Tag: Malayalam cinema

Ela Veezha Poonchira (2022) #SherylPuthur

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Directed By: Shahi Kabir

Screenplay By: Nidhish G; Shaji Maarad

Cast: Soubin Shahir; Sudhi Koppa; Jude Anthany Joseph; Jithu Ashraf; Vincent Vadakkan; Girish Mohan; Jineesh Chandran; Rajesh Kumar

Language: Malayalam                                                   

Genre: Crime; Suspense

Run Time: 1 hour 42 minutes

Set on a lonely yet beautiful hill, Ela Veezha Poonchira opens with the disquieting image of a severed foot found by a stray dog.

The hill has a police patrol cum wireless station which monitor the place since it is frequently hit by lightning strikes and yet because of its beauty there are always visitors trying to climb up. Since the officers need to stay for a few days at a stretch, they have a cabin with radio equipment as well as a kitchen and sleeping arrangements.

The loneliness of the place and the isolation of their situation does take a toll on the officers stationed there. Madhu (Soubin Shahir), an officer stationed there, has the resigned energy of someone used to the quiet, unmoving landscape of his life and yet maybe feels some frustration at it. As the story progresses, we realise that his frequent absences have caused tensions between him and his wife. We then see the hidden costs of the profession.

Married life being impacted by the profession is reiterated, when we are introduced to the bad-tempered senior officer Jithu (Jithu Ashraf) who comes in for an inspection, we understand that he is going through a formal separation with his wife ever since she had an affair with their driver and eloped. The police personnel driving the officer around confides in the others that since the incident, the officer has been less than cordial to him because he too is a driver.

The story seems so deceptively ordinary that the viewer begins to feel that they imagined the severed foot. It seems to become about the ordinary, strange, upsetting and frustrating incidents that police personnel stationed in a lonely spot might experience. Such as when the civilians who come to visit the patrol station end up caught in a lightning strike and one of them loses their life or when they catch young lovers trying to make out in the bushes.

Each of the officers take a different approach to the events they experience. Madhu is shaken by the impassive violence of nature and it makes him doubly strict with the tourists. Sudhi (Sudhi Koppa) on the other hand, takes a voyeuristic approach to the sneaky lovers, something Madhu disapproves of.

But, once the police find another severed body part and discover that it is a woman’s body, the story changes. The energy of the narrative becomes dark, murky and yet goes into unexpected places. It is practically Greek in its tragic proportions and also echoes the feeling of a psychological thriller like a locked room mystery.

Ela Veezha Poonchira is a story that misleads its viewers into thinking that they have the story figured out and they walk in naively. The title after all translates into the valley where the leaves don’t fall so it seems pretty straightforward. However, even a leafless hill can be a mask for depravity.

The eeriness of the film depends on its simplicity. Ela Veezha Poonchira does not require dramatic fervour to reach a thrilling yet poignant crescendo. 

Celluloid (2013) #SherylPuthur

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CELLULOID Malayalam Movie REVIEW

Directed By: Kamal

Written By: Kamal

Cast:

Prithviraj – J.C. Daniels

Sreenivasan – Chelangatt Gopalakrishnan

Mamta Mohandas – Janet

Chandni – Rosie

Language: Malayalam                                                            Genre: Biopic

Malayalam cinema is known for its mature handling of the medium and its introduction of themes ahead of their times. It then seems fitting that the Father of Malayalam cinema – J.C. Daniels would be a pioneer in this regard.

However, as forward as the themes of Malayalam cinema were and are it is balanced out by a rigidity of thought and caste prejudices. At present it may be slight in comparison to earlier times but it still exists and so the film functions simultaneously as a critique of Kerala society.

Celluloid follows the ill-fated career of J.C. Daniels (Prithiviraj) who has a dream to make the first Malayalam film. It follows his journey to erstwhile Bombay to meet with Dadasaheb Phalke (Nandu Madhav), who explains various aspects of film making. After a few delays, he manages to get hold of the equipment and a British cameraman, and begins his filming. Since he sold his land to finance the film, to keep costs low, he directed, acted, edited and also wrote the screenplay.

Unlike his contemporaries, his film Vigathakumaran was not based on mythology but was a social drama. Ironically, his own life resembled a social drama because when Bombay-based actor Lana proved difficult to work with he got Rosie (Chandni) a Dalit Christian (the term is ironic since the latter ought to cancel out the former but…) to act instead. She played a Nair lady but when the film was screened the orthodox upper-caste men took offence at the idea of a lower-caste woman playing a Nair woman and boycotted the film.

The film parallels J.C. Daniels life with the investigation of the journalist Chelangatt Gopalakrishnan (Sreenivasan) into the film career of this obscure dentist who was once known as J.C. Daniels, the director of Vigathakumaran.

The relationships portrayed in the film have been beautifully sketched out such as the love based in friendship shared by J.C. Daniels and his wife Janet (Mamta Mohandas). A strong woman who stands by her husband and remains the factor that keeps them knitted together. Her sisterly treatment of Rosie, ignoring the caste barriers makes for some of the most moving scenes within the film. A scene that stood out for me, for its poignancy, was decking Rosie in the attire of a Nair lady and her amazement at their ‘presumption’ that it was normal to treat her as equal.

A technically sound film, it uses film conventions to create symbolism within the film such as the shadow play on the whitewashed walls that eases with breathing. The narrative of the life continued in a closed carriage.

The film is about idealism, regret, apathy at the sight of continued failure and the slight flicker of hope that stays sometimes like a disease and sometimes like a blessing. It is also about the burning need to tell a story – to find expression.

Over and above, though it is a tribute to the first filmmaker in Malayalam. A technically sound film, its obvious use of technique is in itself a tribute to J.C. Daniels – whose first film in some sense set the base for the future of Malayalam cinema.