S. R. Praveen

Right from the title Dheeran (brave), which defines the protagonist, almost every other character in Devadath Shaji’s debut directorial has a defining trait. From a Hindi-obsessed welder to a local don who is more interested in his perfume business to an illicit liquor brewer who has a penchant for stirring up trouble even in the most peaceful of circumstances, it is a motley crew of oddballs. Eldhose (Rajesh Madhavan), the protagonist, gets that unlikely name which he struggles to live up to from an act of bravery in childhood, that also becomes a moment of tragedy in his life. Director Devadath Shaji, who wrote the screenplay of Bheeshmaparvam, gives a wrapping of humour to convey all that he wants to. Beneath its surface layer of easy humour, which keeps the film engaging atleast until the halfway point, Dheeran is also about the long-lasting impact of certain events in the lives of people. One particular incident leaves all those who are involved in it deeply scarred, some physical while for some others it is mental. The incident also dictates the whole village’s perception of a particular character.

As far as series openings go, Kerala Crime Files 2 takes off from quite a peculiar situation. All the police officers at a particular station have received transfer orders over suspected links with criminals and goons. A new set of police officers, clueless about the place or the criminal activity in the area, have just taken charge. Before they could ease into their new seats, they are forced to launch a search operation for one of their own. The initial piecing together of the complex character of Ambili Raju (Indrans), the missing Civil police officer who was among the transferred bunch, makes up some of the best passages in the six episode-series directed by Ahammed Khabeer, a follow up to the first web series made in Malayalam in 2023. The unassuming officer is the kind of person who is vital to any investigation team, with his wide network of acquaintances and deep knowledge of the place. He has his share of shady links, most of them cultivated for the purpose of his profession, yet he remains unsullied by it all through sheer strength of character.

One day might not be enough to get to know a person inside out, but Shahi Kabir’s Ronth almost achieves the impossible of giving us a peek into the deepest recesses of the hearts and minds of not one, but two people over the course of a single night. The writer-director pulls this off not through grand scenarios, but the crucial little details, which are sprinkled throughout the film. These are the kind of details that can be absorbed only by those who have actually lived through similar scenarios, which Kabir has, as a former police officer. Like, the scene where a senior policeman accepts a bribe to let off an inebriated priest involved in a road accident. In most films, such a scene, meant as part of character delineation without much connection to the larger narrative, would end there. Instead, here, it spills over into the next scene in the police jeep, where the policeman explains to his junior that the money is not meant for him, but to pay for the repairs of the jeep, since the reimbursements from the department take a long time to come. The scene thus gently transforms into a commentary on the system, just like the rest of the film.

The way a filmmaker conceives a single sequence can sometimes reveal the entire thought process behind the film. This is especially true of single-agenda films like Aabhyanthara Kuttavaali, the debut directorial of Sethunath Padmakumar. Sahadevan (Asif Ali), the protagonist who is facing a case under Section 498A over dowry harassment and domestic abuse, is shown returning to his wife’s family the 100 sovereigns of gold that he got as a “gift”, a modern-day euphemism for dowry. A sentimental background score accompanies this sequence which is framed fully from the man’s perspective, although he was earlier shown to have denied his wife’s demand for a part of the gold to fund her higher education. Even this demand on her part appears unjust by the way the film looks at it.

Evoking a time period is a challenge of a lesser order as opposed to effectively transporting the audience to that period. A few carefully chosen props might be enough to pull off the former, while the latter involves the arduous task of authentically capturing the zeitgeist of that time and hitting all the right notes to make it believable for those who might have lived through those times. In Moonwalk, debutant filmmaker Vinod A.K. makes a bold attempt for the latter and lands stylishly on his toes, evoking the iconic dance move of the early 1990s. The world that he recreates is the early 1990s in the coastal and rural belts of Thiruvananthapuram or rather more specifically, the emergence of a breakdancing subculture among groups of youths during that period. Of course, there are the grainy VHS tape visuals, Walkman, STD booths, disco-inspired costumes, frizzy long hair, Michael Jackson fanhood and every other nostalgia-evoking material from those times, but all of these are woven organically into a straight-forward, simple plot that holds an emotional pull.

At the core of Thamar KV‘s sophomore film, Sarkeet, is a sticky affair that pushes the limits of believability. But, it is to the credit of the makers and the actors involved that one goes along willingly with this rather unbelievable situation that propels the story forward. Thamar, going by the two movies he has made so far, appears to be adept at pulling off such uncommon occurrences in a light, engaging manner. For about half of its runtime, Sarkeet moves along two parallel tracks, one dealing with a couple who are struggling to manage their child with a severe case of Attention-Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) and another on the travails of a young Malayali who has landed up in a West Asian country in search of a job.

Like a beast taking its time in revealing its true nature, Thudarum almost lulls us into a comfortable space with everyday happenings and innocuous humour in its opening passages. When it shifts shape, it does it ever so slightly, over the course of ‘Benz’ Shanmugham (Mohanlal)‘s pursuit to get back his beloved old car, unfairly seized by the police, and during a night journey up the hills, as one feels the tension ramping up. The film then coasts along on this path, while throwing in Shanmugham’s emotional roots at regular intervals, with the car, with a former stunt master and with his family. With Operation Java and Saudi Vellakka, Tharun Moorthy proved himself as a filmmaker to look forward to, but there was always the apprehension of how he would adapt his approach to a big star. He gets the balance almost right, giving the fans stuff to cheer for without compromising much on what he wants to say, in the way he wants it to be said. Buoyed by a solid story by K.R.Sunil, Tharun gets the right pulse for a mainstream drama. Intelligently woven into the plot is a natural disaster, which turns out to be one of the key elements in a revelation.

Cinema has for long provided an endless supply of content for social media memes, but the flow appears to have reversed in recent years. First came the influencers with their massive online reach, bagging noticeable roles. Now, viral online content has begun seeping into screenplays, to elicit easy applause. For instance, in debutant Sivaprasad’s Maranamass, co-written with Siju Sunny, Suresh Krishna’s recent online image as the “convincing star” is used to the hilt in one of the many humorous passages in the film. This “memeification” of screenplays is not necessarily a bad thing, especially in cases where it works like a charm. Incidentally, at the centre of Maranamass is Luke (Basil Joseph), a popular YouTuber and a self-proclaimed ‘sigma male,’ who has become a headache to the people in his neighbourhood owing to his public-spirited actions, like sticking wall posters of the panchayat president’s Internet search history or putting the local police station on sale to convey a point to the idle police officers. So it is not a surprise that when a series of killings of senior citizens takes place, the needle of suspicion points towards him.