Express News Service
A as the thousands who pour into Chennai every year with directorial aspirations can attest, making your first film can be quite an ordeal. It’s harder still in the present, when theatres are not fully open, when a raging, ever-evolving pandemic continues to stunt the economy.
And yet, as Dumbledore said in Harry Potter, “Happiness can be found in the darkest of times, if one only remembers to turn on the light.” In 2020, a year quite detrimental to cinema, there is still the delightful footnote of first-time directors delivering some impressive work, including films like Dharala Prabhu, Andhaghaaram, Sethum Aayiram Pon, and Oh My Kadavule.
Express News Service
There’s an inexplicable unease caused by the melancholic lullaby, Kanne Kanmaniye, Sivatmikha’s song that precedes each of the four films in Netflix’s anthology, Paava Kadhaigal. It’s the discomfiting hint that the same parents who so cherish and adore their daughters, calling them Kanne and Kanmaniye, somehow develop the cognitive dissonance necessary to be able to unleash unspeakable monstrosities on them in the name of honour.
The slashes of red in the animation video that charts the growth of a daughter, as she transforms from dependent toddler to a freethinking adult in love and later, marriage, is another ominous sign of what’s to come in the four films. I found Paava Kadhaigal’s foray into the horror of our kind something as specific as honour killings to be such a welcome departure from the anthologies themed on generic topics that have come our way so far. This idea serves to offer filmmakers like Gautham Menon and Vignesh Shivan a chan
Express News Service
The main characters of Disney Hotstar’s Triples go by names like Maadhu, Cheenu, Mythili and Janaki. You hear these names; you think of Crazy Mohan such is the impact of the late actor-writer’s contribution to the Tamil comedy scene. Somewhere early in the first episode of this eight-episode web-series, Ram (Jai) and friends borrow money from a loan shark named Baby Chettaa, and proceed to open a coffee shop called Kalakkitta Da (do I need to explain the pun?).
The said Chettaa, before lending his money, says he’s like a bank. Ram and friends smile in relief. But then Chettaa wears his face of menace and takes a deep breath meant to increase the effect of his punchline and clarifies that he is a ‘blood bank’.