Alif

As a cinema Alif isn’t a completely overwhelming movie which can please you entirely. But there is an appreciable amount of boldness in the content of this movie that tries to question the less questioned practices in Muslim religion. Without embedding anything to make it a commercially viable cinema, Alif is a good movie that needs to be watched.

A poor Muslim family is the focus of the story here. Little Ali has a sister, mother, grandmother and grandmother’s mother in his family. As his mother is suffering from Asthma, the only income for the family comes from grandmother’s housemaid job. Using the twisted interpretations of Quran and Shariyath, Ali’s father divorced his mother. For questioning the biased justice, the entire family had to face a lot of trouble from the religious authorities. The fight back of the family against these odds is what director N K Muhhammad Koya trying to show us.

Similar to Sajeevan Anthikkadu’s “Prabhuvinte Makkal”, here also there are some moments of solid debate to make us think about these faults or I should rather say the misinterpretations in religions. There is a very bold scene in the movie where the female protagonist dares to question the inequality to a religious speaker. The over dramatic presentation has made the movie a bit dragging at points. May be that was the only way the director could think about presenting the Quran references.

On the acting side, Seenath was the most impressive among the cast. I think she had the most number of scenes in the movie and the veteran actress did a good job. Lena was convincing in her character. The two child artists were also good. Joy Mathew finally gets a character where the slang looks natural. Kalabhavan Mani, Nedumudi Venu and Irshad also did a nice on screen performance.

Direction from N K Muhammed Koya is an okay one. He has kept the dialogues on a very realistic level but the script at certain points goes to an over dramatic feel. But as I said the boldness it showed to question the injustice with proper Quran reference deserves a pat on the back. Cinematography was nice. Edits were poor. Musical section is just about okay.

Overall Alif is a tale that has a strong and relevant subject which sadly needs to be seen even in these days of progressive thinking. The rating for the movie is 3/5.