Chola

The film stars good but becomes bore later. The film moves at very slow pace with still camera videos for long duration. The story is also didn't make sense after second half. The thrill is lost in second half. Janaki was just crying always except the beach scene. The ending was wierd. The director couldn't tell why the girl who initially tried to run away from Jojo and was later following Jojo. When he touches her she starts crying. When her boyfriend tried to help, she pushes him and goes with jojo. Janaki had same emotions throughout the scene.

An eerie depiction of the story of an innocent girl who sets about to enjoy the day with her boyfriend. Though predictable, it strikes hard on you. Cinematography and music are the key elements that glues your mind on the movie. They add greatly to the rawness. Not a movie for everyone. Strong theme.

Sanal Kumar Sashidharan's penchant for uncinematic but breath taking and realistic shots of nature is one of the prime things that stood out for me in "Ozhivudivasathe Kali". Chola had more of that.

There are a few scenes that are just world class and timeless. The trailer bit. There is a scene that blends in a dramatic climax with raw nature. That scene can stand proud alongside Tarkovsky movie scenes. There is a scene where a very key incident is presented with camera movement and accompanying soundscape. That scene was brilliant too. These scenes are easily ten on ten scenes.

The movie maintains it's darkness. The movie is attempting to say something tall and radical. That in itself is so controversial that it can turn off a lot of viewers. However, even if you let the movie say what it wants to, the movie has not been able to say it convincingly.

Nimisha, Joju and Akhil Vishwanath have had their share of brilliant acting. However, there were portions that did not seem to gel as well. Nimisha's natural acting and voice modulations were impressive.

However, there were also technical imperfections. There was a scene with the camera following the actors in the jeep. The jeep stops and the camera just rushes into the jeep and turns around, making the camera very precarious. Pretty blatant an error.

Not an easy watch. Would recommend a watch to art movie lovers for some really brilliant pieces in the sonata even while the movie as a whole failed for me.

Zero rating.

I watched Chola expecting it to be a good movie given Joju George's brilliant Joseph. Nimisha Sajayan was very effective in Thondimuthalum Driksakshiyum but most certainly not in Chola. What a terrible movie Chola turned out to be.

The opening scene of the boy waiting impatiently for his girlfriend held promise but was exceedingly slow as was the rest of the movie, lingering pointlessly on frame by frame by never ending frame. The plot went sluggishly from slow to weird and eventually bizarre.

If the girl and the boy went mad, then believe me we the viewers also will go mad just by watching this film.

This is one instance where I should have read (and trusted) the reviews first! Now Im wondering whether I should bother to watch Sashidharans S Durga at all.

NOT RECOMMENDED

Available on Amazon Prime with English subtitles

What made me watch Chola was Sanal's terrific previous venture Ozhivudivasathe Kali (yet to see S Durga). Barring the solid performances of Joju George (as the molester) and Nimisha Sajayan (as the abused) and the stunning cinematography by Ajith Aacharya, I couldn't really take to Chola the same way I did with Ozhivudivasathe Kali. The transition from eerie drama to magical realism wasn't seamless and a random interjection of Stockholm Syndrome only made it worse. I like the way Sanal tackles the theme of oppression (this is the third in what one could call SOCU - Sanal's Oppression Cinematic Universe) but Chola takes things one step too far. This is one of the few films (in recent times) that makes effective use of its natural locales (Venu's Carbon is another). The ambiguity in (almost the entirety of) the second half and the climax left a bad taste in my mouth.