Ratheesh KrishnaVadhyar (![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} ratheesh) wrote,@ 2006-04-29 21:13:00 |
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Rasathanthram
Today we watched the latest Sathyan Anthikkad film, Rasathanthram, at Sangeeth theatre. This film shows a reunion of the director and actor Mohanlal after a gap of 12 years (that is, after Pingami).
There was a time when I used to eagerly wait for each Sathyan Anthikkad film. He told simple stories about simple people living in Kerala villages, with a touch of humor. Appunni, Sandesham, Sanmanassullavarkku Samadhanam, TP Balagopalan MA, Varavelppu, Kudumba Puranam, Ponmuttayidunna Tharavu, Thalayana Manthram, Veendum Chila Veettukaryangal, Mazhavil Kavadi, - how enjoyable those films were! And they never bored me even after repeated viewing. His nonsense comedy films - Nadodikkattu and Pattanapravesham - I might have seen a dozen times or more, and would still like to watch again. Sathyan Anthikkad always had a fixed team in most of his films, which included actors like Oduvil Unnikrishnan, Innocent, Mamukkoya, KPAC Lalitha, and his cinematographer Vipin Mohan. Mohanlal, Sreenivasan and Jayaram gave some of their finest performances in Sathyan Anthikkad films.
Sadly, gone are the days when Sathyan Anthikkad movies were so likeable. In fact, it has been quite some time since his movies lost that innocent charm. His last few movies - Kochu Kochu Santhoshangal, Narendran Makan Jayakanthan Vaka, Yathrakkarude Shraddhakku, and Manassinakkare were all disappointing films (I haven’t seen his last film, Achchuvinte Amma), and Rasathanthram is yet another boring and disappointing film, shattering any hopes that his reunion with the great actor would give us another memorable film. All that Rasathanthram generates is a kind of deja vu feeling in its every minute, and it looks like a collection of episodes from a never-ending Malayalam mega-serial.
Rasathanthram is based on Sathyan Anthikkad's own story, and the incidents occur in a village, like in all Anthikkad films. However, this village is a bit different and more picturesque compared to his older films, with beautiful dark blue mountains in the background, a river with a rope-bridge across it, and lakes with shining green water, and so on. Preman (Mohanlal) is a carpenter working with Manikandan Ashari (Innocent) who is the "chief carpenter". Manikandan is "chief" just for namesake, and Preman is the man who does most of the complex tasks. Preman lives with his father (Gopi) in a rented house, owned by Chettiyar (Oduvil Unnikrishnan, who looked so aged and different in his appearance, which made me immensely sad). In the beginning of the film, Preman is introduced to us as he comes to perform a "kutti idal" function for a house, where he educates few skeptical engineers about ancient Indian architecture schemes. Soon, Preman and team gets some work at a house, and he starts observing the hardships of a Tamil orphan girl Kanmani (Meera Jasmine) who works as a servant at the adjacent house.
Thankfully, the director doesn’t show us Kanmani immediately falling in love with Preman. Instead, she is shown going for a suicide attempt, from which Preman saves her, and as a temporary workaround, Kanmani disguises as a boy and goes to work with Preman, that too to the same locality where she had been living since she was seven years old. I think the director's courage is truly remarkable in introducing such fancy-dress scenes with Meera Jasmine acting as a man. Interestingly, this episode has some of the rare scenes of the film with the marks of Sathyan Anthikkad of his earlier films. I especially liked the scenes where the director repeatedly shows a poor video shop owner who gets arrested and beaten up for "kidnapping" Kanmani, and another scene where he shows the jealousy of another neighborhood girl (who, of course, is in love with the hero) in a subtle manner.
Just before the first half ends, the disguise of Kanmani is revealed, and the police arrests her along with Preman. After the Interval, we see a court scene where Kanmani declares that she and Preman had been in love and they are about to get married. This was a plan for bringing a quick closure of the "case", but Preman is devastated that his "good name" is spoiled. Then, we realize that Kanmani is actually in love with the hero, and the next 15-20 minutes and couple of songs are dedicated to show us Kanmani's attempts to conquer Preman's heart. Preman accepts her, and soon the character is dumped in a hostel somewhere far away, as the director has to show us some predictable and bookish scenes about "family issues" before he ends the film. So, the last one hour of the film is dedicated to portray the warmth of relationship between Preman and his father, as well as the hypocrisy of old friends and relatives.
Mohanlal looks too old for the role. He gives a good performance in the scenes where he plays as a mature person (which is hardly any challenge for him); But, he seems to have lost his accent for comedy, and in the very few scenes where he is supposed to make us laugh (like where he tries hard to "escape" from Kanmani), I felt sad observing the failure of this actor, who has given us many of the finest comedy performances of all time. Meera Jasmine looks cute, but with her sophisticated ways of behavior and dialogues, never convinces in the role of a poor uneducated servant (probably it is a fault of the screenplay). No other actor has anything significant to do, and the songs with Ilayaraja's music are the only saving grace of the film.
Today we watched the latest Sathyan Anthikkad film, Rasathanthram, at Sangeeth theatre. This film shows a reunion of the director and actor Mohanlal after a gap of 12 years (that is, after Pingami).
There was a time when I used to eagerly wait for each Sathyan Anthikkad film. He told simple stories about simple people living in Kerala villages, with a touch of humor. Appunni, Sandesham, Sanmanassullavarkku Samadhanam, TP Balagopalan MA, Varavelppu, Kudumba Puranam, Ponmuttayidunna Tharavu, Thalayana Manthram, Veendum Chila Veettukaryangal, Mazhavil Kavadi, - how enjoyable those films were! And they never bored me even after repeated viewing. His nonsense comedy films - Nadodikkattu and Pattanapravesham - I might have seen a dozen times or more, and would still like to watch again. Sathyan Anthikkad always had a fixed team in most of his films, which included actors like Oduvil Unnikrishnan, Innocent, Mamukkoya, KPAC Lalitha, and his cinematographer Vipin Mohan. Mohanlal, Sreenivasan and Jayaram gave some of their finest performances in Sathyan Anthikkad films.
Sadly, gone are the days when Sathyan Anthikkad movies were so likeable. In fact, it has been quite some time since his movies lost that innocent charm. His last few movies - Kochu Kochu Santhoshangal, Narendran Makan Jayakanthan Vaka, Yathrakkarude Shraddhakku, and Manassinakkare were all disappointing films (I haven’t seen his last film, Achchuvinte Amma), and Rasathanthram is yet another boring and disappointing film, shattering any hopes that his reunion with the great actor would give us another memorable film. All that Rasathanthram generates is a kind of deja vu feeling in its every minute, and it looks like a collection of episodes from a never-ending Malayalam mega-serial.
Rasathanthram is based on Sathyan Anthikkad's own story, and the incidents occur in a village, like in all Anthikkad films. However, this village is a bit different and more picturesque compared to his older films, with beautiful dark blue mountains in the background, a river with a rope-bridge across it, and lakes with shining green water, and so on. Preman (Mohanlal) is a carpenter working with Manikandan Ashari (Innocent) who is the "chief carpenter". Manikandan is "chief" just for namesake, and Preman is the man who does most of the complex tasks. Preman lives with his father (Gopi) in a rented house, owned by Chettiyar (Oduvil Unnikrishnan, who looked so aged and different in his appearance, which made me immensely sad). In the beginning of the film, Preman is introduced to us as he comes to perform a "kutti idal" function for a house, where he educates few skeptical engineers about ancient Indian architecture schemes. Soon, Preman and team gets some work at a house, and he starts observing the hardships of a Tamil orphan girl Kanmani (Meera Jasmine) who works as a servant at the adjacent house.
Thankfully, the director doesn’t show us Kanmani immediately falling in love with Preman. Instead, she is shown going for a suicide attempt, from which Preman saves her, and as a temporary workaround, Kanmani disguises as a boy and goes to work with Preman, that too to the same locality where she had been living since she was seven years old. I think the director's courage is truly remarkable in introducing such fancy-dress scenes with Meera Jasmine acting as a man. Interestingly, this episode has some of the rare scenes of the film with the marks of Sathyan Anthikkad of his earlier films. I especially liked the scenes where the director repeatedly shows a poor video shop owner who gets arrested and beaten up for "kidnapping" Kanmani, and another scene where he shows the jealousy of another neighborhood girl (who, of course, is in love with the hero) in a subtle manner.
Just before the first half ends, the disguise of Kanmani is revealed, and the police arrests her along with Preman. After the Interval, we see a court scene where Kanmani declares that she and Preman had been in love and they are about to get married. This was a plan for bringing a quick closure of the "case", but Preman is devastated that his "good name" is spoiled. Then, we realize that Kanmani is actually in love with the hero, and the next 15-20 minutes and couple of songs are dedicated to show us Kanmani's attempts to conquer Preman's heart. Preman accepts her, and soon the character is dumped in a hostel somewhere far away, as the director has to show us some predictable and bookish scenes about "family issues" before he ends the film. So, the last one hour of the film is dedicated to portray the warmth of relationship between Preman and his father, as well as the hypocrisy of old friends and relatives.
Mohanlal looks too old for the role. He gives a good performance in the scenes where he plays as a mature person (which is hardly any challenge for him); But, he seems to have lost his accent for comedy, and in the very few scenes where he is supposed to make us laugh (like where he tries hard to "escape" from Kanmani), I felt sad observing the failure of this actor, who has given us many of the finest comedy performances of all time. Meera Jasmine looks cute, but with her sophisticated ways of behavior and dialogues, never convinces in the role of a poor uneducated servant (probably it is a fault of the screenplay). No other actor has anything significant to do, and the songs with Ilayaraja's music are the only saving grace of the film.
