In the movie Machante Malakha, at one point, the main character, Sajeevan, says that he is done being stuck between love and gratitude. As the germ of an idea, this situation offers the makers a chance to create an interesting conflict in the life of someone. But this Boban Samuel movie has no aspirations to reach that conflict and resolve it in a fresh way, and what you end up seeing is a two-hour-long daily soap with relatively better production quality.
The movie revolves around our central character, Sajeevan, who is a conductor in KSRTC. Sajeevan has been actively looking for a life partner in the conventional way, and nothing really worked in his favor. Long story short, Sajeevan gets married to a girl named Bijimol, who was a frequent traveler on his bus. The unexpected series of dramatic events that happened in the married life of Sajeevan and Bijimol is what we see in Machante Malakha.
The script of this movie, written by Ajeesh P. Thomas, based on a story by Jexson Antony, is drifting from one conflict to another just for the sake of drama. Initially, we would feel that the controlling and manipulative behavior of Bijimol would be the reason for the conflict in the story, but then it would drift away from that and make us feel that the sacrifice angle would be maneuvering the story forward. But the movie then goes after silly reasons and arguments to create a tussle between the main leads. There is no explanation for why these characters are like this, and some of the reasons why this movie gets dragged into a court are bizarre.
Soubin Shahir, as Sajeevan, feels like a misfit for this movie. It is like seeing his typical “Kochi Machan” character in a serial like Chandanamazha, and that’s a multiverse we never asked for. When he performs the vulnerability of the character towards the end, it has a very comical shade. Namitha Pramod, as Bijimol, gets a character whose behavior is unpredictable. The movie mentions that the family has gone through a certain trauma in the past, but that rarely connects to the reason why this Bijimol character acts like a woman child. Largely because of this flawed writing, Namitha’s performance also feels exaggerated.
Shanthi Krishna, as the caricature mother-in-law, is the most serial-like character in this film, and that character is like the writer’s go-to tool when the movie is running short of masala because she would say anything. Manoj KU is playing Sajeevan’s father-in-law in the film. While the emotional bits were performed neatly by him, the deliberate efforts to stay away from the Kannur slang make his performance slightly flawed in the dialogue rendering aspect. Dhyan Sreenivasan’s advocate character says, “I vehemently oppose this submission, your honor,” multiple times in this movie, and he should have said that to the script as well. Dileesh Pothan and Vineeth Thattil David are also part of the star cast, along with the quintessential Sheelu Abraham.
Boban Samuel’s treatment of the film is extremely outdated. It is almost like he is oblivious to the change that happened to Malayalam cinema in the last decade, and the man still thinks Malayalam cinema is exactly in the same place when he did Romans 12 years ago. He is going after certain scenes so that he can say that there is romance, sentiments, comedy, etc. The script fails to establish a lot of the character dynamics. Bijimol is a toxic character, and Sajeevan does not have a history of romance with her before or after marriage. And it just doesn’t make sense why he wants to cling on to such a person, and in the same way, we just won’t understand why Bijimol eventually reconciles. This is a couple that follows the manipulator-victim combination with gender-swapped from the conventional one. The background score is spoon-feeding the audience far too much, and there are instances where Ouseppachan is using some instrument for each word in a dialogue.
I think the conversations regarding current family movies and comedy movies being not so memorable or not having repeat value has led to a scenario where certain filmmakers think that trying outdated things can solve that issue. Machante Malakha is one such outdated movie that is stuck in the past. The only kind of people who would find this movie enjoyable is the ones who think the toxic daily soaps we endure on channels are slice-of-life creations.
The only kind of people who would find this movie enjoyable is the ones who think the toxic daily soaps we endure on channels are slice-of-life creations.
Green: Recommended Content
Orange: The In-Between Ones
Red: Not Recommended
