Thiruvananthapuram: Young actors Jayasurya and Soubin Shahir, who have experimented with divergent genre of roles in commercial and realistic movies, shared the best actor award at the 49th Kerala State Film Awards yesterday.
Nimisha Sajayan won the best actress award. Shareef C-directed ‘Kanthan-the lover of colour, which depicted the struggles of marginalised tribals, was adjudged the ‘Best feature film.’
Eminent director Shyamaprasad won the ‘best director’ award for his film Oru Njayarazhcha, which was also selected as the second ‘best feature film’. Sudani From Nigeria, helmed by Zakariya Muhammed, a realistic movie which had also been a commercial success, won five titles in various categories including ‘the best popular film’, the ‘debutant director’ and the ‘screenplay’.
State Cultural Affairs Minister A K Balan announced the annual awards here during a press meet. Jayasurya won his first state award for his exceptional performances in the movies Captain and Njan Marykutty in which he enacted the life of a transexual.
Soubin bagged it for enacting the role of a local football manager in Sudani From Nigeria. Nimisha was adjudged best actress for her performances in Oru Kuprasidha Payyan and Chola.
The jury, headed by filmmaker Kumar Shahani, selected Jojo George as the ‘best character actor’. The ‘best character actresses’ title was shared by Savithri Sreedharan and Sarasa Balusseri. Vijay Yesudas and Shreya Ghoshal were selected as best playback singers for their melodious numbers in the movies Joseph and Aami, respectively.
Vishal Bharadwaj won the ‘best music director’ award, while B K Harinarayanan bagged it for the ‘best lyricist.’ Carbon directed by Venu emerged as the big winner in the state awards this year with six titles-most of them in technical categories. A total of 104 films were considered for the awards, of which 20 films were shortlisted in the final round by the jury, the minister said.