I finally snagged a copy of Kannathil Muthamittal through Netflix and spent a wonderful evening watching an amazing drama unfold. It began with Shyama (a winsome Nandita Das) getting married to Dhileepan in the backwaters of Sri Lanka and then a war took over their romance. Shyama had to flee to India and landed in a refugee camp where she gave birth to a child. Several years later we see Amudha, a playful well-loved child (P. S. Keerthana), who is the darling (or burden) of teachers, parents and fellow schoolmates alike, in a very "How to Solve a Problem Like Maria" (Sound of Music) sequence. On her birthday she is told by her parents Thiru (Madhavan) and Indra (Simran) that she is not their biological child, she was adopted. This tilts her confident love-filled world and she constantly dwells on why her birth mother left her. Several attempts at truancy later the adoptive parents take her to Sri Lanka to try to find her birth mother. The country is torn asunder by a raging civil war and the trio are inevitably caught up in the mess. But this also leads to their meeting the new Shyama - one who finally is confronted by Amudha and asked why she abandoned her daughter.
The story of a child who has to grapple with the fact that she was abandoned at birth, her obsessive drive to reconnect with her birth mother, the unconditional love of the adoptive parents, the demons that drive the birth mother, the normalcy of Chennai and the horrors of terrorism ravaged Sri Lanka - Mani Ratnam made a masterful film that blended many ingredients into a saga that is soul stirring. AR Rahman's music beautifully complements the magical and the poignant moments in the film. The film has excellent performances from Madhavan, Nandita Das, Simran and an absolute stunner role as Amudha - the abandoned one - done by the child artiste P. S. Keerthana. This performance won her a National award.
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I have never quite found Mani anything more than self-indulgent(of all the movies I have seen of his).I would any day pick a Shankar over him.
ReplyDeleteI think Mani is one of the best out there, but what I find a little underwhelming is that he bites more than he can chew. I haven't seen enough of his movies TBH, but I have based my opinion on Dil Se, Yuva, Kannathil, and OFC Raavan. Bar Yuva, all other had a hint of terrorism in the movies, which seems to be Mani's favorite topic, but other than in Roja, I don't think he has successfully shown anything worthwhile from that angle. May be he is trying too hard to see from "their" POV, may be thats why I fail to connect, but for me even to show the "other" side, h has not exactly shown any details or anything substantial. All his attempts of showing the other side have been half hearted for me at least.
ReplyDeleteMani never really takes sides in any of these "terrorism conflict" films. That is why I love them. Even in Kannathil the conflict is simply shown to us, with no editorial comment from the director. The film that best explored what Terrorism is in the context of taking lives was Sivan's The Terrorist.
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