvardhan Rane).

Since the thriller is set in a small town by the river, the sport of rafting plays an integral part in the story, and it was necessary that the main characters be a part of this sequence.
 
Vinil shared his experience of shooting the rafting sequence with the cinematographer Jayakrishna Gummadi. “We had to shoot a rafting scene in a rapid river,” he explained.

He added, “Since we could not carry heavy cameras onto the raft, the DOP and I carried portable cameras and got into the raft to shoot the actors ourselves. Holding the camera with one hand and our lives with the other, we shot the scene as the raft dangerously tossed and turned. It was a fun crazy day, at the end of which we were fully drenched.”

Pannu plays a character who is eventually suspected of murdering her husband, and it is up to her to escape from the web of obsession and deceit that she finds herself in.

Produced by T Series and Colour Yellow Productions, Haseen Dillruba is due to be released on 2 July on Netflix.