Engravings on the sands of time

As usual, after a hectic day, rather night at the news desk, I woke up to TV at 2 am and started surfing so that I can get bored enough to sleep. Somewhere in between, I saw the inimitable Sukumaran, a new teacher at a college, telling the girl-students in his unmistakeably masculine, magnetic timbre that he would have started a marriage bureau if he didn't land this job to marry them off! Of course, he was paying back in kind to the girls who were trying to tease him. I was hooked.

The film was 'Shalini Ente Koottukari', written by Padmarajan and directed by Mohan. As I sat back and watched the faded print, I felt like seeing something far away, unfamiliar and exotic. It was not the storyline ( a melancholic Shobha getting afflicted with cancer and succumbing to the inevitable end after a successful surgery), not the breathtaking performance by Sobha, Jalaja and Sukumaran, not the mushy lyrics dipped in sentimentality and fake romanticism, not the evergreen melodies of Devarajan in the silk and gold voice of Yesudas, ...

Don't think I am stretching the suspense too long, and in the process fooling you. It is the feel the film provides, that of a Kerala which was so near, yet so far away. The people, their mindsets, their hopes, their fears, their relationships, their attitudes, their dress...It seemed as though I was travelling back in time to a far far away land, where by some coincidence, the people there looked somewhat similar to us. Nothing more.To think that only a quarter of a century has wrought such massive changes in our land and ourselves! Slim college girls ( Without the help of multi-gym, dieting, aerobics and art of living!) draped in voile sarees with big prints, boys sporting huge bell-bottoms and huge collars resembling goat-ears and flowing down mustaches, campuses thrilled to hear the rumble of a rare Rajdoot and Lambretta thundering past, boys declaring their love to girls as though they are about to die with the effort, and girls, though very much interested in the 'offer', fearful of acknowledging the same. Charming hypocrisy. But, all that idyllic, Platonic love seems so out of place and time now.

And the relationships. The one between the friends Sobha and Jalaja beautiful and empathetic and was well appreciated then. If such a film comes out now, the critics would look under to see whether something more (physical) is there in their love for each other. The terror with which the siblings Sobha and Venu view their father would look exaggerated and even comic for the new generation, especially for those who have seen films like 'Ishtam' wherein a mock-serious Dileep admonishes his father Nedumudi Venu for his pranks.

What a sea change the landscapes have undergone! The open spaces, the greenery, the cool shades and the sights and sounds that made our land so special is all there. When compared to that, the concrete jungles we and the flicks of our times inhabit, inspite of the mad rush of people and traffic, seem so desolalate and hollow.

Cinema, as a medium of the young, captures them in all their shades. The sorrows of the jobless educated as depicted by Venu Nagavalli may seem too unreal and sentimental for the youngsters of this generation who get employment before they come out of college. The number of 'divine' loves shattered on the rock of unemployment then! God only knows how big a number that can be.

To think of it, every movie, or any form of documentation, whatever may be its merit or quality, preserves something of the essence of the times. Isn't that so?

A raw deal, once again

'Pachamarathanalil' teaches the audience new lessons in boredom

The title 'Pachamarathanalil' itself goads one, beaten to pulp by the merciless summer sun and humidity, to go and watch the flick.
But, once the movie begins, the heat comes back and you break in to a sweat, inspite of the air-conditioners. By the time the film reaches its inevitable climax, you end up with jaws aching with incessant yawns and the startling realisation: Your hard-earned money spent on the ticket is lost!
The plot, if one hears the one-line is catchy. But, making it in to a script needs a little creativity and a small amount of common sense. The presence of Sreenivasan is a reassuring thought when you go to watch a movie. One expects loads of common sense and watchability from his movies. Remember flicks like 'Arabikkatha' and 'Katha Parayumbol'. But the debutant writer-director Leo Thaddheus has made such a mess of the script that the movie remains raw(pacha!).
The story goes like this. Sachidanandan(Sreenivasan) is a famous cartoonist, or rather an illustrator for children's magazines. For him and his wife Anu(Padmapriya), Sneha(Baby Ahina), the smart and cute eight-year-old daughter is the centre of their lives. While going for an ad film shoot with her dad, Sneha disappears all of a sudden, which incident takes all the shooting crew to the police station. After "painstaking' investigation by the gluttonous circle inspector Venkity, enacted with panache by the veteran Tamil actor Nasser, skeletons tumble out of the cupboard of the grieving couple.
And lo, it turns out that Sneha is not their child, was orphaned during the Coimbatore blasts seven years back and
that the couple got married solely for the love of the ever-shrieking girl.
As in any other movies, the past comes back to haunt the couple, in the form of the child's biological father, Muhammed Ali(Lal). It was he, an accused in the blasts, after jumping jail, kidnapped his lovely daughter. After nauseating melodrama and interminable wait, all the aggrieved parties, including the police, meet and the story touches its nadir. The child says, she wants to live with her adopted parents, and the real dad concedes to the request! Before Ali is taken by the police, Sachi tells him, the doors of my house will be open for you always. One is reminded of Jean Valjean. Poor Victor Hugo!
The director has gone in for the sure-fire formula of having a very light first half and an emotional second half, as popularised by Priyadarshan and co. The first half is bearable, with sunny performances from Ahina and Suraj Venjarammood.
Post-interval, the story meanders aimlessly, and almost every character is given a sentimental flashback. Towards the fag end of the movie, one will get tense on seeing anybody on screen. Will this driver also have a weepy flashback?
It is Nasser that takes your breath away, with a fine-tuned cameo. Ahina has done a good job, though a little over the top. Sreenivasan proves once again that he cannot 'live' on screen and is very uncomfortable in the role more suitable for a youngman half his age. Padmapriya has precious little to do by way of acting. Lalu Alex, Lal, Meera Vasudev and many others come and go without making their presence felt.
The visuals captured by Manoj Pillai linger in mind, nothing else.

Fiery tales

S Mahadevan Thampi's "Athirukal" is a collection of short stories dealing with some touching moments in life
In liberalised Kerala, literature has changed beyond recognition. Everybody talks about the woes of divorce, lonely old age, brittle relationships and the problems associated with material well-being. In the search for the exotic, writers seem to forget the places they live in, the people they are surrounded with and the simple sorrows and joys they share.
It is here that "Athirukal"(Boundaries), a collection of ten short stories written by S Mahadevan Thampy deserves notice. All stories deal with human situations in a very humane way. They deal with a variety of themes, ranging from the plight of Kashmiri Pandits and terrorism to the avarice of private medical colleges.
The author has shown great finesse in selecting themes for his stories. And he makes them come alive through real characters and masterly narration. The ease with which he portrays the lives of people who inhabit the not so shining underbelly of the society is exemplary.
Take the case of Ammini in "Appurathinumappuram." Physically weak and saddled with an abnormal mother chained to the bed post and a young sister, she is forced to rent out her little child Annadaneswary to beggar gangs for a daily rent of Rs 50 to keep their bodies and souls together.
The story titled "Agni Padarunna Nakshathrangal" takes us to a different world. Shamas, a clerk in a travel agency in Delhi needs Rs 2 lakh for his mother's surgery. He then gets a phone call. If he can plant a few bombs in a train the money is his. But can he do it?
In the world of marital discords, the story of "Satheeyam" is a whiff of fresh air. It tells the story of a man who walks into the funeral pyre of his wife Sathi.
The style of narration is simple and direct and connect with the reader instantly. It is a detached, yet attached way of story telling. But a few of the stories could have done better with a little more editing.
Fire is a recurring image in the collection. The fires of love, passion, hunger and anger rage through the pages silently.