Saturday 12 March 2011

Mynaa

2010 by Prabhu Solomon, watching third time, for wife

Suruli lives with his father and step mother in a remote village in the western ghats of Tamil Nadu. He stopped school, at an early age to work and earn something. He protects Mynaa and her mother and will die for her. They are in deep love but her mother would not like an illiterate Suruli to marry her girl. When her mother tells him about her plans, he cannot beleive it and gets violent with her. She goes to the police station in the nearby town and complains. Suruli is remanded in the town jail for 15 days. It is the 14 th day. The jailor, Bhaskar, is a young officer, who is newly married, and his wife wants to celebrate their first Diwali (first one after marriage) as part of which has planned for a family shopping (with her parents, brothers and their spouses) in the city. Bhaskar has an important function in the jail this day, part of Diwali (Diwali is the next day, when it is a public holiday)celebration, after which he promises to take her to the city. Her parents are already on the way and his wife is not happy that they are late. To make things worse, she doesnt heed his request to go by herself and keeps on waiting for him.
         A boy from the village, a friend of Suruli visits him in the jail and tell him that Mynaa's mother has planned a marriage with a man working in the middle east and the marriage can happen on the morning of Diwali. Suruli cant wait and he escapes. Only when the celebrations are over does Bhaskar and his colleagues realise that Suruli is missing. He telephones his superior about the situation but requests him to not report this for the moment, as it will affect all his staff. In turn, he promises his officer to get back Suruli in 24 hours. Since next day is Diwali, the officer can with held his report without any hassle. Bhaskar with one of his assistants, Ramaih, goes to Suruli's village. They arrive in right time, morning of Diwali day, when Suruli has managed to stop the supposed marriage. Mynaa's mother turns violent and could have even hurt Suruli and Mynaa if not for Bhaskar and Ramaih. The four, Suruli, Mynaa, Bhaskar and Ramaih sets out to the town. Well things dont go as planned and they finally end up in Munnar in Kerala, the boarder state. They take a bus to their Tamil Nadu town. Movie is more of a thriller from here and I dont want to write the rest.

Mynaa is an excellent movie offering lot of romance, thrill, drama and a brilliant but shocking climax. There are certain time wasting scenes and dialogues, here and there which are pardonable. I can only think about 2 other movies in Tamil, Kalloori and Paruthiveeran, which can compete with Mynaa for its heart touching and shocking climax. After my first watch, I found that most people leaving the theatre, were having a heavy face. It was so hard to accept, that you wonder why the story had to end so, but life is mostly like that. Happy endings are quite rare in life so.

A lot of credit for the director for this excellent movie. He could have done better without a few scenes, dialogues and one or two songs. Movie has a good camera work, some good low light works, but I felt generally it could have been much better. Especially if they could have managed some soft lighting for some scenes. Money could have been the constraint, may be. A big applause also for the casting. Suruli, Bhaskar, his wife, and Mynaa will talk and fight in our minds for long time even after the movie. There are certain scenes where even the small characters like Suruli's father and Mynaas mother were more than excellent.

I must repeat, Tamil cinema has gone much ahead of other movie industries from India. They seem to be the only industry in India, who have recognised the importance of casting. If it was shot in Bollywood we would have seen a 'chocolate' boy and girl with more western features for the hero and heroine, and for the other characters too. I also credit Tamil industry for finding stories and themes from their own villages and cultures. The movies turn out very Indian in the end. Thankfully, Tamil people seem to recognise these efforts and most of these kind of movies are successful in the box office.

For those who want to watch real Indian, main stream, movies, watch Mynaa.