Crocodile Love Story

An idea that had all the scope to deliver something fresh to the viewers spoiled by some lame romance and unimpressive humor; that’s what I felt about the latest Malayalam release Crocodile Love Story. A tiring first half that fails to establish a sensible love story and a silly second half that can’t take the plot innovatively makes this film a disappointing comedy.

Kiran is a B Tech drop out who is currently struggling because of his unfocused life. He meets his childhood friend Nithya from a yoga class and their relationship ends up in a love affair. Nithya’s parents aren’t happy with the relationship as Kiran isn’t that secure in terms of job. The plot goes in to an interesting situation when the couple gets stranded in an island and gets attacked by a crocodile. The movie mainly focuses on the incidents that happen in that phase. How they get stranded and how eventually they manage to escape is what Crocodile Love Story basically talking.

The script takes a one and a half hour long run time to establish a romance between the main leads, which still isn’t that digestible. With a Da Thadiya like scenario introduced in the plot from the beginning itself, the writer has shut his eyes towards that most genuine conflict of being offended by figure. I am saying this because they started of the movie in that fashion and after a particular point it wasn’t an issue in the script. There is no strength in the romance. And in the second half the movie gets cluttered with some lame jokes that were quite boring. Interestingly the last 20-25 minutes that had Kalabhavan Mani entering the island had some sensible humor which allows us to end the film on a smiling knot.

The direction isn’t that great. Anoop Ramesh can’t add anything special to make the dull script more sensible. Script is too slow in the first half and is out of focus in the second half. The spoof on Sreesanth wasn’t that convincing and that character was an unwanted addition. As I said earlier, the last portions showed some promises. The dialogs are quite typical. Neat cinematography and good music. The visual effects were good in parts.

On the performance side, Praveen Prem was just about good. His dialog delivery in some of those serious portions was annoying. Avanthika is a promising actress. Ashokan did well in his caricature role. Manikkuttan, Prem Kumar etc also did their part nicely.  With his last minute entry Kalabhavan Mani did a good show and he was successful in making the audience laugh.

Overall, Crocodile Love Story had its chances, but lost the race due to lack of surprises. I am giving the movie a 2/5. It’s one of those movies that could have made an impression for its variety.