PS 1 Ponniyin Selvan Part 1 Filming: Mani Ratnam’s dream project, Ponniyin Selvan, was released worldwide with a huge budget of 500 crores and later split into two parts that were shot back to back. Ponniyin Selvan was filmed in several locations, including Pondicherry, Thailand, Orcha, and Madhya Pradesh.
The production of this movie began on December 11, 2019, in Krabi, Kanchanaburi, Thailand, and other places in Thailand, where they planned its shooting schedule for 40 days with the crew and members, and they completed the first schedule.
After that, in January 2020, the crew members planned to shoot the second schedule in Chennai, but later moved to Puducherry due to COVID-19, and started on February 3, 2020, and completed within six days, which was just a small action sequence scene. After that, the team and crew moved to Hyderabad for the next schedule, on February 10, where the entire team planned to shoot at Ramoji Film City, and wrapped up on February 26, 2020.
After that, in March 2020, the makers shot the major portion of the film for 90 days before the shooting was stopped due to the COVID-19 pandemic. In September 2020, Ratnam planned to resume the shooting in Sri Lanka, but due to restrictions on the international trip, it was difficult for the team to get permission from the officials to resume filming, so they chose to shoot major portions of the film in India, where they shot major portions in Hyderabad, Jaipur, Madhya Pradesh, and many major locations across India.
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The crew members started shooting the major events of the film in January 2021, and it was the biggest schedule ever wrapped up within a single shot. After a nine-month-long hiatus, the shooting for the film resumed on January 6, 2021, at Ramoji Film City, Hyderabad, with the major cast featuring Aishwarya Rai Bachchan, Sarathkumar, Trisha Rahman, Prakash Raj, Parthiban, and Mohan Raman, with some local actors.
On February 3, 2021, the filmmakers shot a special song video starring Trisha and 250 other artists on a massive set built at Ramoji Film City, which was completed in March 2021.
The next schedule was planned to start in May but was delayed to June due to a spike in COVID-19 cases. So, they planned to shoot in North Indian states during that time and instead shot in Chennai and Hyderabad. After COVID-19 cases decreased in August, filming resumed and the team moved to Madhya Pradesh for location, so that they could shoot the pending cuts, and later resumed the shoot in Orchha and Gwalior.
On September 4, 2021, the team started shooting in Pollachi and Mysore for a song sequence, with Karthi, who joined the shooting in Pollachi, and Ashwin Kakamanu, who joined the shooting in Mysore, where the major portion of the movie is being shot.
On September 18, Mani Ratnam confirmed that the entire shooting of the first part had been wrapped, except for a few action sequences, which remained for the second part, but on March 20, 2022, Jayam Ravi, Karthi, and Aishwarya Rai Bachchan wrapped up a small scene, which was fully completed in seven days.