Lijo Jose Pellissery

Lijo Jose Pellissery
Lijo Jose Pellissery
	Lijo Jose Pellissery at IFFI 2018
Born	18 September 1979; Chalakudy, Thrissur,Kerala, India
Other names	Lijo Jose; LJP
Alma mater	Carmel Higher Secondary School, Chalakudy; Union Christian College, Aluva; IIPM;
Occupation	Film director, actor, Producer
Years active	Since 2010
Parent(s)	Jose Pellissery; Lilly Jose
Awards	2013 Asianet Film Award; 2017 Cinema Paradiso Club Award; 2017 Kerala State Film Award; 2018 Silver Crow Pheasant IFFK 2018;

Lijo Jose Pellissery is an Indian film director and actor who predominantly works in Malayalam Cinema. Known for his unconventional approach in directing, his films are characterized by nonlinear storylines, aestheticization of violence, extended scenes of dialogue and very long takes.[1][2][3][4] He is a recipient of the Best Director Award at the 48th Kerala State Film Awards for Ee.Ma.Yau and a recipient of Silver Peacock for the best director at the 49th International Film Festival of India and 50th International Film Festival of India for his films Ee.Ma.Yau and Jallikattu respectively.[5] He also received the Silver Crow Pheasant Award at the International Film Festival of Kerala 2018.[6].He is widely considered to be one of the most important and influential filmmakers of Indian Cinema.

Pellissery made his debut in 2010 with the crime film Nayakan and followed it up with the crime-drama City of God (2011) and the black comedy satire Amen (2013), the last mentioned, a commercial success at the Kerala box office. His fourth film, Double Barrel, an experimental film received only mixed reviews. His fifth film was again a crime-gangster film Angamaly Diaries (2017), starring almost 90 new actors, which preceded Ee.Ma.Yau, released in 2018. His latest movie Jallikkattu premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival.

Personal life

Lijo Jose Pellissery was born on September 18, 1979 in Chalakudy in Thrissur district of the south Indian state of Kerala to Lilly and Jose Pellissery, a known film and theater actor and a winner of a state award for best stage actor.[7][8] His schooling was at Carmel Higher Secondary School, Chalakudy and, after graduating from the Union Christian College, Aluva, he earned a master's degree in business administration from the Indian Institute of Plantation Management, Bangalore.[9].[10] [11]

Career

By the time Lijo Pellissery was born, Jose Pellissery who co-owned a theater group by Sarathy Theatres,[8] was active in Malayalam films and this gave the young Lijo an early grounding in films.[12] His career started as an assistant to Manoj Pillai, an ad filmmaker, and Pellissery soon started making short films of his own. One of his films, 3, was one of three films shortlisted for the best film award at the PIX Short Film Festival 2007.[13] He debuted as a feature film director in 2010 with Nayakan, which narrated the story of a Kathakali artist who joined the underworld to take revenge on those who killed his family. Though the film was critically acclaimed, it failed at the box office.[14][15][16][17] His next venture, City of God, one of the early New Generation films of Malayalam cinema[18] and a multi-starrer featuring Indrajith Sukumaran, Prithviraj Sukumaran, Parvathy, Swetha Menon and Rima Kallingal used hyperlink cinema as its narrative structure and was a critical success[19] but, again failed miserably at the box office; it was pulled from cinemas just days after its release.[20]

It took another two years before he came up with his third movie, Amen, in 2013, which had Indrajith Sukumaran, Fahad Fasil, Swathi Reddy and Kalabhavan Mani in the lead roles and the movie succeeded at the box office while drawing good critical response.[21][22] After a gap of almost two years, Pellissery released his fourth film, Double Barrel, a comic thriller, with Prithviraj Sukumaran, Indrajith Sukumaran, Arya, Sunny Wayne and Asif Ali in the lead roles. However, the film did not succeed critically or commercially.[23] The next project, Angamaly Diaries, a black comedy cloaked in a gangster plot that revolves around the locale of Angamaly, was scripted by popular actor, Chemban Vinod Jose.[24] The film, made on a small budget of ₹30 million,[25] was received well at the box office and drew critical acclaim; Anurag Kashyap opined that Angamaly Diaries was his film of the year.[26][27] Ee.Ma.Yau, his next film based on a satire written by P. F. Mathews[28] and with his regular composer, Prashant Pillai, scoring the music,[29] was premiered on November 30, 2017[30] but the release was delayed due to undisclosed reasons.[31] Before it was released on May 4, 2018, the film received the Kerala State Film Award for Best Director at the 48th Kerala State Film Awards.[5] The film also won him the Silver Peacock Award for the best director at the 49th International Film Festival of India (IFFI), 2018, which was held in Goa in November 2018[32] (Chemban Vinod Jose, the protagonist of the film, also received the Silver Peacock Award for the best actor.[33]) followed by the Sinema Zetu International Film Festival Award for Best Direction.[34]

Influences and style of film making

A fan of film makers such as K. G. George, Padmarajan, Akira Kurosawa,Alejandro González Iñárritu, Quentin Tarantino and Francis Ford Coppola,[35][36] Pellissery often uses non-linear style of narrative.[18] His early films had established actors in the lead roles but Angamaly Diaries marked a change where almost the entire cast were newcomers with 86 new actors making their debut, and subsequently accomplishing a triumph in the form of a 11-minute uninterrupted long take in the climax.[37][38]

Creative works

Filmography as director

Year	Title	Cast	Screenwriter	Notes
2010	Nayakan	Indrajith, Siddique, Lakshmi Sharma, Thilakan	P. S. Rafeeq
2011	City of God	Prithviraj, Rima Kallingal, Indrajith, Parvathy	Babu Janardhanan
2013	Amen	Fahadh Faasil, Swati Reddy, Indrajith	P. S. Rafeeq
2015	Double Barrel	Prithviraj, Indrajith, Asif Ali, Arya	Lijo Jose Pellissery, Arun George K David
2017	Angamaly Diaries	Antony Varghese, Anna Rajan	Chemban Vinod Jose
2018	Ee.Ma.Yau	Vinayakan, Chemban Vinod Jose, Dileesh Pothan	P. F. Mathews
2019	Jallikkattu	Antony Varghese,Chemban Vinod Jose	S Hareesh, R. Jayakumar
2020	Churuli	Vinay Forrt, Chemban Vinod Jose	Vinoy Thomas, S Hareesh
2021	Anti Christ	Prithviraj Sukumaran, Indrajith Sukumaran, Fahad Fazil	P. F. Mathews	Announced
2021	Disco	Indrajith Sukumaran, Chemban Vinod Jose, Anna Rajan, Mukesh	S Hareesh	Announced

As producer

Year	Title	Director
2015	Double Barrel	Himself
2018	Swathanthryam Ardharathriyil	Tinu Pappachan
2019	Thamaasha	Ashraf Hamza
2019	Jallikkattu	Himself
2020	Churuli	Himself

As actor

Year	Title	Director	Role
2010	Nayakan	Lijo Jose Pellissery	A smuggling agent
2011	Bombay March 12	Babu Janardhanan	Terrorist
2014	Sapthamashree Thaskaraha	Anil Radhakrishnan Menon	Priest
2016	Aakashavani	Khais Millen	Thomas Kuruvila
2016	Darvinte Parinamam	Jijo Antony	Himself
2017	Oru Cinemakkaran	Leo Thaddeus	Himself
2017	Mayaanadhi	Aashiq Abu	Director Len Prasad
2018	Swathanthryam Ardharathriyil	Tinu Pappachan	Lawyer Tony Mattathil
2018	Padayottam	Rafeek Ibrahim	Gangster Britto