Tag Archives: Athmiya Rajan

Joseph (2018)

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M. Padmakumar’s 2018 film is a character-driven crime drama, centred around a retired police officer who fills his lonely nights with memories of his estranged wife and daughter. During the day, despite his constant drinking, Joseph (Joju George) is a brilliant investigator who can read a crime scene like a book. This ensures he is still called out to new crime scenes, even though he is retired. When his ex-wife is killed in an accident, Joseph’s skills tell him something is not quite right, leading him to investigate the most personally difficult case of his career. 

The film starts slowly with the first half mostly a character study of Joseph before moving to the crime investigation. Joseph is shown as a quiet and reserved man, keeping his thoughts and feelings to himself, even when out with his friends. He lives alone, mostly drinks by himself and routinely wakes up on a chair in his living room after drinking himself into insensibility. Gradually, through flashbacks and conversations with his friends, the film reveals the reason why Joseph is alone and why he drinks each night to forget.

After briefly starting with a police medal ceremony, the film moves to a crime scene where an elderly couple have been murdered. The investigating officer calls Joseph to investigate the murders and in a very short period of time, Joseph finds the culprit and is able to explain what has happened. In the course of his investigation, nothing escapes Joseph’s notice and his attention to even the smallest detail ensures he gets to the answer much faster than anyone else.

Having introduced Joseph as a solitary man who enjoys smoking, whiskey and marijuana, we then see a different side to Joseph on a day out with his friends (James Elia, Kijan), Sudhy (Sudhi Koppa) and Sidique (Irshad). I love the song they sing on their road trip, although the subtitles on the version I saw oddly substituted ‘rowers’ for ‘flowers’ which makes no sense to me at all. This is a more social side to Joseph and it’s clear to see why his friends respect him and enjoy his company, even if they don’t understand his wish to be alone in his house.

After their day out, Joseph is woken by one of his friends to explain that his ex-wife Stella (Athmiya Rajan) has been seriously injured in a car crash. Her current husband Peter (Dileesh Pothan) needs Joseph’s support during this difficult time. One of the best parts of the film is the depiction of the relationship between Joseph and Peter. Although the reason for Joseph’s estrangement from his wife is eventually revealed, his conversations with Peter, and Peter’s obvious respect and friendship with Joseph are also key in helping to define Joseph’s character. When Stella dies, it’s Joseph that Peter turns to for support and he trusts Joseph to find out the truth about the accident. 

The film follows Joseph’s investigations into the accident, which also draw in his friends and Peter as they try to track down the car which hit Stella and the people who assisted by taking her to the hospital. During the investigation, Joseph’s past is revealed including his previous relationship with Lisamma (Madhuri Braganza) and the tragic death of his daughter Dayana (Malavika Menon). The details all come together to reveal a conspiracy at the hospital, which is rather far-fetched but does allow the story to neatly tie all the ends together.

What works well in Shahi Kabir’s story is the gradual build-up to the investigation and the way Joseph pieces together the clues he finds along the way. The finale is less successful, but really it’s the journey to get there that matters. The flashbacks to Joseph’s past and how each of his 2 relationships have shaped the man he has become are the key points of the film and Joju George brings a different feel to each version of Joseph. His young Joseph is carefree and willing to risk censure for his apparently inappropriate relationship with Lisamma. Her father is against the match and the two lovers have to sneak away to spend any time together. Once married to Stella, Joseph becomes a textbook husband who adores his wife and daughter. But when tragedy strikes, and their marriage breaks down, all Joseph has left are his memories. Joju George is excellent throughout and as he shows Joseph ageing, we clearly see the experience and pain written on his face. 

The support cast are also excellent, particularly Dilesh Pothan and Sudhi Koppa who have well defined relationships with Joseph. Sadly, the women get little screen time and there is little depth to their characters, but both Madhuri Braganza and Athmiya Rajan are good in the flash-back sequences. The film really belongs to Joju George though and it’s his performance that anchors the story and keeps it interesting. 

Although a crime drama, essentially this is the story of Joseph’s life and the key moments that have shaped its course. The film successfully uses the crime story as the basis for revealing Joseph’s life while keeping the investigation suspenseful as the clues start to pile up. Worth watching for Joju George and the way his previous and current relationships are shown to shape his character. 4 stars.

Cold Case (2021)

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I often write that I’m not a fan of horror films, but I seem to find myself enjoying them. Perhaps it would be more accurate to say that I’m not a fan of Western horror films since recent offerings from India such as Tumbbad, Alidu Ulidavaru and older films like Gehrayee have all been excellent. So, when an Indian horror film is mixed in with an investigative thriller, I’m definitely going to watch! What is interesting about Cold Case is firstly how well the title suits the film in all respects, and secondly the juxtaposition of a police inquiry with a psychic investigation of the same crime. The cast are excellent, the effects generally good and despite some second half doldrums, overall Cold Case delivers on both crime and supernatural storylines.

The film starts with a couple of exorcisms, with the second featuring a child supposedly possessed by his murdered father who then names his killer. The subsequent police case is part of a TV program by journalist Medha (Aditi Balan) who works on features dealing with the paranormal. She is a confirmed sceptic though and doesn’t believe in ghosts or paranormal ideas at all. Medha is looking for a new house after separating from her husband and on the way to view a prospective place to live, she passes a fisherman. The camera moves from following Medha to focus on the fisherman, who pulls up a black plastic bag in his net that he finds contains a skull. As Medha decides to take the house, the police team of ACP Sathyajith (Prithviraj), Muhammad (Anil Nedumangad), Rajprakash (Bilas Nair) and newly appointed officer Neela Maruthan (Pooja Mohranraj) start their investigation into the suspicious death suggested by the skull.

Medha moves into the new house along with her daughter Chinnu (Ester Evana Sherin) and her maid Chandrika (Shailaja P. Ambu). Through conversations with her overly spiritual mother Padmaja (Parvathy T) and her lawyer Haritha (Lakshmi Priyaa Chandramouli), Medha reveals that she is divorcing her husband Arya because he won’t stand up to his controlling mother Roshni (Sanuja Somanath) and that her sister who was studying parapsychology suicided a year before. Medha herself is a strong and confident woman who is forging a good career for herself and is confident and well able to take care of herself. That’s just as well, since shortly after she moves into the new house there are a series of odd occurrences centred around the fridge. The first is actually the most disturbing when Chinnu drinks some water from the fridge and grimaces, then pours it down the sink. Bizarrely the water doesn’t drain, and when Medha uses a skewer to unblock the drain, she pulls up a tangle of black hair. It doesn’t sound scary but it definitely raises chills!

As Medha starts to suspect there is something very odd about the fridge, she enlists the help of a medium, Zara Zacchai (Suchitra Pillai) who wears some impressive scleral contact lenses! With Zara’s help, Medha discovers the identity of her ghostly visitor, just as ACP Sathyajith, using more conventional means, also discovers the identity of the skull. Both are one and the same – Eva Maria (Athmiya Rajan). 

The police investigation follows a more conventional route, using forensic anthropology, digital reconstruction and dental records. There is speculation that the body may be that of a girl who went missing, rumoured to be linked to the Home Minister’s son. While there are other missing persons being considered, the lack of any of the rest of the body also confounds the police efforts. While the investigation discovers more about Eva Maria, Medha’s paranormal investigation is also close to finding out the truth and eventually ACP Sathyajith and Medha come together to solve the crime.

Overall the paranormal storyline is more successful with some genuinely creepy moments, although the final scene is less effective. Cinematographers Gireesh Gangadharan and Jomon T. John use a mix of dark sets and flickering shadows to increase the scare factor while director Tanu Balak drip feeds the scares to increase the tension. The police investigation doesn’t move out of a fairly well-worn path, and the promise of having a new officer involved sadly doesn’t amount to anything. Prithviraj is good but the rest of his team are relegated to simply being there so that ACP Sathyajith has someone to whom he can explain his reasoning. This is a step too far into tell, rather than show territory and the storyline suffers as a result. There are plenty of red herrings, but none of them seem to be all that plausible and the team quickly narrow in on the life and disappearance of Eva Marie. 

Aditi Balan has more to do and better dialogue as well. Her struggle to keep Chinnu in the face of her mother-in-law’s determined efforts to keep the child provides a good backdrop, while Chinnu’s attachment to a particularly creepy doll and her fascination with a well on the property also add to the tension. Suchitra Pillai is also good as the eccentric psychic, adding some good drama to Medha’s more pragmatic approach to the haunting. One of the few false notes in this part of the film is Medha’s lack of surprise and to some extent her apparent lack of fear in the face of the supernatural happenings in her house. While some of this is explained by her role in debunking the paranormal for TV, Aditi Balan never seems to be quite worried enough about the strange things happening with her fridge. 

I really liked the idea of parallel investigations, one police and one paranormal. Although the police investigation doesn’t work quite as well, the cross-over between the two is interesting enough to be entertaining. I found the paranormal aspects to be creepy, but not scary enough that the film can’t be watched alone at night. The subtitles on the streaming version I liked were good too, although I did read that the translation of ‘northern Indian’ for Eva Marie’s husband was inaccurate and it should have read ‘Hindu’, which seems like an odd mistranslation but doesn’t have any significant impact on the plot. This may not be scary enough for fans of true horror, and it’s also not convoluted enough for aficionados of crime thrillers, but the two aspects together make for an overall entertaining whole. Worth watching for Prithviraj, Zara Zacchai’s séance and Aditi Balan’s pragmatism. 3 ½ stars.