Idukki Gold

It’s that attempt to explore the nostalgia. Aashiq Abu’s latest film Idukki Gold is a package that is supposed to be entertaining and enlightening but works only in that mere entertaining part. Colorful visuals, sarcastic background scores and humor that are there throughout the narration will surely keep you interested in this stuff.

It’s a journey of five friends Michael, Ravi, Antony, Madan and Raman who are in their 50’s now to their old school in Idukki. The movie explores through the events that strengthened their bonding in the younger days and the present complications in their life.  How this get together influences their lives is basically what this movie tries to depict.

The plot is somewhat trying to convey the same feel goodness that Zindagi Na Milegi Dobaara tried to state. But here, that transition of friendship becoming a solution gets less lime light thus making it more focused on the dialog humor. There are some instances where these characters ask each other about personal life, but they haven’t developed anything appealing from it. The school days are rendered quite impressively and the present day sarcasms are also enjoyable. Placing the five characters in different levels that are sensible was something good about the plot.

On screen all the actors have given their best. Maniyan Pilla Raju and Raveendran handle the humor nicely. Babu Antony doesn’t have much to express (rightly said in the movie). Vijaya Raghavan did his part smoothly.  Prathap Pothan was also comfortable in that NRI avatar which suits him because of the kind of malayalam diction he has. All the child actors were really good especially the one who did Raveendran’s childhood. Sajitha Madathil, Praseedha, Joy Mathew and Lal did their small roles convincingly.

In the making, Aashiq Abu once again conveys his film with freshness. Starting from the disclaimer to the separate color tones, the director has showed his signature style of making things look different. Screenplay is uneven in terms of pacing which at times is a bit decelerating. The dialogs are largely fresh and humorous. Occasionally some irritating dialog humors are there like the reaction of Sadhu when he knows that Ravi fooled him. Cinematography is stunning with really gorgeous visuals. Edits could have been better. BGM’s are cool especially the ones in the flashbacks. Music is also quite pleasing. A special appreciation for the retro makeup style and also the art direction.

Overall Idukki Gold is good. It’s enjoyable for its individual ingredients rather than the whole recipe. My rating is a 3/5 for this one. The caption is really correct “Athibheekaramam Vidham Saadharanam”. One time fun watch.