Kanupapa

I as a child and in fact we as children, would have all played blindfold and found it suffocating for even those 25 to 40 seconds very irritating and some might have even sustained bad injuries. Well, imagine if a blind man was given a responsibility to save a kid from every unknown danger. Can he succeed? Can he make it through the web safely with everyone involved completely safe?

PLOT : Jayaram (Mohan Lal) is a poor blind guy but he develops a knack to remember sounds and cleverly plans things to subdue the perpetrators. So he works as a watchman for a well known Apartments with the help of Judge Krishna moorthy (Nademudi Venu). Krishna Moorthy trusts him with a secret that he has a daughter studying in Ooty School and as always sends Jayaram to visit her. The life threat that posses to him and his daughter is explained by him to Jayaram! One day Krishna Moorthy is killed after he cashes out all his savings. Jayaram from then on tries to save the daughter and a lady police officer helps him in that! So who is Vasu (Samudrakani)? Is he the killer? What is the relation of Devayani (Vimala Raman) with entire story, needs to be seen on screen?!

Performances : Mohan Lal turns up another brilliant performance like he does all the time. May be this man eats characters for breakfasts and his variation in doing such a role with aplomb accuracy just makes you admire him more. There are few things here and there that screenplay undermines his brilliance but whenever he is given a chance he outshines the brilliance of written material too. He is such a director’s actor and cannot imagine any hero that too a well known massive Star to pull off such a performance he did in a Police Interrogation Scene. The man is brilliance personified and remains to be so.

Vimala Raman, young girl Meenakshi along with Anu Sree pull off some good performances too. Samuthrakani is in excellent form in the film as he never misses a best to menace and you have to see him on screen to understand the fear he can instill in you just by some glares. But in few scenes he tried to overdo certain stereo types and clearly they are not his strengths. All the supporting cast deliver performances that you adore and enjoy through out the runtime and Nademudi Venu turns up yet another subtle performance that fills you with amusement. It is the performances that keep you glued to yet times not so thrilling premise.

Technicalities : N.K Ekambaram deserves all the credits for maintaining the suspense element even with his camera. His camera doesn’t just lie around but it captures important moments when it is required and also present you the situation in the glory detail and style that it needs to be.

M.S. Ayyappan Nair makes an edit that suits Telugu audience sensibilities and the team seems to have done away with several lagging elements of the Original. Music by 4 Musics is good to the ears while you are at the theatres and have nothing special to carry back home. The back ground score is the major highlight of this thriller and Ron Ethan Yohan delivered few spine chilling moments his best work to take them to the next level. He seemed to understand the brilliance of silences as well.

Story by Govind Vijayan is nothing new and a bit Crime Patrolish too. But the execution and screenplay by experienced Priyadarshan brought in the required film feel to the story. Priyadarshan here as he did several years, depended on his close friend Mohan Lal to carry the film with a knock out performance for more than two hours and he tried to maintain to keep pace with his quick reactions and resoonses. It looked like he knew as a director, he just has to follow the man to bring his character to life and therefore infuse some more detailing.

When it comes to his screenplay, he made several boring and lacklustre films over the years but changed that here in the presence of his trusted associate. He never overpowered his love for the actor to take over the script and was able to deliver decent enough suspense in his signature 80’s style. We can say that his experience bailed him out in few sequences but this his way saying that the fire is still not over.

Analysis : The movie takes it time to establish the characters and their world. It doesn’t try to move at a pace and solve the mystery or be the thriller without any purpose. The approach taken by the director could have been old school but in letting audience to connect with the story in hand it works out very well. The realism factor adds to several sequences and the film is a good reminder of early thrillers that made the genre popular in South Films. You should enjoy these kind of movies at a theatre near you.

Rating : 2.5/5

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