God’s Own Country

The movie God’s Own Country is almost a half-baked version of the 2011 super hit Traffic. By that I am not comparing the story; it’s just that one day’s events feel. Even though they were successful in making the audience clap by some worthy sentences about personal relationships and trust, the path they chose to reach there wasn’t a great one. Filled with too much of unnecessary complexities and over dramatic dialogues this movie falls in the average category for me.

It’s the story that happens in one day where an NRI Malayalee is in search of a hawala dealer to get 75 Lakhs of Indian Rupee. A taxi driver is also in search of 6 Lakh Rupees to save his daughter. In the meantime there is this public prosecutor Maathan Tharakan who is on a risky journey with a key witness of a rape case that has taken Kerala by a storm. Everyone has emotional reasons behind their quest and risks. How all works out at the end of the day is what the movie talking about.

When you just look at the structure of the script, the planning was correct. But the drama in the writing and certain level of filmy transformations makes things not so impressive. From scene one itself you kind of get that “Traffic” feel and having watched it and so many other films which came in the same mold I couldn’t feel anything fresh or interesting about GOC. The characters looked predictable at many occasions and certain Godly acts towards the climax looked exaggerated.

On screen I liked Fahadh’s character Manu. Fahadh nicely handled the character’s emotional equation. Lal did his taxi driver’s role nicely. Sreenivasan’s character was really annoying. He narrating everything even at the peak of certain risky chases just doesn’t make any sense. Leave something for the audience to think. Mythili was good in her role and so was Nandhu. Lena, Sreeraman, Isha Talwar, Sudheer Karamana, Manikkuttan and some more are there in the lengthy star cast.

Direction from Vasudev Sanal was just about okay. When you are trying a used out idea there should be some freshness in treatment, but sadly it was missing here. Screenplay did a good job creating good backstories for characters, but when it came to stitching them together, it failed. The dialogues sounded over dramatic. Cinematography seems to be compromised with poor lighting. I liked that scene where Manu take the hawala dealers in one move. But the rest of the action was a bit too much. BGM’s dosage was a little too high. Music was okay. Edits were not sharp.

Overall, I felt God’s Own Country as a passable average film. Audience along with me applauded at the end of the movie when the voice over by director Renjith said some true things about relationships. That part was good, but the movie is just average. Rating is 2.5/5.