Bharat Nalluri gets complicated television moving without losing sight of the people in it. We rate his feel for an ensemble, especially in Life on Mars, where the actors give us as much reason to stay as the mystery.
Fi1m perspective
In Life on Mars (2006), the arguments between John Simm and Philip Glenister give us as much reason to keep watching as the time-travel mystery. We were gripped because the pair made the consequences of that mystery feel personal. Bharat Nalluri directed the pilot and further episodes, helping establish a series whose unlikely premise needs that human contact. His strength is getting an ensemble to work within a busy plot without reducing the actors to people delivering information. We rate that ability to make a complicated programme immediately involving.
After the early feature Killing Time (1998), the decisive stretch came through television with Kudos Film & Television. Spooks (2002), Hustle (2004) and Life on Mars put his ability to launch an ensemble to work. He also co-conceived Hustle, so his contribution was not confined to directing what had already been devised. His mobile camerawork and rapid editing suit stories driven by conversation as well as action. Crucially, he makes room within the high-stakes plots for domestic concerns and emotional consequences.
The move into feature comedy with Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day (2008), starring Amy Adams and Frances McDormand, makes sense for someone whose camera and cutting draw on screwball comedy. That background gives us a better way of understanding his interest in speed than treating it solely as a thriller director's habit. The Man Who Invented Christmas (2017) brings Dan Stevens and Christopher Plummer to the story of Charles Dickens writing A Christmas Carol. The reservation there is slightness, despite the strength of the cast.
Life on Mars also makes clear why pace and a strong pairing need fresh material. The police stories and the friction between the leads begin to repeat, even though Simm and Glenister remain compelling. That is a reservation about the series, rather than a fault we can confidently place at Nalluri's door. His later television work includes Boy Swallows Universe (2024), but Life on Mars remains our starting point. Allow for the occasional feeling that these two men have had this argument before.
Biography
Bharat Nalluri is a British-Indian film and television director. Born in 1965 in Repalle, Andhra Pradesh, India, he moved to England at a young age and grew up in Newcastle upon Tyne, where he attended the Royal Grammar School. He later studied at the Northern Film School.
Nalluri directed the pilot episodes of several BBC series produced by Kudos Film & Television, including Spooks (2002), Hustle (2004, which he helped to conceive) and Life on Mars (2006). He also directed episodes of Torchwood and the HBO miniseries Tsunami: The Aftermath (2006), for which he received a Primetime Emmy nomination. His feature film credits include The Crow: Salvation (2000), Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day (2008), Spooks: The Greater Good (2015) and The Man Who Invented Christmas (2017). He has worked as second unit director on Resident Evil (2002) and AVP: Alien vs. Predator (2004).
More recent work includes directing episodes of The 100 (2014), Shantaram (2022) and Boy Swallows Universe (2024).
