Film / Documentary - Recently watched & worthy of some discussion

[balaajee]

Cuckoo (2014 : Tamil : 2h40m)
Written & Directed by Raju Murugan

Music : Santhosh Narayanan

Starring : Dinesh as Thamizh & Malavika Nair as Sudhanthirakodi

Simple story about romance blooming between two visually impaired couples (ofcoarse opposite gender), with the "as usual" crooked minded family members who try to benefit from them by going to any extent to seperate their love and the "golden hearted friends" who are not only prepared to help them financially but support them throughout their journey on this "thorny-love" road [but as usual go missing during crucial suituations]. The prime motive of the film is to show us Who they (all) are, How - Thamizh & Kodi meet; fall in love; get seperated and whether they join again crossing all the hurdles which even humans with sight could tumble, and finally how their love acts as a sound to guide them in this 'dark-pathetic' world, helping them to recaputre & retarce their paths just as the fabulous melody - Cuckoo Cuckoo.

Let me tell this straight away - Cuckoo is not for everyone. There are dramas and melodramas which are quite soothing for any audience even if they have a dislikeness to such genres, but cuckoo stays quite pure and needs a bit of thinking and interpretations throughout the movie to fully enjoy it, which could make the viewership not only tiring but seemingly long.

Raju Murugan has neatly presented his tale, which is quite difficult to produce visually. Admist the life of the visually impaired, he allocates enough sweet & sour moments for the main couple, making it as an "docu-interesting" watch. The co-artists were damn good and its shown in such a way that you are amoung them enjoying their "normal" take of life rather then getting preachy or sorrowed by their state. The humour has come out well, but again it will not be appealing for the most as its not spoon-fed oneliners. There are some crumbling onliners about politics, current cinema, humanity etc., just like the jokes coloumn of Vikatan weekly.

The lead pair takes away the lime light. They are not only natural but beleivable, esp., Malavika. Her agony mixed with desperation to put forward the anguish in her expressions are very subtle. Be it tolerating the naughty comments or kiddish acts of Dinesh or facing her families decesion, knowing well that she is not only helpless but is not even capable of confronting them, are so very well enacted. Dinesh does some tremendrous exploitation of himself getting well inside the shoes of a visually impaired person. They have carefully edited his close-up shots to give us a varied feel for each of his expressions. Sharing the same podium with them is Santosh Narayanan. Only default are the songs and its placing that does not coincide with the suituations, which make us aloof from the picturisations. He scores too high in BGM and RR which fits the emotions of the lead pair as well as the expression of the film itself. Hats off to him to have learnt where to be silent. Special mention goes to all the colorful visuals and the man who had captured them all.

Scenes which impressed me lot (either its music or performence or directors touch) :
- Title card
- Dinesh Intro
- Awesome IR songs everywhere
- Bustop scene
- Kodi wating for Thamiz after giving him the parfume
- Opening of Manasual Sorra Kathae (and its visuals)
- Kodi Facing her family
- Police station encounter (and the scene just after that where Dinesh wishes to feel the Police official and ...)
- Climax (towards the far end)
- End credits

But still on the whole, it fails to impress even the fans of such genre. The prime reason being going over board with realism & extending scenes where even after the message is passed the film continues as a tutor repeating the same lines. The idea was great, the visual naration was top notch but the assemblage was a bit clumpsy. The scenes unfold as a custon design : jolly suituation => pathos scene => happy mood => cruelty => etc. When each start to happen, it happens in huge quantity, and thrown as a junk, esp. towards the climax where the film tries to catch its own tail. Another thing is that, every scene is crowded, there is a lot of noise and commotion. Eventhough I understand the motive behind it, I thought it should have been kept under check after a few illustrations and registrations, but the film continues to pound our ears. It should have been more creative in its approach to control the realism. Fact is that we are here to see what Thamizh & Kodi are doing and not how they are doing admist all the pollution throughout ! Finally, the journalist subplot is not very original - I wished they could have skipped it and narrated in an alternative way (in a straight forward manner) - its a twin to Ajith Starrer Red (but Cuckoo is nowhere near to Red - trust me).

I do not know how this movie is doing in theatres, or whether its still running, but Cucukoo is a movie to be cherished just for the efforts put by the whole team. Thamizh & Sudhanthirakodi are a lovely couple and their love indeed reaches out for you.

Cuckoo - SoulfulL

Its doing good...Had second weekend special show in Satyam Cinemas...