Kirubhakar Purushothaman

An overarching similarity in the three directorial ventures of actor Dhanush is their simplicity. Their stories are straightforward and so are their screenplays. Pa Paandi is about a retired stuntman trying to find his lost love. Raayan is about a brother trying to save his family from itself. Now, Nilavuku Enmel Ennadi Kobam is a rom-com about a guy trying to patch up with an ex-lover during her destination wedding. These are time-tested stories that had high success rates in the past, and Dhanush attempts to revive these old-school narratives in a contemporary setting. The best metaphor to describe this marriage of the old and the new is the image of Pa Pandi cruising on a Royal Enfield bike to find his love in Dhanush’s debut. An old guy trying to get back his lost romance is old, but his taking on a long ride to see her is new. Similarly, Nilavukku Enmel Ennadi Kobam has an age-old story with cliches, but the ethos is new.

Painkili is one of those films that leaves you confused. There are streaks of brilliance in it, but something leaves the project way off the mark from being the unique experience it strives to be. Written by Aavesham director Jeethu Madhavan and directed by Sreejith Babu, Painkili is an attempt to provide something off-beat and eccentric, but instead, it ends up being random because of the lack of a story arc. While the film is supposed to be about the meeting of two enigmatic personalities–Sajin Gopu’s Suku Sujeeth Kumar and Anaswara Rajan’s Sheeba Baby–it takes a long time to reach the point. Instead, it meanders too much, doling out comedy sequences. While the humour works to a large extent, you are constantly left wondering about the point of it all.

Kadhal Enbathu Podhuvudamai is a film about the upper limit of a modern family’s progressiveness. For Sam (Lijomol Jose), it comes as a shocker that her parents aren’t the rational beings they seem to take pride in. Their facade of being a modern couple crumbles down when she reveals that her lover is a woman. Director Jayaprakash Radhakrishnan manages to pack in a lot of questions and answers about acceptance in a matter of 102 minutes, with a gripping tale that doesn’t let you meander much. The success of this character-driven film is due to its focus on the conflict and not pretending to be anything other than what it is. The film follows the events of a day at Lakshmi’s (Rohini) household. Lakshmi is excited as her daughter’s lover is expected for lunch. She is also annoyed by the absence of her maid Mary (Deepa), who we are shown to be dealing with an abusive son-in-law at a police station. Lakshmi’s excitement knows no bounds as she is ready with gifts for her to-be son-in-law. However, Sam is petrified as her lover is Nandini (Anusha Prabhu), a woman. We are kept on the edge for almost all of the first half of the film as the ice doesn’t break. Nandini comes with a male friend and Lakshmi takes him for the lover of her daughter. When the cat finally gets out of the bag, Lakshmi flips, revealing her ugly side. What ensues is an interesting conversational drama that makes a case for queer love.

“Going home again" is a cinema trope that continues to string hearts despite being around for a while. It never becomes dated as everyone–even the ones staying in their hometown–longs to go back since home is never a place. It is a collection of memories of a place and time with people that’s lost. Narayaneente Moonnaanmakkal (Narayani’s Three Sons) explores the popular adage: “You can never go home again." It isn’t there anymore because even the one, who is missing it, is not the same individual who once lived there. Sethu (Joju George), the middle son of Narayani, learns it the hard way when he tries to bring back his estranged brothers to their hometown, when their mother is on her deathbed, counting her days. The family reunion brings to the fore the old scars, nostalgic memories, and new problems, making up for an immense experience of laughter, tears, and profound thoughts.

Thandel becomes the much-needed breakthrough for Naga Chaitanya, who establishes himself as an able actor, something he has been striving for a while now. The Telugu actor plays the role of Raju, a fisherman from a coastal village in Andhra Pradesh, named Machidesam. The fishermen in the town make a living off travelling to the Gujarat coast and fishing in the treacherous waters, which borders a Pakistan-controlled region. Raju, the Thandel, the captain of the village’s fisherman, is deeply in love with Sathya (Sai Pallavi), another pillar of the film. Together the two actors make Thandel a moving love story about perseverance and aid hugely in letting go of the blemishes, that are scattered in the movie.

Vidaamuyarchi opens with a long shot of Arjun (Ajith Kumar) casually walking out of his house in Azerbaijan, carrying a bag. He opens his car boot, which provides a chance for a mid-shot of the Tamil superstar. There is no slow-motion nor a close-up. Anirudh Ravichander doesn’t whip out his signature ‘mass’ background score. In fact, the music is almost non-existent. The whole sequence is conspicuously in a matter-of-fact tone, sending a message that Magizh Thirumeni and Ajith Kumar are vehemently steering away from the usual gimmicks of a Tamil superstar film. Within a few minutes into the movie, it becomes certain that Vidaamuyarchi is a story-driven film in every sense of the word, where the superstar embraces a white-collar role that is too subtle for his fans. Every scene screams one thing: There will be no fan service here. And that will be a huge welcome for any Tamil cinema viewer, who has been bombarded with Rockies, Pushpas, Jailers, and Beasts. It is funny how Tamil filmmakers get a pat on the back for not doing the bad things, even if they aren’t doing anything great. That’s telling of the state of affairs.

If one has to go on a quest to find why the Malayalam film industry is consistent with churning out good cinema, the journey will end with the secret alchemy of finding stories from the people. Lijo Joseph’s Angamaly Diaries is about Angamaly. Maheshinte Prathikaram provides a gorgeous landscape of Idukki, and so does Idukki Gold. Manjummel Boys is, well, about the resilience of the boys from Manjummel. Malayalam writers don’t make stories but end up finding them around. Ponman, written by GR Indugopan and Justin Mathew, is yet another story about everyday people in the port city of Kollam. The story, the conflict, and the stake of Ponman are small. But the film leaves one pondering about big things of human resilience, grit, and ethics–typical of good Malayalam cinema. The film’s protagonist PP Ajeesh (Basil Joseph), has a rather unique and risky business called Madiyil Jewelry or Walking Gold. Ajeesh sells gold upfront to families who are struggling to come up with dowry themselves to marry off their daughters. After the wedding, the families pay him off with the gift money. The conflict in Ponman arises when Ajeesh lends 25 sovereign gold to the family of Steffi (Lijo Mol Josse), but her useless brother Bruno (Anandh Manmadhan) and hapless mother only make half the amount to pay back. With Steffi’s husband being a short-fused ruffian from a notorious area of Kollam, Ajeesh ends up in a do-or-die predicament to retrieve his gold.

In a sense, Oru Jaathi Jathakam is a bold attempt as the director M Mohanan, writers Rakesh Mantodi and Sharesh Malayankandy didn’t shy away from making a comedy-drama, which for pedantic and caviller eyes might strike as problematic. In reality, the intentions of the film seem to be the opposite. Oru Jaathi Jathakam is about a problematic 38-year-old virgin named Jayesh (Vineeth Srinivasan), who is struggling to find a match due to his regressive ideas about gender, queer community, and women in general. Throughout the film, we travel with this caricature of a sexist, and the film satirises their worldview, their take on women, and things that are beyond the grasp of their regressive thought. Jayesh, a writer with a magazine, has numerous conditions and demands for his future bride. He wants her to be fair-skinned, stay-at-home wife/mother, heed to gender roles, and above all, her horoscope should match his. When we meet Jayesh, he is in a hurry to find a girl since his horoscope claims that his father would die if he isn’t married before 38. Nevertheless, Jayesh isn’t the compromising type. With equally-regressive family and friends around, he doesn’t budge despite his age, looks, and attitude. Oru Jaathi Jathakam is essentially his journey of meeting and rejecting women.