REVIEW 622: MARADONA

Release date:	Kerala: July 27. Delhi: August 3, 2018.
Director:	Vishnu Narayan
Cast: Language:	Tovino Thomas, Tito Wilson, Sharanya R. Nair, Chemban Vinod Jose, Leona Lishoy, Jins Baskar, Shalu Rahim     Malayalam

It’s not what you are thinking. Maradona is not a sports flick. The title comes from the name of the small-time criminal played by Tovino Thomas in this new Malayalam film release. 

Maradona and his friend Sudhi (Tito Wilson) are on the run from a bunch of brutal hitmen led by a fellow called Martin (Chemban Vinod Jose). While one of them holes himself up in a hotel room, the other finds refuge in the Bengaluru home of distant relatives (Leona Lishoy and Jins Baskar). Stuck in that flat in a high-rise building in a massive housing complex, Maradona at first experiences intense loneliness, a foreign feeling that drives this callous man to seek out fresh relationships in an alien world.

Hundreds of kilometres away, in Kerala a senior politician is preparing for a crucial election. His son Aravind (Shalu Rahim) lies in a hospital with a life-altering head injury, and silence around the boy’s condition is of essence for the neta’s career. He is, however, determined to find the people who reduced his child to this state.

As debutant director Vishnu Narayan takes his time to unveil the events that brought matters to this pass, he centres his screenplay around Maradona’s coming of age.

The story of Maradona by Krishna Moorthy has been modelled somewhat on the lines of Aashiq Abu’s Mayaanadhi (2017), which also starred Thomas. That film was about a gangster on the run who is desperate to convince the woman he loves to remain in her relationship with him. It was soulful, poetic and convincing.

Narayan and Moorthy manage to marginally replicate Mayaanadhi’s tonal quality, but their plot is not as credible. They operate on the premise that human warmth can change the worst of men for the better. Fair enough. However, for one to believe that Maradona evolves because of the friendships he finds unexpectedly in that impersonal ocean of apartments, it was essential for the film to establish that his earlier life was bereft of all such bonds. But it is not. It is clear from the start that Maradona and Sudhi are joined at the hip and willing to risk life and limb for each other. What then is the difference between that equation and the ones that develop in the present day in that housing compound? The answer: nothing apparent.

Maradona expects us to buy into the hero’s conversion simply because it tells us he is converted. But why should we? He was a jerk a moment before he metamorphosed into a non-jerk, good co-existed with evil within him (read: his great love for Sudhi versus his nastiness towards the rest of humanity) a moment before he became an all-round Mr Nice Guy, but with an unconvincing in-between the metamorphosis is just not believable.

What works in Maradona is the protagonist’s chilling behaviour in his before story filled with acts of meanness and violence that, significantly, do not involve bloodletting. Nothing betrays the hardness of a human heart better than harshness towards kids and harmless house pets – through Maradona’s behaviour towards child and beast, Messrs Narayan and Moorthy establish the man’s utter amorality.

Thomas is wonderful in those scenes. He is also a good casting choice because his urbane outward appearance and natural charm make you want to like his character until the narrative reveals how unlikeable he is.

(Spoiler alert) Aside: that said, unless Team Maradona is intentionally taking a pro-vegetarian stand, you have to wonder what they were thinking, or if they were thinking at all, while equating Maradona’s other acts of cruelty with a scene in which he captures a bird for food. Is eating meat the same as physically hurting a child or tying a dog’s mouth shut because it is disturbing your phone conversation? Really? (Spoiler alert ends)

When Maradona’s transformation to selfless goodness does happen, it is signalled by another scene involving birds that is melodramatic and in-your-face to the point of being silly. This is one of only two instances of overstatement in the film and a needless break from the otherwise subdued tone that is its most attractive feature. The other instance comes when a person the leading man has grown to love simply disappears. There is a heightening of tension when this occurs. (Possible spoiler ahead) The person offers no excuse when she resurfaces, making her disappearance an obvious contrivance intended to manipulate the viewer, unless Narayan and Moorthy are deliberately resorting to the women-are-teases stereotype. (Spoiler alert ends)

All is not lost though. I loved Sushin Shyam’s ominous background score for Maradona, and Sabu Mohan’s art direction, especially the film’s colour scheme. Conventional cinema tends to equate the big city with inhumanity while painting the countryside as an idyll where innocence and decency dwell. Narayan turns that trope on its head by setting Maradona’s goriest scenes in thickly vegetated seemingly remote locations while placing the central character in an urban jungle as he journeys towards self-discovery. The forest where men are seen being beaten to pulp is a delicious deep green, the brick-and-cement cluster where Maradona becomes a better man is a soothing, ice-cream-like lime green.

Often in that urban agglomeration, Maradona is shown standing on a balcony or a terrace rooftop from where cinematographer Deepak D. Menon pulls out further and further and further, until the man is a disappearing dot on the camerascape. It is a captivating device that elevates Maradona’s atmospherics and thoughtful air – until it gets repetitive.

As the titular character, Thomas is the fulcrum of Maradona and justifies every second of screen time given to him. The young actor is growing with each film. Tito Wilson is excellent but gets too little space here. Hopefully it will not take long for Mollywood to realise that U-Clamp Rajan from Angamaly Diaries is hero material.

Sharanya R. Nair who plays Maradona’s neighbour Asha has an interesting screen presence, but it is worth asking why film after film in Mollywood persists in casting newcomers as female leads instead of seeking out established names as they do for male leads. Leona Lishoy – who appears as Nadiya, in whose house Maradona takes shelter – is an example of a woman actor with an impressive on-screen persona who is repeatedly given character roles and supporting parts because for decades now, Mollywood has rarely allowed women to build up substantial filmographies as leads.

That is a separate discussion and one worth having. For the moment though, let’s talk about Maradona, a gangster flick with a difference that is mildly engaging but fails to live up to its own promise.

Rating (out of five stars): **

CBFC Rating (India):	UA
Running time:	2 hours 28 minutes

A version of this review has also been published on Firstpost:

https://www.firstpost.com/entertainment/maradona-movie-review-tovino-thomas-adds-layers-to-a-mildly-engaging-film-that-leaves-its-promise-unfulfilled-4890981.html

Visuals courtesy: https://www.facebook.com/MaradonaTheMovie/

REVIEW 621: KARWAAN

Release date:	August 3, 2018
Director:	Akarsh Khurana
Cast: Language:	Irrfan, Dulquer Salmaan, Mithila Palkar, Amala Akkineni, Kriti Kharbanda Hindi with English

As mix-ups go, this one is weird. A man loses his father in an accident but the body delivered to him is of the mother of a woman in another state. Avinash Rajpurohit was not fond of his Dad, but duty calls and he agrees to meet the lady to exchange coffins somewhere between Bengaluru where he lives and her home in Kochi. A few hundred kilometres separate the two cities but Avinash travels a lifetime on that journey he makes with his friend Shaukat and a young woman called Tanya who joins them along the way.

Writer-director Akarsh Khurana’s Karwaan is a quiet film. Apart from the tragedy that kicks off the narrative, nothing much seems to happen here yet a lot does. It is a story of rumination and awakenings, and as in life, here too, such things rarely happen with drum rolls and bugle calls.

Karwaan has made news for two reasons so far: because it has been released even as Bollywood actor Irrfan battles a debilitating illness and because it is the first Bollywood film featuring Mollywood heartthrob Dulquer Salmaan, DQ to his fans. The news now is this: Irrfan and DQ live up to their formidable reputations here, and are both absolute dears in this sweetly understated road flick.

Irrfan’s Shaukat is a garrulous fellow, exceedingly old fashioned in many respects and for the most part, immensely funny. “For the most part” because I felt uncomfortable with the humourisation of his racist attitude towards a white couple he encounters. I know I know, some of you will say white people do not need the protection of an Indian film critic, but excuse me for pointing out that othering is not okay even when directed at powerful communities, though of course I am not equating it with racism towards the marginalised. As for that cliched old defence, “this is just a portrayal of reality”, the answer is: of course conservatives do exist in the real world, but this is the only point in Karwaan where the storyteller’s own tone condones the character’s obnoxious behaviour. This is particularly jarring because in another area of his life, Shaukat proves to be a remarkably progressive fellow and challenger of an appalling status quo.

That discomfiting scene apart, Shaukat is amusing throughout. And Irrfan’s dialogue delivery is a killer as always. His is the more striking character of the two leads, but DQ rises to the challenge of playing the less obviously likeable Avinash, a role that on the surface also appears less challenging.

The promotions of Karwaan have hopefully given Bollywood viewers an idea of exactly how big a deal this young man is in Mollywood. His matinee idol looks, excellent acting and discerning choices have catapulted him to the top of his profession in just six years. Add to this blend his fluid personality, and you get the perfect package for superstardom across industries. His career path indicates that he may well get there considering that at 32 he is already a dominant force in Mollywood, has made his mark with a handful of films in Kollywood, and this year has forayed into both Tollywood and Bollywood.

DQ brings to Karwaan the attributes that have made him such a perfect fit in Mollywood, a film industry that pushes the envelope far more than India’s Big Three, Kollywood, Tollywood and Bollywood. He is handsome but not self-conscious, and in Karwaan as in all his works, he conveys the impression of being unaware of his hotness, which is such an attractive quality in a star, such an essential quality in a true actor and so crucial to his unobtrusively gripping performance as the self-effacing Avinash, forever held back by his internal turmoil and bitterness. Besides, his commitment to his work is evident in his Hindi accent, which is unbelievably good for a man who has never lived in the Hindi belt.

While the two male leads are more prominent in the story, Mithila Palkar holds her own in the presence of these established actors, playing the feisty teenaged Tanya. Kriti Kharbanda is luminous in a small role. Why do we not see her more often in Bollywood? And Amala Akkineni brings dignity and warmth to her cameo in a way only a beloved veteran can.

That said, the initial part of the writing of her character is one of Karwaan’s flaws. She sounds laboured while conveying grief in telephone conversations with Avinash, and the manner in which she entrusts her child to a complete stranger is bizarre, to say the least.

So yes, Karwaan is far from perfect. The first half feels insubstantial. Considering that this is a road film, I sorely missed glimpses of the cultures of the places the lead trio pass through. A Hindi film in this setting requires a suspension of disbelief anyway because Hindi is not the lingua franca of southern India, but the stray Malayalam dialogues and lyrics in Karwaan give it a natural feel. Dialogue writer Hussain Dalal also makes the wise choice of mixing Hindi and English in equal parts in Avinash’s lines, which gives them an easy flow. That said, it bothered me that the storyteller is so accepting of Tanya’s dismissive attitude towards the language of her home city – I get that north Indian supremacism has led to a situation where Hindi bhaashis travelling to other parts of India tend not to make an effort to learn the local languages, and in that sense Tanya’s arrogance is realistic, but the implied okaying of her arrogance by the film is troubling.

(Possible spoiler ahead) Karwaan is also casual about facts in its reference to the Islamic practice known in common parlance as instant triple talaq, which was banned by the Supreme Court last year. The discussions around this development have all related to men divorcing their wives by uttering the words “talaq talaq talaq” but there is little awareness about women’s right to do likewise. This fleeting portion of Karwaan is clearly meant to be uplifting to liberal women viewers, but good intentions notwithstanding, because the issue is complex the scene is bound to create confusion or generate misinformation. It could easily have been snipped out without disrupting the narrative, yet was not, which suggests a deliberate prioritisation of populism over other concerns. (Spoiler alert ends)

In another fleeting reference, Karwaan would have done well not to suggest an equivalence between a man making a move to hit a woman and that woman’s intrusive impertinence towards him. The film could have also done with better editing to tighten a fight scene involving a bunch of bit part actors.

I wish these issues had been ironed out, because Karwaan overall is a heartwarming little film. For one, it is unusual in the way it does not deify parents but reminds us that like all human beings, they too come in a range of good, bad and ugly. “Logon ko haq jamaana aata hai, rishtaa nibhaana nahin (People know how to exercise their rights, not abide by relationships),” says a character when discussing parents who are jerks.

The film offers a nuance not often seen in Hindi cinema or Indian cinema at large, when it speaks of a generation gap between youngsters separated in age by perhaps a decade. It also does not see a romance as essential in every relationship between two attractive people of the opposite sex, though it acknowledges that such sparks are a possibility. And it takes a brave stand on domestic violence.

Karwaan’s effectiveness lies in the fact that it rises above its pre-interval indolence. Critics often speak of “the curse of the second half” afflicting so many films that start off well and then peter out. Karwaan is the opposite. It revs up post-interval, not merely in terms of actual physical events and encounters, but in the character graphs. What remains consistent from start to finish is cinematographer Avinash Arun’s inventive, expansive frames. My favourite of them all involves a low angle shot of DQ reading a paper framed against a backdrop of thick green trees.

As someone who has followed Dulquer Salmaan’s career from the beginning, I confess I was apprehensive when I realised that the Akarsh Khurana directing his first Hindi film is the same gentleman who helmed a fizzled-out firecracker called High Jack starring Sumeet Vyas earlier this year. Khurana is the only one who can tell us what went wrong with that film, because my fears were misplaced and he is in fine fettle in Karwaan.

As for DQ, his talent was evident from his Mollywood debut in 2012 but his more recent works like Kali, Kammatipaadam and Solo – an anthology in which he played four roles in four separate stories – have elevated him to a higher plane by offering gigantic proof of his versatility. Kammatipaadam also indicated his willingness to risk films with sensitive themes and an off-mainstream tone and, more important, his readiness to submit to a director who did not allow his stardom to overshadow the project although his presence could be counted on to raise its profile. Karwaan is not a bone-crushing beauty of the sort that Kammatipaadam was, but here too we have a director and star collaborating to give a script priority over all else.

As a Mollywood buff I obviously hope that DQ remains rooted – allow me to play on the title of one of his Malayalam films – in the neelakasham, pachchakadal and chuvanna bhoomi (the blue sky, green sea and red earth) of his home ground. As a Bollywood buff though, I am thrilled to welcome him to a new fold in the company of the delightful Irrfan and the charming Ms Palkar.

“Ae mohtarma yu na sharma / main aashiq hoon koi creep nahin / ae husn pari, you don’t worry / meri shayaribhi zyaada deep nahin (Hey lady, I am a suitor, not a creep / Hey beautiful, don’t you worry, my poetry is not very deep),” goes a song in Karwaan sung by Papon, with music by Anurag Saikia and lyrics by Khurana. The words mirror the simplicity Karwaan aspires to, though it must be said that the film’s unassuming demeanour camouflages considerable depth.

At one point, a character in this film explains that he is not sure whether Person X was a good guy but it is clear that he was not bad, which in itself is quite something in this day and age. There can be no more appropriate a description of Karwaan: it is not earth shattering, but it is not bad at all. Which is another way of saying it is an intelligent, funny, thoughtful film and a pleasant experience.

Rating (out of five stars): **1/2

CBFC Rating (India):	UA
Running time:	2 hours

This review has also been published on Firstpost:

https://www.firstpost.com/entertainment/karwaan-movie-review-dulquer-salmaan-and-irrfan-are-absolute-dears-in-a-sweetly-understated-road-flick-4884551.html

Poster courtesy: https://www.facebook.com/KarwaanMovie/