After more than six months, the Malayalam film industry heaved a sigh of relief as the State Government allowed the theatres to function at 50 % capacity apart from other stringent guidelines. This essentially raised questions as to whether big budget movies like "Marakkar" would even be able to break even & from the look of things, it seems headed for Amazon Prime. However, we had Domin D'Silva's "Star" hitting the screens which had a relevant topic as its core theme. So will movies like these encourage people to flock back to the theatres???
A celestial event was about to unfold that captured the attention of the astronomy community as the star 'Betelgeuse' was on the verge of explosion. In Hindu astrology, it was associated with the Ardra / thiruvathira nakshatra which was the zodiac star of Ardra (Sheelu Abraham), a college professor. Coincidentally, her life started to take a turn for the worse at around the same time which strained the relation with her husband, Roy (Joju George). As the family started to notice an evident change in her behaviour, they decided to take a trip to her ancestral home in the hope that would calm her nerves.
This was Domin's second venture after "Pyppin Chuvatille Pranayam" & without mincing words, I would have to say that he has failed to impress. It would however be unfair to put the blame solely on him as the primary reason for this dull venture was Suvin S Somasekharan's mediocre screenplay. It lacked any sense of clarity & even their 'so called' strategy to out-think the audience with the concoction of myths, superstitions & spirits failed to arouse any kind of interest. On the contrary, it tests our patience & by the time, Suvin reveals his core theme (in the last 5 minutes); we are flummoxed. It made absolute no sense as to why such a relevant and sensitive topic which was rarely touched upon & had a credible scope to be explored was handled in such a careless manner. On the technical side, William Francis's BGM was note worthy while the other aspects were ok.
In a woman centric movie like this one, it needed an artist who could carry the movie on her shoulders on the back of her performance. It didn't make sense as to why Sheelu was chosen for this role as she never showcased any such caliber in her previous ventures. As expected, she was no where near the mark as she had a single stone faced expression right throughout the length of the movie. Joju & Gayathri did justice to their roles along with Prithviraj in a cameo role. As for the rest of the cast, they were average at best.
Verdict: To be frank, the manner in which the story was scripted didn't make any sense at all. Even a short film would have been far better. They had a credible thread which could have been well explored & given the audience something to think about out. Unfortunately they didnt & hence, I would suggest to not even bother!!!
Rating: 1.75/5
Regards...Ben
Exact experience. Penned precisely. 👌🏽
ReplyDelete