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.