Into the third week of May & there has been quite a few big banner releases. As I have been quite busy over the past couple of weeks, I didn't quite find the time to pen my opinion about them. Though a couple of them did inspire expectations coz of the cast & crew in them, the final celluloid product failed to do justice to the talent of the people involved. Anyway the following are some of the movies that I had watched & what I felt about them.
Pavi Caretaker: "Dileep needs to take care of his career more sensibly!!!"
It's been quite a while since we had seen Dileep in a movie & a significantly much longer time, before one of them genuinely managed to impress us. His latest effort to win over the audience is in Vineeth Kumar's "Pavi Caretaker" where he plays the role of a Gulf returnee who presently worked as a caretaker/security personnel in a post apartment complex in Cochin. He was a bachelor & more of a loner with his pet dog, Bro being the only company that he had. Things moved along uneventfully until his house owner, Mariyamma (Radhika Sarathkumar), a retired police officer informed him that he would have to share his quarters with another tenant, who happened to be a woman. Though reluctant initially, Pavi warmed up to his house-mate through letter interactions as they never got to meet in person since she stayed over in the house only at night when he was off for work. Anyway in due time, Pavi started to develop feelings for her & the movie is about how their relationship panned out.
This is Vineeth's third directorial venture & he has collaborated with the experienced Rajesh Raghavan who has penned for movies like "Aravindante Athithikal". It is a feel good comedy drama which kind of reminded me of the themes from "Bodyguard", "The Lunchbox" & the slapstick sequence from "Ee Parakkam Thalika". In effect, it didn't provide a fresh feel though I wouldn't say that it tested my patience primarily because of the manner that it was packaged with the emotional sequences being reasonably fine. As for the technical aspects, it was ok with mention for Sanu Thahir's visuals & Midhun Mukundan's music.
There is no doubt that Dileep is a talented artist but his choice of scripts in recent times has been far from good. As Pavi, I felt that the humour which was his USP in the past felt forced while in the emotional scenes, he was quite good. There were quite a few new faces among the female leads & most of them were fine such as Swathi (as Leena), Sreya Rukmini (as Janaki), Rosmi (as Jeena) etc. Johny Antony & Radhika did their parts aptly in the limited opportunity provided.
Verdict: It isn't a bad movie but nowadays when quality movies are coming out quite regularly, it is unlikely to have much of a run at the box office. It's high time that Dileep really thought about his choice of movies rather than merely release flicks for the heck of it. In short, nothing new!!!
Rating: 2.25/5
Malayalee from India: "Screenplay lacked the punch to drive this political satire!!!"
It would be fair to see that all movies require a certain degree of pre-release hype to cash in on the initial which is absolutely essential in this present age due to the limited number of days each one manages to run in theatres. In the case of Diju Antony's latest release, he had to acknowledge Vineeth Sreenivasan's "Varshangalkku Shesham" to a certain degree for the hype & expectations due to the impact Nivin Pauly's character had created in it, not to forget Dijo's previous release was a commercial hit. So how did all these factors eventually pan out???
The movie unfolds in an alien terrain where Gopi (Nivin) was in search of an address & the story is narrated in flash back whereby it tells us how he landed up there. Gopi & his buddy, Malgosh (Dhyan Sreenivasan) were right wing supporters who loitered around without being useful either for their family or society. Gopi's life changes on the night the Indian cricket team loses to Pakistan & that coincided with a couple of Muslim kids bursting crackers. The bigoted mindset of Malgosh makes him to hurl a petrol bomb in retaliation which creates unset in the area & Gopi is forced to flee to the Middle East to his uncle until the tension reduced. However, what was in store for him over there was something that he had least expected.
This is the third time that Dijo Antony & Sharis Mohammed had collaborated & unlike their previous ventures, they have opted for a satire which looked into the effect of politics and religion. There are some hilarious sequences for sure in the initial segment but in the latter half it felt as if it was left in shaky ground in terms of what tone it wanted to adopt. It looked like a spoof of "Aadujeevitham" with a sprinkling of "Bajrangi Bhaijaan" & Malala and culminates in a predictable manner. At the same time, I felt quite a few of the sequences & dialogues were pretty good. As for other aspects, Sudeep Elamon's visuals were fine though Jakes Bejoy's music didn't quite rise to expectations.
Coming to performances, Nivin has done a decent job as the protagonist & it would be unfair to put the blame on him for a shoddy screenplay. Dhyan was quite irritating while Anaswara was wasted in a poorly etched role. As for the rest of the cast, both Manju Pillai & Deepak Jethi did their parts well.
Verdict: It was in the news for all the wrong reasons after its release with Nishad Koya making plagiarism claims. Anyway whatever might be the truth behind that, there is no denying that the screenplay was quite mediocre which failed to maximise on the potential of the satire.
Rating: 2/5
Nadikar: "A rather shallow take of events in the latter half!!!"
The cine world has always be so tempting that every one wants to be part of it in the belief that there is nothing more that a person could possibly wish. However, the truth is in order to remain relevant it is a combination of talent, discipline & talent which is a tightrope that many find it hard to balance. Over the years, we have had numerous movies that looked into that world & Lal Jr's latest directorial effort is also along similar lines.
David Padikkal (Tovino Thomas) was the emerging superstar of the industry with a track record that boasted of an industry hit as well. However, with fame & money; arrogance crept in & his focus turned towards worldly pleasures which caused his movies to suffer at the box office. With repeated failures, his demand was on the wane & on the advise of his manager, Paily (Suresh Krishna); he decided to clean up his act by collaborating with the acclaimed director, Koshy (Ranjith). However, his inadequacies as a performer got exposed by Koshy & he walked out from the project in retaliation. It was at this juncture that Paily suggested that it was indeed time for David to accept the criticism & address the issue. The solution that Paily had was to take up the services of a seasoned yet unconventional acting coach, Bala (Soubin Shahir). So will David be able to swallow his arrogance before it is too late???
Based on the script by Suvin Somasekharan, Lal Jr has crafted the first half pretty well whereby we get to see how arrogance had plotted the downfall of the protagonist. The tantrums of the star, his emotional struggles & demeanour in general to people around him was quite well captured in the first half. But both the writer & director lacked the ability to hook in the audience to the efforts made by the protagonist for redemption. It failed to provide any kind of emotional connect & despite scenes put in to convey that, we don't feel the impact of the efforts put in and the change that is happening as a result of it (especially the one related to his childhood trauma). On the technical side, Alby's visuals were in sync with the mood while Prashanth Madhav's production design was praise worthy. The same also applies to the costume department while Yakzan Gray & Neha Nair's music was just average.
Despite evident shortcomings, Tovino has done an impressive job as David and effectively conveyed the arrogance & emotions of the character. Soubin Shahir was average while Bhavana was wasted in an inconsequential role. As for the rest, Suresh Krishna, Balu Varghese & a host of cameos did their parts aptly.
Verdict: Though the idea was in place for the second half, the lack of a well thought story regarding how to incorporate the gravitas to those sequences proved to be the bane of the movie. In effect, Tovino's performance proved to be the saving grace!!!
Rating: 1.75/5
Regards...Ben
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