Lucia is a 2013 Indian Kannada-language psychological thriller drama film written, co-edited and directed by Pawan Kumar.
[10] Sanjay, a detective from the Mumbai police Crime Branch starts investigating the incident that caused the protagonist's (Sathish Ninasam) current state.
The story starts with Nikki in a village near Mandya, working as an usher/"torch-shiner" in a Bengaluru movie theatre owned by Shankranna (Achyuth Kumar).
On one of his sleepless nights, Nikki is contacted by a drug dealer who gives him Lucia pills as a solution to his sleeping problems.
With the help of the Lucia pills, Nikki starts seeing himself as being a successful actor called Nikhil surrounded by people he knows in the real world.
Meanwhile, in reality, Nikki struggles to win Shwetha's heart, who rejects him first due to his low salary but later falls for his humble character.
Shwetha's attempts to get Nikki educated and lead him to find a better paying job turns out to be futile and also result in the death of Shankranna in the hands of goons.
Nikhil, the actor, meets Shwetha and tells her that he cannot decide if the present moment is a dream or reality but he is ultimately happy.
Asking Shwetha to close her eyes, Nikhil jumps off the roof to the confusion of everyone present, including the contract killer waiting to kill him.
At present, Sanjay with the help of the suspects performs a sting operation on the drug dealer and learns more about the Lucia pills.
In December 2011 Pawan Kumar announced on the Web that his next project, after the success of his directorial debut film Lifeu Ishtene, was going to be Lucia.
Three days after it was published, the response was so overwhelming that he decided to pitch the idea of inviting people to produce the film and Pawan Kumar initiated Project Lucia.
It was funded by 110 investors who contributed to the project through a Facebook page and a blog run by director-actor Pawan Kumar.
[1] Kannada language television channel Udaya TV bought the satellite rights of the film for ₹0.95 crore (US$110,000).
[15] Actor Sathish Ninasam along with the music director Poornachandra Tejaswi visited colleges in Davangere to promote Lucia.
It was released across Bangalore, Chennai, Kochi, Hyderabad, Mumbai, Pune, Ahmedabad, Surat, and Delhi with English subtitles.
Well-known critic Baradwaj Rangan remarked, "An entertaining new Kannada film pushes the envelope even as it pays homage to the old way of doing things".
[38] The dream and real sequences being shot in monochrome and in color to differentiate between the two stories, like the Memento and Open Your Eyes to alternate between two plot-lines.
The director, an advocate of alternative distribution strategies for indie filmmakers, said, "It’s time to set up your own virtual movie theaters on the World Wide Web which will be open 24×7 across the globe.