2018, Tamil, Amazon Prime, 9/10 IMDB, Directed by Ram
Just when your cribbing reaches the pinnacle with the hideously stupid plot, you are saved by the core of a sensitive issue handled sensibly without much melodrama..
Welcome to the world of the parents with spastic children. To make it even worst, here it’s a single parent combo of a dad and a daughter. Ever young Azhagan Mammootty, plays a driver working in Dubai, facing crisis when his wife in India leaves him for another man to avoid responsibly of handling a teenage spastic daughter of theirs..
The plot plunges rock bottom when the story is explained how the duo ended up owning a old colonial cottage sold at affordable price to them by a foreigner as a gesture of her love for his spastic child.
There is a drag when the real estate mafia trying to assault him to get hold of the place, when Anjali is sent as a maid to persuade him fraudulently to sell the house and the height of tolerance is tested when he says he has sexual feelings since he is a human and ends up marrying the unknown maid, all this just when his daughter starts mesurating.. The drama never stops to seize as he is being asked to write off the house to Anjali as she isn’t interested to live with him anymore.. All the silliness in the screenplay, makes you wonder what on earth might be the directors motive that won him international awards..
First half was a weirdest drama and that’s when you think what the hell has he got in store for the second half. In the interval, I became totally restless and started browsing the government aided organisations to help these spastic children and their parents, and read about rehabilitation services they provide and financial assistance in www.spastictn.org.
To my relief, after interval, the movie opens to mamooty on the roads of Chennai searching to find a decent place for his child to stay, while he is away working 12 hours as a taxi drive. Eventually he seeks the help of the organisation, but again there is no boarding facilities and his daughter ends up in a suspicious abusive home.
When the sequences start portraying the insecurity of the spastic girl child without a mom, you are inevitably thinking of Kamal Hasan’s ‘Mahanadhi’, and the recent real life incident of the spastic girl abused by security people in an apartment.
Just when you are preparing yourself for a nauseating twist, the director takes you to an untouched phenomena in any Indian movie that we are aware of.. He talks about how entertainment industry induces unwarranted sexual desires in a spastic child, let alone normal children. Now that’s a new phenomena and delicate when it’s a lone dad who had to address it.
Mammootty does a great job in out-rightly bringing the stomach churning confused disgust on in face.. He just emotes the audience emotions onscreen. Every ounce of the child artist, Sadhana’s contribution, the ‘Thangameengal’ child, has an evident craving for an award and hard work pays off. She is a natural.
Yuvan shankar fares but doesn’t rock. Not a great visual treat as well except for few scenes in the first half..
Loved the transgender role played by Malayalam Bigg Boss fame Anjali Ameer, except for the prototype prostitute character, but she was a breeze flaunting her feminity.. The minute she comes into the picture one could guess the climax.
Also just when I was wondering what the child’s mom would be upto now, leaving the child that she cared for more than 10years, Ram introduces a mature storyline that she is happily living with her ‘not so good looking’ husband and a new born baby, sans disability, making it difficult for Mamooty to ask her if she can give a had in helping their daughter..
Unlike director Bala who is brutally sadistic in bringing out the depth of the characters, often making you squeamish, Ram deligently attempts the delicate subject of natutal sexual desires of spastic children. It’s not too much an advice and at the same time not too outspoken which might make you uncomfortable.
‘Awareness’ that the movie created can make you forgive Ram’s failed attempt to recreate the magic of his guru, director Balumahendra in capturing the nativity of the simple lives of uncomplicated people in hilly backdrops.