Wanted to do this post around the release time of the movie. We are talking about master director Mani Ratnam’s bilingual Raavan/ Raavanan. The man who manages to capture stunning images on screen without flying out of the country did it once again by shooting the Kata Kata song in the Madhya Pradesh town of Orchha. Once we knew that the song was shot in Orchha, it was just a matter of time before we found out this temple where the song with the wedding and the subsequent capture of Beera/ Veera’s sister were shot.

About the location (from here):
Vir Singh Deo ordered the construction of the Lakshmi Narayan Temple around 1622, but due to inadequate maintenance over the years the temple soon began to fall apart and had to be reconstructed by Prithvi Singh in 1793. The temple is worth seeing because it has been built using a mixture of temple and fort architecture. Built for Lakshmi, the Goddess of wealth, inner chambers were built for pilgrims to offer sacrifices to the Goddess. Strangely and unlike the majority of temples, there is no idol of the Goddess kept there.

The small town of Orchha (or Urchha), just a few hours south of Agra is positioned on the edge of the state of Madhya Pradesh and just a few miles west of Uttar Pradesh. With the Betwa River to the east which also surrounds the palaces and with huge rocks and boulders that seem carefully positioned on the rivers-edge the palaces seem almost unattainable. Founded in 1501 CE by the Bundela chief, Rudra Pratap Singh, he became the first king of Orchha and went on to rule for 30 years.

Movies shot at this location:
Kata Kata from Raavan
Keda Keda Kaari from Raavanan