Style

Ever wished to see a Malayalam film that looks like a typical Telugu masala heroism movie? (I never wished for that). Then Style directed by Binu S is that attempt. The ad caption of the film was that it is the first cliché film of 2016, well I would say it is the first Malayalam film of 2016 with cliché taken from Telugu. With Tovino Thomas made to play an eccentric villain who looks foolish ultimately, the second film from Binu S (Ithihasa fame) is a disappointment.

Tom, a young auto mechanic falls in love with Diya whom he sees one day from the bus. The love got blossomed and at one point a psychopath named Edger came in to the life of this couple after an unfortunate accident. The incident lead to a scenario where Edger got humiliated and the movie is basically about the rivalry between Tom and Edger.

Hero seeing heroine while it was raining, he instantly falls in love with her, too many “coincidences” ending up in their frequent meetings and finally love happens. In between all this a psycho villain comes and the common man chocolate boy hero suddenly transforms in to that super action hero who can smack down even the toughest guy with just one punch. It is the storyline of most of the other language films which get dubbed in to hindi and gets broadcasted in Set Max making you say “not again” with a facepalm expression. It is too easy to predict what will happen in Style and whatever unpredictable is there looked silly. The whole structure of the story looks like an attempt to create a “Puthiyamugam” for Unni Mukundan.

Making of Binu S lacks genuine feel. The sort of treatment we see in other language masala films get blatantly copied here. The script is too simple and silly and the character construction is also underwhelming. Punch dialogues sounded too cheesy and heavy. Cinematography is just okay with too much of lens flare effect. Vivek Harshan has tried his best to make the movie look pacy. Chenthamarachundil song was nice, while the remix wasn’t that good. BGM is pretty much like a DJ party with its overdose.

Unni Mukundan still lacks that grace a mass action hero should have. The lack of clarity in dialogue delivery and issues in voice modulation affects his performance. The heroine is just there because of skin tone and pretty looks. Well about Tovino, he has that charm and attitude to be an antagonist, but here the character looks too foolish. There are many instances where you sort of laugh and giggle seeing his character’s failure. The actor should work in being more flexible in action sequences (only area Unni managed to score above Tovino). The little boy was good as Jerry. Balu in his typical style offers some fun moments.

On the whole Style borrows too much from Tamil and Telugu and that does put the film in an alien premise which is a bit hard to digest. If you like masala heroism that used to work five or six years back, go for Style.