Movie Review – Ayyappanum Koshiyum

Double the fun, double the mass

Having heard good reviews from trustable friends of mine, I thought of watching the movie together with family. Sparks started to fly right from scene one. Being a Prithviraj fan, it was even more pleasure to watch. As one of my friends mentioned that it would be tailor made role for Simbu, I started agreeing that right from scene one. It indeed looked tailor made for Simbu. All he’d have to do would be to carry on the attitude that he had in Chekka Chivantha Vaanam.

A fully drunk Koshi (Prithviraj) gets caught by police for having a number of bottles. He gets beaten up and things get awry. His attitude remains the same even in the police station and that enrages Ayyappan Nair (Biju Menon) more. He calls the superior officer and informs about the same, who in turn asks Nair to go little easy on him. That makes Ayyappan fix a drink for Koshi as Koshi was showing withdrawal symptoms (not sure whether it was intentional or happens for real). He shoots a video of Nair opening the bottle. Because a FIR was filed, Koshi had to spend a couple of weeks in sub jail and starts plotting revenge post that.

The first act of the movie was as brilliant as it could get. The tension was palpable. We know Prithviraj was the wrong doer, yet we root for him. I guess it’s the deep-rooted hero wordship in us which makes us to do. And being someone who’s familiar with and a fan of the protagonist (who so far was Prithviraj for me) the scenes get even more intense and interesting. When Koshi explains that the bottle was only for some party we feel that Nair had overdone. Again, Koshi shows attitude that make us take our previous stance. This goes on an on for the entire first act. The seething rage of Koshi was there to see. It was very tough to chose who had performed better.

Post that it was a Koshi show, Prithviraj makes sure that the film focuses on him. We feel bad for Nair. Now our villain is Koshi. Like many of his advisors tell that he was going overboard with his antics, we get the same feeling too. When he submits the video, the little sympathy that we have on him too goes for a toss. He eventually does his bit and makes us think that Nair is the hero of the film.

The second half is Nair show. Again, my friend who had suggested Simbu for Koshi, had suggested Vikram for Ayyappan. But I don’t think Vikram would have underplayed and given Simbu a chance to be heroic even in the first half. That’s both his negative and positive. He has that much screen presence which will make any other star look meek. So, to imagine Vikram in the first fight post interval was a treat to watch. Because that’s where Ayyappan gets fully heroic.

But even in the second half when its an out and out Ayyappan film, there is Prithviraj who was standing tall even though knowing that he doesn’t have any chance. He stands tall with his morals and attitude even when the whole village is against him. It’s like Sachin against mighty Aussies. He fights for his case, all alone, truly and honestly.

Even in the climax when he accepts defeat and goes to the police to reinstantiate the order of Nair, he accepts the defeat with a certain bit of attitude. He exhibits that till the very last scene. When Nair comes to his house, you see a fear but you see in the same face that he is not the guy who’d beg Ayyappan to forgive him, he’d rather fight. I loved that attitude of Prithviraj. That’s the style which Prithviraj brings to the movie.

There were other equally memorable characters too, like Kurian (Ranjith) who never lowers his guard even when he gets arrested. Thus, we know how Koshi had got that attitude. Even the CI was terrific in his role. How he nonchalantly shoos of Kurian saying that post Ayyapannum Koshiyum we’d have a Kurianum Satheeshum.

On top of everything, I loved how the title was not taken literally by again and again citing the name Ayyappan. Instead he was called Nair throughout, except for that one scene where they say Ayyappanum Koshiyum. That was some good filmmaking.

Movie Review – Raazi

An okayish patriotic act

It was a movie I was not very keen to watch. But still something about the movie was lingering in my mind. This one and ‘Uri: The Surgical Strike’. Also having heard great reviews about the movie I decided to watch it on a tiring night.

I was recommended this movie for the love of Alia. I guess it forms part of the Alia trinity package. ‘Highway’ and ‘Dear Zindagi’ being the other two. ‘Highway’ was one of the movies which was a revelation. ‘Dear Zindagi’ was her type. She could do it even if woken up from sleep at the middle of the night. I guess ‘Raazi’ was one notch above it when it comes to difficulty in acting with respect to Alia. And she has done it with elan.

I hated her introduction scene right away where she saves a squirrel (showing how kind hearted she is) and telling the phone number of someone (telling that she is the telephone directory of college, quite literally). This sequence could have definitely been given more time to evolve instead of just putting it on our face to know about Alia’s characteristics.

In a parallel story we see her father being a double agent and helping India. His track was better. The story is about how his daughter Sehmat (Alia Bhatt) goes as a spy to a Pakistan home of a brigadier by marrying his son. It was a slow thriller which had its moments. Otherwise just a normal story of patriotism.

Two of my favorite scenes were the one where Sehmat tells her husband Iqbal (Vicky Kausal) that she wants to make some offering for Abdul’s death and wishes to go shopping for that. Iqbal says that he’d like to come along too but the next day. He and his brother were asked to come along with her father. His brother says that he’d have to investigate about Abdul’s death so now Iqbal is in a spot of bother and couldn’t accompany Sehmat. There is no communication between two but the disappointment of Iqbal to not go with Sehmat and Sehmat’s relief that he’d not come was superbly shown and underplayed.

Similarly, in the climax scene when Sehmat holds the gun at Iqbal, Beig’s son comes all of sudden and Sehmat holds her gun behind him. The suddenness was beautiful. The climax where Sehmat gets saved felt like preposterous but the trick which was done for it, saved the scene. Also, Alia’s acting was superb. Like I’ve said before, she’s the second-best crier on screen. Here she gets to do it a lot many times.

In the series of good scenes there were equal number of boring scenes too. First the introduction, then the servant, I thought Sehmat would win his confidence but it became pretty unidimensional when he spots her and she kills him. The anklet scene was interesting. I thought it was intentional by Iqbal so that he can find out where she is but it was better than that. He after all ends up to be nice husband and bought it only out of love but the anklet twist came in a different way when he spots it while checking for the evidence in Iqbal’s room. That was a nice little twist.

Vicky Kaushal was one other reason to watch the movie. As recently during a trek, I got to hear from few people that I look like him and he’s a great actor. I was curious to see him. He didn’t have much to do here but his acting was superb. It’s not easy to underplay in such a film where all the importance is on Alia but he had done a terrific job but keeping his emotions in tact and performing only what is necessary. Which has become a rarity nowadays.

Even though this film wasn’t had, it wasn’t anything extraordinary too. It’s a decent watch if one likes this genre.

Movie Review – Dheepan

Caught by Surprise

Dheepan is one of those typical slow burners which French cinema is good at. But thanks to my misunderstanding to be a Malayalam film and the Tamil language spoken in the movie, I watched it along with family during COVID-19 self-isolation. Otherwise I’d have never chosen this movie to be watched with family and that too not at that time of the day. It’s not an evening watch. It’s solo watch when you’re all alone and all fresh. Not a movie to be watched when you are tired. It’ll depress you even more.

The thriller factor and heroism of the film was like modern French films. But the feel of the film was more Iranian. If not for the explosion it’d had been an Iranian film. I thought the movie would delve on how Dheepan (Antonythasan Jesuthasan) and Yalini (Kalieaswari Srinivasan) deal with each other along with Illayaal (Claudine Vinasithamby) post war. But instead of the family turmoil, the film was on how they all deal together about their change in lifestyles. It’s an important and interesting aspect to note too. But I’d have loved to know how people deal with life when things have become all good, instead of them dealing with another similar background.

The film was certainly rooted. Wonder how a foreign person could make a film so rooted. Even our own directors don’t make such movie. Even the most lauded one (Kannathil Muthamittal) is so cinematic. Here, look at how the characters react to each of the situation. Without actually showing the war sequence and what happened during that time, the director has beautifully explained what the people have undergone. For example, in the initial scene a lady searches for some young girl who has lost her mother, for those who have their kids, they say it’s their kid, for those who don’t, they just tell that it’s not theirs. That’s how she gets to Illayaal, A kid who has lost her mother. Neither does her aunt protest nor she. They all know they’d be better off anywhere than there.

In the same way, Illayaal asks Yalini to kiss her cheek before dropping her at school and at home carefully explains her to show affection. It was beautifully written, that scene. People who don’t know Tamil wouldn’t get it in the subtitled. She tells her about ‘paasam’ not just ‘love’ in plain terms. That’s how things are matter of fact for them. Even though I felt bad for the kid, I still felt at least, they’ve this much now. It’s the same way they feel about their life too. Maximum they could complain about their life would be for two minutes. Then they carry on with whatever they have. It was a shame that Illayaal didn’t get as much screen space as the leads, she was such a charming young woman.

Towards the climax, the ‘Dheepan’ role gets to become a heroic one. A kind of role which Rajesh M. Selva would have thought that he created for Vikram in ‘Kadaram Kondan’ but ended up doing plain bland movie. Here the heroism was superbly shot and thought about. Making is terrific and acting is top notch too. The way he gets his skills back (to his dismay) and finishes them in a true Samurai template. It’s only from this scene it actually felt like a French film because it was so stylish, prior to that, this film reminded me a lot about ‘Terrorist’, a Santosh Sivan classic which had got a similar treatment.

May be people with lot of exposure to world cinema end up doing films in a separate style which doesn’t stick to any specific location. Even though it works for Kurosawa’s films, for films like ‘Dheepan’ and ‘Terrorist’ the style still looks alien. It’s tough to knit pick that as a shortcoming for the film but even though it feels like a terrific film which looks authentic, as if made by a local, it makes us say ‘as if’ and doesn’t make us forget that it’s a foreign film. Guess that’s where the cultural difference comes into play. There are a lot of things to ponder about when we take this topic but for now Dheepan is a worthy watch.

By the way, what did the elephants come for. It’s a superb shot alright. It followed the time arc too. But why, reason? I’m not curious, just interested.

Movie Review – Kali

Rage sans reason

Thanks to the Sai Pallavi fan in me and the status message of her dancing in red saree, I was intrigued to watch the movie. Also heard reasonably good reviews from few. If it had been overwhelmingly good reviews, I wouldn’t have had expectations. I’d have thought it to be just another commercial pot boiler. But because not everyone was in favor of the movie but none hated it too, I gave this a serious thought. I guess that’s where the mistake was made.

The movie begins with an action piece where a food joint is being ransacked by goons and the title appears. Post that the story of DQ and Sai Pallavi begins. By this time, we totally forget about the first incident. Their track begins with Sai Pallavi walking out in tears. No marks for surprise, it’s due to DQs rage. Now this too cuts and we go back to see his story.

We see Siddhu (Dulquer Salman) growing up to be a kid who is ferocious and short tempered. The growing up sequences are highly illogical heroic scenes. Especially in the college fight, there is no lead as to why it happens, what happens next. There is one guy coming up running to him, he fights and a big group circles them and the guy who approaches him for fight finally gets to beat who chases him, thanks to Siddhu. We don’t know who they are, what problem, in which college it happens, whether they’re outsiders in Siddhu’s college or vice Versa. Then appears Anjali (Sai Pallavi), again out of the blue. We don’t know whether she’s a student, lecturer or anything. The cuts are blind with no information whatsoever.

They get married without their parents’ consent. I thought that’s where the movie would get interesting. They’ll show the turmoil between the couple. What anger does to relationship. A story on the lines of ‘Separation’. Of course, I was not mad to think that ‘Kali’ would be of ‘Separation’ level but I’d have been happy if the film had focused on their relationship. But instead of that, there was a guy hitting him, his superior hitting on him, insurance agent smiling at him and a kid increasing volume. All these seemed petty. In fact, I felt the anger justified for most of it. There was no tension for any scene or hatred towards Siddhu for behaving so. Even the car driving scene was fun, I couldn’t feel bad for Anjali.

Post those little antics and some ‘aunty’ques, we get back to scene one where Anjali walks away crying from house. The single best scene of the movie is when the smoker gets up shocked when Anjali gives a scary reaction. Post that its only one incident which takes place entirely in the second half.

Siddhu drives and tells he’d drop Anjali to airport or something but rather drives a looooong way. After a good chase sequence, they end up in a road side motel (the same where the first fight happened). That was a horrible little twist. I thought it’d get over in few minutes but unluckily for me, it happened in the entire second half. The tension was nice but the intention was cheap. It would have been a good short film but making a full-length feature film with just this one meek concept was not something to be proud of.

Few cat and mouse game happen between the couple and the people in motel, I saw a lot of inspiration from ‘Duel’. Guess the director is a fan of that movie. Because the whole thought process was focused on those scenes. Post that it was again bland, Siddhu gets few advices on how to behave and then there is Dulquer in ‘Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon’ (Tamil dubbing) fashion jumping in the air.

As soon as the Dulquer lowers the car window, I was humming ‘Kannu chuvakkanu pallu kadikkanu’. That’s the impact that small little scene from ‘Premam’ gave during the climax.

Movie Review – Highway

Road movie, the Imtiaz way

Back when the movie released, Alia Bhatt was the reason I was skeptical to watch it. I thought what else could be the story if it had Alia Bhatt, other than getting on a truck and exploring highway life. But now Alia Bhatt was the same reason that I watched the moved. What a breath of fresh air she is. Right from the scene where she runs out of house and removes her blanket. We feel the sense of independence which she inhales. Over the time what an actor she has evolved to be.

When I wanted to watch the film a couple of weeks back, I watched it till that point. I thought it was going to be one of the movies where a bride escapes from her marriage, explores the world and comes back home as an independent woman. The film looked tailor made for actress like Alia Bhatt. How wrong I was. After a couple of dialogues, I got to know she indeed wasn’t trying to escape but just was in marriage tension. Her antics were cute to watch.

The story starts post that, she gets abducted by a thief and travels around. In a way it was ‘Ravanan’ story. The locales are also similar. The sceneries are beautiful. A bad man who doesn’t touch a girl in both the films. The girl faces problems at home here in ‘Highway’ and the girl gets doubted by her husband in ‘Raavnan’. Even the names are similar. Protagonists names are ‘Veera’ in both. But ‘Highway’ works much better than ‘Raavana’ both at surface level and at philosophical level. I’m a fan of ‘Ravanan’ too but it’s for Vikram. None could play a role, any role better than what Vikram did in ‘Ravanan’ but that’s that. The sceneries are post card perfect but it doesn’t make any scenes. The shots are gimmicky and there was absolutely no emotion whatsoever with respect to the film. In plain words, it was boring.

But here in ‘Highway’, the ‘road’ makes so much sense. Right from the opening scene till the last point, the randomness of the roads was superbly shot. The shots were not of a famous scenery or a sunset or something unique but just like that, the roads, the mountains, sheep etc. everything looks beautiful. Even when Veera (Alia Bhatt) stops her car at the last minute, Imtiaz doesn’t choose a picture-perfect location. It’s just a space where men would pee if they get down from bus. But look how magical it looks. Imtiaz is a true wanderer. Only a true wander can make proper road movies like this. Even his personality is that of a modern hippie. He looks so cool.  If GVM has a kind of charm. Imtiaz has another kind of charm. You straightaway feel like respecting him.

On a high level it’s a regular cliched story which we had heard numerous times but the Imtiaz treatment is what makes it special. After trying to escape and coming back to captivity, Veera’s character suddenly changes. She becomes all cutsie and confident which didn’t work for me. But there is a brilliantly acted scene where she tells her flashback. That’s where Alia shows her mettle. But what we don’t notice is Mahabir (Randeep Hooda) in the background who is out of focus. What Alia takes so much time to prove, Randeep proves by just staring at her, that too out of focus. What an actor. He too gets a chance to showcase his talent like Alia. That’s where he shows what acting is. The scene where he goes out and cries and the breakdown post that is as fabulous as it can get. Just like the previous sequence, here all our focus is on Randeep but see how well Alia comforts him, she couldn’t even hold him, he’s so powerful, so macho, so big. She being so small couldn’t even hold him and comfort him properly, yet she does. How cute that scene was.

For a movie, time arc is something very important. See how well it works her on one of the most important scenes. In the initial stage when Veera gets abducted, he’s being told on how one should not meddle with the rich and he gets shot in the same way towards the climax. If the first scene happens about twenty minutes from the start, the response to it happens around twenty minutes before the climax, thus maintaining the perfect time arc. For the latter scene, when Veera thinks of Mahabir the locales are hazy and dreamlike as he’s no more.

Another aspect of Imtiaz, is him being an unapologetic Muslim filmmaker. Some people would always be conscious to mask their identity. People don’t want to show their belief, that they belong to some religion. For someone who has faith in Vishnu, he doesn’t want to show it everyone or a Christian wouldn’t want to have any Christian aspects in film because people would tag it as a religious film. There is another category which says only their faith is correct, rest all are wrong. Let’s not even get to that.

With respect to Imtiaz, when Veera is first kept hiding in a Muslim location, he doesn’t mince with it. Instead he gives an authentic flavor to it because he knows about it. Plus, the Sufi music and his collaboration with A R Rahman is some sort of magic. It needn’t be a devotional song but he feels like including ‘Ali’ in a song and he does that. Look how awesome it sounds. It gives a truly liberating feel.

When Veera first comments on all the different type of location they take her too. That’s what my feeling was, that would have been your feeling too if you had been a true traveler. I was like, “next time I should stay in such kind of locations”. Also, the use of beautiful wide frames. I don’t know when I last saw so many wide-angle shots in an Indian movie. My memory fails to remember any such movie.

Movie Review – Jiivi

A‘maze’ing

Wonder how many good films have gone unnoticed by majority. It’s understandable if the movies are like ‘8 Thottakkal’ or a ‘Suttu Pidikka Utharavu’ but ‘Jiivi’ is one notch above. It’s right to even say that the film is Nolanisque because the movie is so convincing. It’d easily be one of the best Tamil movies I’ve watched recently.

Initially while starting the movie I was annoyed thinking that it’s going to be another thriller. Thriller is the new comedy nowadays. But the way it evolved and got better and better with each portion was something I didn’t except.

When the protagonist Saravanan (Vetri) looks at someone throwing a plastic bottle out of the car I thought it was going to another movie bitching about Chennai but it was just the beginning. The irritation was more philosophical than instinctive. The movie then quickly traverses to a totally needless love story. Why a filmmaker who was so good with the writing had to include a song there. The romance totally didn’t work and so was the break up. The breakup didn’t necessarily feel like something which gave the protagonist the reason to go awry. It felt like just another day in his life and the break up scene looked quite unidimensional too. For such an important juncture, wish some effort had been made to make it look serious.

From then the film just cruises. Saravanan has a proper gramathu paya look which works to his favor. Even his style of wearing lungi with the side folds and banian was so realistic. If you had been in bachelors’ room in Tamil Nadu you’d know for sure. So, it was good to see an educated individual who doesn’t look like either a sophisticated person or as a rouge. And his way of curiosity was also fun.

His frustration makes him try for a robbery, the scenes of which were shot interestingly but the greatest twist arrives when he thinks that the happenings of his story are similar to that of the family from whom he robbed. He calls it Mukkona Vidhi, literal translation would mean Triangle Law. To know what it is or to know whether there is anything like that at all, one needs to analyze deep, which I feel like doing but wouldn’t do. An answer might arise as to what that law means, may be then we can identify how brilliant the plot is.

But even without all that, with us being just Karunakaran’s it’s still a highly satisfying explanation. What the director achieves is, he makes us think the film as a proper sci-fi and not a horror film. We don’t feel things are supernatural but scientific coincidences. That’s where the director wins us.

Another highlight of the film is the characterization of the protagonist. He’s a hugely unsympathetic fellow but not a total villain. He doesn’t care when his sister is married off to a lower caste person but when the need arises, he diverts the attention towards it (remember the funeral scene) and escapes it. Another brilliant scene is the dream sequence where he dreams of his dad and a young blind kid. My wife beautifully decoded it. It comes at a point where he thinks his life and owner akka’s life are similar. So, he dreams of his sister’s daughter as a blind girl. At that time, she wouldn’t have even born. Just sometime before his sister would have said that a soothsayer had told her that she’d give birth to a girl but he’d have some trouble. We focus only on the trouble part but the point is, it’s a ‘girl’. Similar to owner akka’s blind daughter.

These type of interesting plot twists keep us engaged. It gets better and better with time. It ends with a great climax too. I wasn’t exactly clear on it but I could understand that the chain was broken.

Movie Review – K.G.F: Chapter 1

Maverick Mayhem

Even though I missed it in theatres I still watched the movie amidst a lot of hype. The movie is a dream for any star. Note carefully, any star, not any actor. But to be a star requires a lot of charisma. It wouldn’t work on just anyone. And not everyone can become a star just by being in the film. Yash had that screen presence. Being someone who has fairly any knowledge about Kannada cinema, it still gave me goosebumps, that too in Tamil, wonder how it’d have been for Kannada people who had known the language and known Yash. And how much it’d have meant for Yash fans. Just the thought of it is so unimaginable.

It’s a type of film which Vikram would have been looking for, looking for in his entire life. I actually feel like making a film on Vikram on how he wanted to choose an elusive script till the end of his life and finally doesn’t get it. I guess that would be his ‘Raging Bull’. Funny fellow.

The fact that it appealed even as a Tamil movie shows the sincerity in translation. The words, poems and more importantly punch dialogues were built up superbly. Even though the number of slowmos and build up music gets overboard after a point. It still adds value to the film and doesn’t end up like a Simbu film where there are introduction shots in every single scene. In that way the director had succeeded. It’s only through his firm belief that a film like this had been made. Even if he had had an iota of doubt, it’d have got transformed in the film and could have spoilt.

The movie minces no words. Its heroism right from the start. If you read the story on paper it’s a typical MGR film. That too the film happens during 70s so it’s a perfect MGR film. But with the graphics, slowmos and lighting it looks more present. But in a way it spoils the film too. The action sequences could have been definitely better. We hardly see Yash in anything. It’s like seeing Dinosaurs in Jurassic Park. You get to see only part of him, thanks to the lighting. It’s okay if it had been used that way once. But being too clever in the action sequences got very much evident. He knows that he can’t fully light up a fighting scene because he can’t afford to make it look great then.

The villains are just a way bit too much. They’re like video game villains, one after another in different get up. The shock value for each of the villain remains the same. After a point it becomes overwhelming as the same template was used. It’s only a richer way of introducing villains but at ground level its same as how Perarasu does in introducing Pattasu Balu. In spite of it, the villains did a fair job in being villains. The only bad casting seemed to be the heroine who looked so out of place as someone from the outside world who had jumped into the film. You need someone like a Deepika Padukone or Anushka Sharma to be a femme fatale. Here Srinidhi Shetty was not fatal but just a causality. It’s like being the only human in ‘Who Framed Roger Rabbit’. She looked like the only mortal in the world of caricatures. Who would have guessed that being mortal would be such a negative trait?

The film has a number of great moments but to know the story one has to keenly hear. Read again, hear and not see. That’s a big mistake. Narration should be a style but a necessity. Here the story is conveyed only through narration because Rocky (Yash) is so busy fighting, he doesn’t have time to talk. The narration overlaps a number of times and so is the storyline. Even if it was intentional, it disrupts the viewers. It’s not made with any formula. Just random throwing here and there and cut horribly wrong. It’d have easily been given a more traditional approach and made it look great. This needless experimentation spoils the joy of viewers. Instead of enjoying the film we’re made to think who’s who.

In spite of all this, the film still works and makes me very eager to watch the second part in theatres (if we’re alive by then, that is) because of the power. Like Rocky realizes. KGF is a powerful film. Like I’ve stated, its mayhem but still its maverick. Superbly made. Makes you feel as if you’re in theme park with thrilling rides back to back and there is no one to stop. Yash’s presence is terrific, except for that one drunk scene with the heroine, all other scenes he was awesome. Even the kid who had acted as rocky had done a fair job. The thrill remains.

This might not be a perfect film. This might not be a Bahubali, yet. Still we have one more part to arrive. Remember that Bahubali became a Bahubali only after Part 2 so I have high confidence that it’d good. Credit has to be given to Prashanth Neel for visualizing this larger than life story and executing it properly. This might not be perfect but it really could be a beginning.

Movie Review – Oh My Kadavule

The stars shine bright

It was one of the promising movies to come up recently with cast which looked perfect, the aura which ‘Raja Rani’ created with its cast. The cast and the overall mood of the film looked like a rehash of ‘Soodhu Kavvum’. The actors did what they’re perfectly capable of doing and did it with elan. Ashok Selvan was charming at his best, Ritika Singh was cranky as wife and fun as friend. Vani Bhojan was, what else to say, terrific in whatever part she got. And the duo of Vijay Sethupathi and Ramesh Thilak were so much fun. It didn’t even look like they were acting, the smiles and all were so real.

The movie jumps to the story right away with three friends Arjun (Ashok Selvan), Anu (Ritika Singh) and Mani (Sha Ra) having a drinks party. A place which severely reminded me of the pub where Harish and Raiza party before ‘High on Love’ song in ‘Pyaar Prema Kaadhal’. Even the film in a way reminded me of ‘Pyaar Prema Kadhal’ but it was a bad example of youthful love story and took itself too seriously. Here it was all fun, well almost. The three friends formed a terrific combo. I loved how the swear words were not trimmed and how healthily the swear words come out of their mouth, especially Mani’s. He was way better than Comali. Maybe it’s because the role here which was proper unlike Comali where it’s just a caricature.

As revealed in the trailer the movie focuses on the breakup of Arjun and Anu right from the first and Arjun narrates what all happened in the first half to the gods. That forms a great first half. Meera akka in whatever little scenes she comes oozes charm. Ramesh Thilak effortlessly utters philosophy, just like how he does in ‘Soodhu Kavvum’ and ‘Kadhalum Kadandhu Pogum’. He has a knack of delivering those dialogues in a casual manner.

Ashok Selvan effortlessly leads the pack, his fun reactions and serious face both are not cringe worthy but enjoyable. He has a proper face and physique to act in these types of movies. As of now I’m not able to think what he could do in a movie where he’s not a boy next door but for now I’m satisfied. Audition scene here is so natural unlike the one in ‘Remo’. But that’s not a thing to criticize. SK did it in his style in ‘Remo’ and Ashok did in his style in ‘Oh My Kadavule’.

The problem starts with second half, I loved the confidence of Meera, I loved how the middle finger scene didn’t end up in fight and in the party scene, wow man, she looked like a million bucks. Wish there was more screen space for her. Even in the second half I didn’t find any solid reason as to why he wanted to have Anu for wife. She still looked like a solid friend material. Being his ‘Noodles Mandai’ suited her better than being his wife. There were few scenes which was dragging and soupy. When he wanted to go to Kerala, it was like, “oh please not again”. Seriously what’s this Kerala fascination. Like how Pulikesi tells in ‘Imsai Arasan 23 M Pulikesi’ that one can’t do anything more than false impersonation in a double action movie, seems, in a romantic film, if one is stuck with screenplay, then one has to go to Kerala. What a jargon.

Of course, the movie would be a happy ending but the director Ashwath does a decent job by playing with the heels. Also, they end up being in the same bar in the climax. Anu in her white wedding gown. Guess someone is a serious ‘Friends’ fanboy. Anyways it was lovable. All is well that ends well. Also, this film doesn’t make women drinking a big deal as well as it wasn’t something rebellious. It was casual and cool. I loved the scene where Meera drinks a beer. It was classy.

In a time where kisses have become common, they were not shot well. The last good kissing scene I remember is from ‘Aashiqui 2’ and before that ‘Band Baja Baarat’. Tamil cinema seriously sucks at it. No matter what, this is one thing which no one can beat Kamal. But here the scene was shot superbly, the shock was nice and the scene was sparkling. A nice way to end the movie.

The movie even though didn’t live up to the hype it generated, It’s a really good movie to pass your time but nothing to remember thereafter.

Travelogue – A day’s trek to Sadhuragiri

2/22/2020

It was one of the long-hauled hikes. Due to its unavailability on days other than Full Moon Day and No Moon Day and proximity to my hometown I couldn’t plan easily. I had to be there in Madurai around that time otherwise I don’t feel like going to Madurai and just visiting Sadhuragiri without going to my relative’s place. Finally, during an extended weekend which happened around No Moon Day I was able to visit the place.

We started early morning around 4 so that we could start our trek soon. Got cab immediately from home to Matuthavani Bus Stand. From there again we got on bus to Virudhunagar and got down at Krishnan Kovil stop like ‘n’ number of people going for Sadhuragiri. As previous night was Siva Rathri there wasn’t much crowd in the bus. Most of them would have trekked the previous night.

After having a bad tea in the bus stop, we took another bus to Thaanipaarai, the base to the Sadhuragiri. There were lot of share autos plying but as it’d be uncomfortable, we resorted to bus option. We got the front seats with great view. The travel till Thaani Paarai was lovely.

We could see a lot of people near there. There were a number of Annadhanam centres too at the base but as it was only around 8 AM we thought we’d start with the trek without eating. We weren’t feeling very hungry. We had to get entrance ticket to enter the forest. It was for five rupees. We got it and started our walk. We kept brisk pace and didn’t stop anywhere for more than five minutes.

Within five minutes we reached Sangili Parai, it was just a small rock tied by a chain, thus the name. On the other side there was water till knee. We crossed it easily and then it was gradual ascent. I think at some point there was a small lingam on the side which we visited and then straight to Vazhuku Paarai, which again wasn’t anything terrifying, just a careful walk would set us in other side.

From there we went straight to Sundara Mahalingam, had great darshan of slanting lingam which felt great. Smeared my forehead with sacred ash and had lunch. Both homemade and the one we got at Annadhanam. It felt great. We then proceeded to Sandhana Mahalingam and got a huge sandal paste on head. Together we spent around an hour there. I guess the climb took 2-3 hours.

We proceeded down post that. Had Sarbath and Thaen Mittai in a shop, got a brief shower and then we bought Sambrani in one of the numerous shops. Otherwise we didn’t stop much. We distributed whatever snacks, cool drinks we had to people who were climbing up. It felt good. The sun started scorching so we hurried as much as possible and came down in a couple of hours.

I ate Annadhanam again but wife didn’t. She didn’t like eating it more than once. We got bus in few minutes and boarded it. Drank a Palm Fruit Juice which the locals said was not original. From Krishnan Kovil, buses to Madurai were crowded so had to stand for half the distance, so couldn’t sleep. Even after getting a seat it was uncomfortable. So, I couldn’t sleep the whole distance.

Once we came back to Matuthavani we got cab to our place and came home by 5 PM, to everyone’s surprise. It was a day well spent.

Movie Review – Munnariyippu

Silent Killer

That would have been an apt title for this film but it’d have given a bit too much too. It’s great fun to see an actor of Mammootty’s caliber to have acted in such a film. He makes entry after quite some time and that too with no heroism. In fact it’s quite an interesting entry. The entry is sudden but there is no suddenness in the entry. We don’t get shocked by his entry, there is no built up to it, there is also no cinematic passing by of the entry. It’s sudden, it’s focused but by some means important.

Talking further on the entry, there is carefully written sequence of events, which if called as screenplay is brilliant. One event leads to other and the events doesn’t have a bigger purpose. It’s not as if some scenes are made up to eventually arrive at the introduction. Instead of being butterfly effects, they are proper sequence of events which could happen to anyone. Anjali (Aparna Gopinath) gets caught by traffic police, then goes to an author’s event which leads to her going to a policeman to write story and bam she gets her prisoner there. The traffic police, police, author don’t have a greater purpose they just happen to be part of the process in ending up to Mammooty.

The jail superintendent Rama Moorthy (a brilliant Nedumudi Venu) and KK (Prathap Pothan) surprise us sometime when the latter claims her as devil and two together scold her during their drinks event but nothing big happens because of them. We think she’ll get affected by them but it ends up being just part of life. But what it does achieve is, if redirects our focus from Mammootty. We forget what he’s up to and starts thinking about them.

There are various means by which he achieves it. Another brilliant tool he employed is Prithviraj (Chacko). I don’t know how it’d have been to people who don’t know him. But for us when a big actor comes all of a sudden we expect some twist of him. That’s a brilliant way to use a special appearance. Thanks to Prithviraj too to have accepted the role. It’s only because of him, the focus again shifts from Mammootty. Generally in a movie like ‘Seven’ where Anthony Hopkins was involved without being informed, we expect something to happen because of him. And it does. It works there but what Venu does here is much better than what Fincher had done there. He uses the same tool but in reverse effect. In a way the film is slap on the face of people who are busy racing in life. But it’s not so obvious like a ‘Tamasha’ or a ‘3 Idiots’. It does everything in a subdued manner.

The actors have been brilliant, especially Aparna Gopinath, who does a Parvathy. The way she carriers the whole film on her is brilliant. She’s just a normal person but not a subdued one, the one with emotions. Not even at a single place does she go overboard to do something cinematic. She’s a writer by choice and doesn’t have some sad melodramatic story behind it or an irritating coming of age story. She’s a writer and that’s that. The maximum that we hear about she being more than normal is when her mom says that now it’ll shut their relatives mouth who have been telling ill things when she went to study journalism. If I remember it correctly she doesn’t even say journalism, she says some study related to this profession. She doesn’t have a father and does that have any significance to the story, no. As simple as that. There is nothing unnecessary, just crisp writing.

Even here, if you see till now all we’ve been talking is about actors other than Mammootty. That’s where the director achieves his success. And Mammootty or numerous other Malayalam actors are always successful in being part of the story rather than being a story (a cue which Vikram needs to take care if he has to scale heights). Mohanlal too does a similar role in a similar story in Drishyam. It’s good to see people trying hard to bring reality in the movie by just being normal people than being superstars. Even though I’m a Mammootty fan, I felt between the two Mohanlal does a better job in Drishyam.

But when it comes to film or making or writing, it’s Venu who is a clear winner. One can’t make a movie like this interesting without craft. The movie just takes that one double homicide story as a crux and keeps going on. There is no tense music, there is fast cuts, yet there is underlying tension. It just happens subconsciously, as if something is happening behind the layer of cinema which is being projected on screen. We feel that there is some disturbance behind the screen, something confusing, something unanswered. It all gets answered in that one final scene in the end, which is brilliant. I wish the film had end few minutes earlier when Anjali just stares at Raghavan.

I carefully avoided using a specific word, which would make the climax guessable. And tried carefully not to reveal the climax as well as the intention. Let’s see what you feel. What do you think the Mammootty character really did? What could be your version of his past?