Abhishan Jeevinth’s first movie as a hero, With Love, is a film that explores the concept of finding closure in teenage love. And for that, director Madhan takes this approach of making it conversational to a good extent. Even though the conflicts in the movie have that forced feel, the mature approach towards the closure moments and the way it adds certain fun tweaks to the obvious ending, make this movie a breezy, fun watch with occasional spikes. With Abhishan and Anaswara Rajan managing to crack a good chemistry on screen, even with imperfections, With Love manages to have the qualities of a comfort watch film.
Sathya is a designer living in Chennai, and his sister has been setting him up for meetups with girls for a marriage alliance. One such meeting of Sathya happens with his school junior, Monisha. Sathya feels a sense of connection when they both shared about their respective schooltime crush, in which they never got the chance to convey their feelings. What we see in the movie are the things that happen in this relationship when Monisha suggests this idea of finding their respective school day lovers now and expressing what they couldn’t do back in the day.
The core idea is a bit too filmy and can look extremely impractical. But the good thing is that writer-director Madhan is not trying to overlook the skepticism the audience may have towards the idea. In fact, to an extent, the hero is the representative of the audience who also thinks about whether this seemingly crazy idea would create more trouble. After setting up the story nicely in the first half, through coffee shop reminiscence about school days, the film goes into travel mode, where you see the usual beats of the hero trying to impress the heroine. The conversational humor is fine there, and there is even a nice moment where Sathya seeks forgiveness from one of his teachers, and Madhan handles those moments without too much melodrama.
Where the movie falters a bit is when they introduce a conflict between the lead pair. The misunderstandings and the lack of communication between the characters in that phase lacked smoothness. The hastiness with which the hero jumps to conclusions and makes a mess of situations feels more like a need of the script rather than a character trait. However, Madhan manages to surround these uneven scenes with some heartfelt and funny bits. The most beautiful sequence in the movie was the one where Sathya eventually meets his school love, and the interaction has a realistic warmth. Towards the end, when the movie starts to have a predictable structure of a romantic comedy, Madhan adds some hangover humor and presents that unsurprising climax with a certain level of joy. Sean Roldan’s music adds that jovial romantic energy to the script.
Abhishan Jeevinth, who last year made the superhit movie Tourist Family, had actually played a small yet vital role in that movie. Well, in this film, he plays the lead role, and the character has a wider canvas of emotions. He performed the less macho and vulnerable side of this grounded hero very neatly in this movie, and I loved how he performed the humorous scenes. Anaswara Rajan, as the female lead, is getting to do a role that has a journey pretty much similar to the male character. It offers her a space to portray various emotional states of the character, and she has performed all that very convincingly on screen. She has dubbed the film in her own voice, and except for that last “Biriyani,” the rest of the Tamil sounded fine. Kavya Anil as Anisha delivered a memorable performance.
With Love, directed by Madhan, begins with an appealing conversational romance that gradually transitions into nostalgia, teenage love, and enters the core area that deals with the idea of moving on from regrets. As I already mentioned, even though the graph is dropping occasionally, the movie is able to bounce back with elements that are either emotional or genuinely funny. With Love is a relaxed, fun comfort watch movie, with forgivable flaws.
