Hridayam Malyalam Movie Review

 

Picture Courtesy: Onmanorama

I thrive on memories and is a tad bit too attached to the threads of past.  When the hype was created about Hridayam as a nostalgic journey and so on, I kind of restricted myself. I wasn’t in a state of mind to take such a journey especially since a movie is not just a movie for me, as I associate my own experiences with the path the movie takes. Thus, after postponing for the longest of time, I finally finished watching Hridayam and honestly, I felt nothing. When Premam was hyped like this, years ago, I had the same experience and the best I could describe that movie was that it is a good biriyani with all the ingredients that the creators knew the audience would relate to, was carefully curated to evoke certain emotions. Hridayam is the same with added aesthetics and a bit of poster wokeism.  

Issue could also be that, I am tired of this ‘coming of age’ genre where a man goes through stuff, in this case, college life, breakup, spiralling down to toxicity (shades close enough to the infamous ‘Arjun Reddy’), then travel, being one with nature and finally moving on with life. What does others do? Nothing major. For example, despite Arun (Pranav Mohanlal) moving on with his life, being a lover, husband and even a father, Darshana (Darshana Rajendran) who also built her own life is still swooning over her possibilities that could have been with Arun. Even the night before her wedding, for crying out loud. Darshana who has so much potential is criminally wasted in this movie except for some very pretty scenes and a song in her name.

 

Picture Courtesy: The News Minute

Don’t even get me started on Nithya played by Kalyani Priyadarshan who is the most one toned female character in the movie; the cute dumb girlfriend, jealous insecure wife and finally the ‘new age’ mother. I honestly haven’t seen her in anything that could make me focus beyond her beautiful face and hair makeovers. There is no depth to the connection of Arun’s relationship with either of the women, except may be a prolonged ‘love at first sight’.

         Picture Courtesy: The Indian Express

The whole movie has an extremely sanitized and aesthetically crafted narrative and that is also a reason which restricted it from evoking any natural feeling inside me. I mean kudos to cinematographer Viswajith Odukkathil, who captures every single scene so beautifully that it acts like a beauty filter to the incidents or journey, they try to capture throughout the film.  The surface level writing by Vineeth Sreenivasan did nothing to help the movie either. Something that worked for me were the songs and background music by Hesham Abdul Wahab, although it was sad to witness some pretty good background music just going shallow when the scene hardly evoked any feeling.

Picture Courtesy: India Today Malayalam

Also speaking of things that worked, Maya played by Annu Antony is one character that portrayed some depth. Although her character is introduced as similar to Preethi marred by Stockholm syndrome from Arjun Reddy, the way she moves out of something that is clearly undermining her value was beautifully portrayed. We all can learn a thing or two about self-respect in toxic relationships especially with people close to your heart and in vulnerable conditions.

                                                Picture Courtesy: Free Press Journal

Now coming to the man of the movie, Arun Neelakandan (not subtle at all, if you still not get it, there is a scene dedicated for the second name pun), can the universe please keep Pranav Mohanlal in his natural habitat, that I think might be nature. In the almost 3 hours movie, that’s the place where he seemed most comfortable. Also bit contradicting myself, this is the only movie till date where I felt he was the most comfortable in front of a screen, mostly because the co-actors and director Vineeth Sreenivasan was familiar, kinda like a home-made production. It’s funny how we largely ignore the not-so-subtle ‘nepotism’ traits in the Malayalam industry, which here is evident from the moment title credits with actors’ name is shown on screen, you will see what I mean. Also, not his mistake probably, but the whole buzz around ‘see how Mohanlal’s son is simple’ or ‘look he only owns few clothes’ and so on marketing around the promotion of Hridayam was borderline annoying. Yes, he is a human being probably into minimalism, can we leave it at that? The attention he was given by people were like as if he is the adult version of Taimur Ali Khan. 

                                                Picture Courtesy: IMDb

Arun’s character arch from being a man baby to an absolute jerk to a somewhat okayish man would have been jarring to sit through if not for Pranav’s likeable personality, which I think is the most prominent reason why he is an apt cast.  

Except for Kalesh Ramanand as Selva (moral anchor turning point for main character), Aswath Lal as Antony (hero’s best friend) and Vijayaraghavan as (Arun’s father), who did their best with the typical roles given to them, no one else’s roles lasted for me from the movie. Also, Aju Varghese seriously needs to move beyond extended portrayals similar to the kozhi chunk / best buddy. It was funny may be in “Thattathin Marayathu” but not anymore and oh yes, mention from that movie is also there by the way.

In conclusion, if you have literally nothing to do on a weekend for almost three hours and also likes to see a movie which can please your eyes and just that, then may be sit down with popcorn, nah slash that, make it lunch preferably sambhar sadam, tea and snacks. Hridayam is streaming on Disney+Hotstar.

                                                 Picture Courtesy: Onmanorama