“You will see my father like you’ve never seen before,” announced Sajitha Anuttara at the premiere of Seeruwen (titled ‘Attention!’ in English) movie. Listening to Sajitha’s speech about his father, Jackson Anthony, it became evident how little we truly knew about his extraordinary talent. Many actors spend time preparing for their roles, but only a few achieved the depth and dedication Jackson Anthony exhibited.
Jackson Anthony has long been celebrated as a gifted performer. Only a few knew him as an orator of gifted intellect too. This dual talent enabled him to tackle some of the most demanding characters in cinema.
His portrayal in Ksheera Sagaraya Kelabina, where he depicted an emperor renouncing luxuries in search of truth, is the last we remember of his ability to blend contrasting traits into a performance. We have seen enough emperors. We have seen enough men who renounced.
But not really a combination. Anthony’s extraordinarily demanding performance was indeed an expensive visual treat. His role in the movie Seeruwen also falls into the ‘extraordinarily demanding’ category.
He plays a retired army general living alone in a mansion. Most notably, this general is blind. A gang plans to rob him, assuming that his substantial compensation from the government is hidden in the mansion since his bank accounts are empty.
They believe his blindness will make the heist easy. However, as the movie progresses, the general’s military discipline proves to be a significant obstacle. The plot provides us with a thrilling and suspenseful narrative which is not so common in Sinhala cinema.
Survival Strategy Sajitha gave the audience a glimpse into how his father prepared to portray the blind general’s survival against the robbers. Superhero fans will inevitably recall Matt Murdock, aka Daredevil, a fully blind character who operates as if he isn’t blind, thanks to his heightened senses. For example, he hardly uses a white cane.
Typically, blindness is associated with guide dogs and white canes. I’m not sure if the script intentionally avoided these elements to emphasise Jackson’s performance’s normalcy. A guide dog appears but is of minimal use since most of the action takes place indoors.
Sajitha made an intriguing reference to how the ear takes on the role of the eye in blindness, expressed in his sophisticated Sinhalese. In Sinhala, the ear is known as ‘kana’ and the eye as ‘ehe’. The saying Ehe kana venava subtly depicts that when someone goes blind, the ear becomes the eye, highlighting the heightened senses that develop.
Based on Sajitha’s clue, I paid close attention to moments in the movie where every small sound mattered. There were occasional instances where sounds were introduced unnecessarily and felt out of place, as they didn’t relate to Jackson’s character. Jackson the actor adeptly portrays the blind man who relies heavily on his auditory senses.
As Sajitha noted, Jackson has meticulously practiced how a visually impaired individual would behave spontaneously. His role presents a dual challenge: he must convincingly embody both a blind man and a military figure. When he hears a sound, he reacts swiftly, turning and shooting with precision.
His portrayal utilises subtle cues like blinking or the subtle movements of facial muscles to convey his character’s acute sensory awareness and military discipline. The script would have perhaps been without impossibilities that need reconciling, goofs better smoothed over. But the kudos where it deserves, the script succeeded in keeping me on the edge of the seat, my mind in alert (or attention like the title of the movie suggests).
Striking Exception Many young performers excel within their craft but struggle outside of it. A run-of-the-mill performer may find it challenging to communicate their craft effectively to a lay audience. Expressing the complexities of their art in a way that goes with non-experts can be very much a challenge for them.
Sajitha Anuttara stands out as a striking exception. Whether handed a microphone or not, he effortlessly emanates sophistication and intellectual depth. Onstage or off, he goes into intricate details.
It is indeed a pleasure listening to him speak or seeking his feedback. In the speech preceding the premiere, the young Sajitha was invited to speak on behalf of his late father’s honour. He showcased himself as not just an actor but an enterprising young intellectual.
Sajitha shared his father’s insights on the movie and provided his own analysis, forming the basis of this essay. Onstage, Sajitha detailed his narrative with primary focus on his father’s dedication—months spent building the physique for the role and thorough script study. Offstage, he freely shared his own insights, discussing sound effects, plot intricacies, script nuances, casting choices, and the cast’s performances.
His critical analysis of every aspect left me stunned. Such critical analysis is undoubtedly the result of years of rigorous academic study. That compelled me to pose him an off-the-record question if he manages to fit in academic readings alongside his busy acting career.
He responded with his usual boyish smile, humbly mentioning his interest in academic intricacies. He has studied writing as a specific skill and pursued acting for his degree. In this country, it’s not quite difficult to find singer parents whose children also pursue singing, but it’s rare to encounter actors known for their intellectual depth, capable of nurturing the next generation of intellectual actors.
We have long admired Sajitha for his acting. It is only now that we are discovering his impressive intellect and oratory skills. “I am not here to carry forward his legacy.
I am here to safeguard it,” Sajitha concluded in his characteristically eloquent manner. Throughout his speech, he embodied that sentiment perfectly. He reminded us of Jackson Anthony, his father, in the way he delivered his oration—with a cadence that ebbed and flowed, filled with interesting substance.
It’s a visual treat to witness intellect passed down from one generation to the next..
