Film: Leela
Starring: Biju Menon, Vijayaraghavan, Jagadeesh, Indrans
Direction: Renjith
What is it that fills Malayalam cinema these days with insanely and hereditarily-rich protagonists, who are free to roam around without doing any work, neither the conventional nine-to-five ones nor the other creative endeavours? Though such lead characters were dime a dozen in the nineties, the current crop comes with an overdose of quirkiness and are prone to do good to others, as was seen in the recent Charlie .
Kuttiyappan (Biju Menon), the towering male presence in Renjith’s Leela , has all this, with an added quirkiness in his sexual desires. His perversions are harmless and at times touching, we are told, in the opening sequences. He invites a sex worker to his room, makes her light a lamp, dresses himself as a corpse and asks her to cry imagining him to be her dead father. The initial apprehension leads to uncontrollable sobs, and later, he bids her goodbye with a hug. The film is woven around his biggest such quest yet, for which he needs a girl and a grand tusker. Aiding him in his search for these two is Pillayachan (Vijayaraghavan), an almost friendly slave to the leading man. It is Pillayachan who becomes the representative of the average hypocritical Malayali, playing along with and even enjoying Kuttiyappan’s perversions until some of them uncomfortably remind him of himself and his family.
For those who have read R. Unni’s original story, the film comes as a letdown as the language is lost in translation to screen, though the narrative stays true to the source. It is a challenging story for a film adaptation. A Charlie hangover is visible in some of the additions, especially the scene of honouring sex workers in public. The lifelessness in the first half, compared to the breezy parts in the novel, is evident. For the most part, it rides on the shoulders of four actors, who have come up with exceptional performances. Biju Menon convincingly transforms as Kuttiyappan, while Vijayaraghavan scores with Pillayachan’s mannerisms. Indrans continues his recent form as pimp Dasapappy. But, it is Jagadeesh who surprises everyone as the detestable Thankappan Nair, not the best character for an election candidate to play. He finally makes a shift from the repetitive comic roles and reveals his potential here.
The film is, in its intentions, supposedly a mirror to the patriarchal society but sadly speaks the same language, maybe unintentionally. It becomes a celebration of perversions of the powerful, rather than an indictment. Many of Kuttiyappan’s actions could be termed eccentricity for the sake of it, like asking his old servant lady to bring coffee through a ladder, for a change, or his fantasy involving the girl and an elephant. For those who have not read the story, the film might feel like ending up alone in a boat mid-sea without an oar at hand.
S.R. Praveen
