Friday, October 18, 2013

"Manjaadikkuru" - Movie review


I never thought that Manjaadikkuru (the word means lucky red seeds)  is a movie that could pull me back and forth in time - it did and it left me floating amidst the vague memories of my childhood that I spent entirely in my native village, and it made me wonder where and what I will be about twenty years from now! A homecoming movie set in the 1980's, Manjaadikkuru is a movie that ambles it way through the mind of the romantic viewer, kindling the humanitarian in him and leaving behind a trail of hope. (Much of what I write these days is on hope, which I think is good because it gives hope). The movie progresses at its own pace, never hustling, and never disturbing its own flow. The slow pace, revels up the striking reality that life at times, and at places, could be frighteningly slow. Events, memorable or otherwise, so many of them, lay scattered randomly like the lucky red seeds on the ground. The collection of those events, define our lives. 
The movie is a must-watch for people of all ages and wages. Actor Mammootty put in his words a precise description of the movie: "Manjaadikkuru is one movie that grown-ups have to watch to understand children, and that children have to watch to understand grown-ups". Hear here what Mammootty said:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZLMzyjGnePM
Kudos to the writer-director Anjali Menon, for creating such a good movie, and for leaving the plot as much in harmony with nature and reality as it could get. This could be an exaggeration, because many actors, I feel, fail to pick up the colloquial tones/ styles of Malayalam language that the movie needs, depending on the place(s) where the story is set. It feels awkward when some actors do justice and some others don't, in the same movie. 

Friday, October 11, 2013

Keeping a dream

Termites rejoice, hail the moment-
that brought down a promising dream.
The dreamer, his love and lament
drown in the mighty scream,
of a thousand souls who relish
this state, their familiar taste.
But it isn't time to die, he say, I cherish
memories too precious to waste.