Nelson Dilipkumar, credited in films as Nelson, is an Indian director and screenwriter who predominantly works in Tamil cinema. His films are known for featuring elements of Dark Humour.
Nelson won the Best Screenplay Award in Norway Tamil Film Festival for his directorial debut Kolamaavu Kokila.[2] He was listed among the Promising Directors of 2018 in Times of India article.[3]
Nelson holds a degree in visual communication from New College, Chennai. He started his career as an assistant script-writer in Star Vijay.[4]
Nelson started his work on what was originally intended to have been his directorial debut, Vettai Mannan, in 2010. The film would have starred Silambarasan, Jai, Hansika Motwani and Deeksha Seth, would have been produced by NIC Arts's S. S. Chakravarthy, and would have featured music by Yuvan Shankar Raja. However, the film was shelved for unknown reasons halfway through production.[5][6] There was an attempt to revive the project in 2017 with a new crew, such as Anirudh Ravichander replacing Yuvan Shankar Raja as the composer.[7] However, the project failed to take off again.
Anirudh Ravichander helped Nelson make his actual debut feature film as writer-director,[8] the dark comedy Kolamavu Kokila, starring Nayanthara in the lead role. The film, produced by Lyca Productions, released on 17 August 2018 and became a commercial success.[9][10][11] His next film was Doctor, starring Sivakarthikeyan in the lead role opposite Priyanka Arul Mohan. The film became one of the biggest Tamil-language blockbusters among films that released theatrically after the pandemic-induced lockdowns.[12][13]
In November 2020, composer Anirudh Ravichander introduced Nelson to actor Vijay,[14][15] who was impressed with Nelson's script for Beast. The film, an action-comedy thriller and Vijay's 65th film,[16][17] also starring Pooja Hegde,[18] was released on 13th April 2022 as a pan-Indian film dubbed in the Telugu, Hindi, Kannada and Malayalam languages.[19][20] Beast collected ?240 crore at the worldwide box office.[21][22] Nelson's next project following Beast will be the film Thalaivar 169.
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Denotes films that have not yet been released |
| Years | Film | Credited as | Notes | Ref. | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Director | Writer | ||||
| 2018 | Kolamavu Kokila | Yes | Yes | [23] | |
| 2021 | Doctor | Yes | Yes | [24] | |
| 2022 | Beast | Yes | Yes | Cameo appearance in the song "Jolly O Gymkhana" | [25] |
2023 |
Thalaivar 169 | Yes | Yes | Pre-production | [26] |
Editor R. Nirmal, Music composer Anirudh Ravichander has worked in four films. Actor Yogi Babu and Redin Kingsley have worked on three movies. Bjorn Surrao, Sunil Reddy, Shiva Aravind, Arun Alexander, and Shaji Chen acted in two films. D. R. K. Kiran has done the art direction in two films. Stunt director Anbariv have worked in two films. Sivakarthikeyan has written lyrics for 3 out of 4 movies.
| Films | R. Nirmal | Anirudh Ravichander | Yogi Babu | Redin Kingsley | Bjorn Surrao | Sunil Reddy | Shiva Aravind | Arun Alexander | Shaji Chen | D. R. K. Kiran | Anbariv |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Kolamaavu Kokila (2018) |  |
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| Doctor (2021) | |
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| Beast (2022) | |
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| Year | Film | Award | Category | Result |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2019 | Kolamavu Kokila | 8th South Indian International Movie Awards | Best Debut Director | Won |
| Norway Tamil Film Festival Awards | Best Screenplay | Won |