In the final act of the movie Christy, the hero, Roy, takes drastic steps to express his love. The film director, Alvin Henry, wants to show the character’s hardships to show his love and also his heartbreak. But the writing in the initial parts of the movie is really unimpressive, and hence even when Govind Vasantha is trying his best to create that 96 vibes with the background score, you aren’t feeling for the character.
The story here is set in 2007. Our central character Roy is studying in Plus 2 in Poovar. He lives with his aunt, and his exam marks aren’t that great. When his parents threatened to take him back to Nedumangad due to his poor academic record, his aunt decided to provide him tuition. He is sent to Christy, a divorced teacher. The influence of Christy in Roy’s life and how it eventually results in a love affair is what you witness in this Alvin Henry film.
The screenplay credit of this movie is shared by two huge names in the Malayalam literary world; Benyamin and Indugopan. And the most shocking thing is that it is actually the writing that looks flat and cliched in the key moments. And it derails the movie considerably. Character exposition techniques are very different in films and books. There are several instances in Christy where you feel they are detailing things way too much. The conflicts in the movie are built on a very fragile foundation.
Alvin Henry’s making is very visual-driven. He uses classic slow-motion shots to convey the development of the romance inside Roy. Even in the climax portion, Anend C Chandran uses the backdrop of airports to convey angst of Roy. The writing covers events in the life of both Roy and Christy. But, it hardly gives you an idea about when that relationship was getting intensified. The moves made by Roy never look romantic, and it is very childish and immature. In the climax airport sequence, you are supposed to have this “oh, poor guy” reaction. But sadly, the characterization was so vague that most people in the audience from where I saw the movie were like, “what was he thinking?” Govind Vasantha’s music is excellent. It was actually the only thing that gave me hope that something heavy was coming at the end. Having said that, his music arrangement has that hangover of 96.
Mathew Thomas as the impulsive Roy is believable for sure. But here, he had the huge responsibility of making people root for a problematic character. And with zero help from the screenplay, Mathew was struggling a bit. With that minimal makeup and the depth one can sense in her eyes, Malavika Mohanan was actually a great choice as Christy. But the massive problem is her dialogue delivery. If I am not wrong, she herself has done the dubbing for this film. Her slang is a mixture of Payyannur Malayalam, Wannabe Trivandrum Malayalam, and the Malayalam of someone brought up outside Kerala. There were several other characters in the movie played by actors who could deliver slang properly. Alvin Henry used a different voice for all those actors and decided to keep Malavika’s dubbing for this film. Those “Deyy”s disturbed the movie’s rhythm in certain key emotional scenes.
Adolescent age crush and the emotional impact of that is a topic that needs solid writing. Christy’s screenplay just can’t make us feel for the character of Roy. And all that airport drama you see in the last 20 minutes of the movie feels like a stretched-out presentation of a feeble climax.
Christy's screenplay just can't make us feel for the character of Roy. And all that airport drama you see in the last 20 minutes of the movie feels like a stretched-out presentation of a feeble clima
Green: Recommended Content
Orange: The In-Between Ones
Red: Not Recommended
