Navigating Hyperrealities: Tamil Film (Kollywood) Choreography as Screen Dance

Abstract

This essay discusses the choreographic ethos that integrates technology and dance as an evolving mode of storytelling in South Indian (Tamil-Kollywood) movies by tracing the work of director Shankar Shanmugam. Through analyses of song-dance sequences, I identify three key principles for using screendance techniques, and reflect on how these innovations contribute to cultivating and shaping the audience imagination. The audience is challenged to further engage at multiple levels and grapple with the relationships between human and more than human worlds. In the Kollywood scene, there is a constant quest for new techniques that can embrace inner realities.