Ganesh_reviews: Pachuvum Athbutha Vilakkum
finally a movie in which Fahadh smiles. A LOT!!
Pachuvum Athbutha Vilakkum (PAV) : Pachu and the magical lamp
Have you ever just roamed around your city - like stopping at every little place which interests you, enjoy it and move to the next - like you got all the time in the world ? That’s exactly how PAV is treated. In the age of movies with decreasing runtime and being laser-focused in order to not be lagging, PAV is unapologetically an outlier which falls on the positive side fortunately.
First and foremost positive factor has to be Fahadh Faasil taking a break from his serious grim-faced roles to just play a common (smiling, normal) man. The last time Fahadh played such a role was 5 years back in Njan Prakashan (Malayalam film). This star factor is complimented by strong writing for 3 central women characters who form the plots and subplots of this film. And the way I see it, Fahadh is these womens’ athbutha vilakku to get to a certain point in their life (while the film does suggest otherwise! I think its mutual).
Beyond Fahadh, placing these 3 women as unrelated as possible gives scope to delve into each of their stories, and as mentioned above, the film completely indulges itself, spends ample time and comes with an engaging product. One admirable aspect of the movie flow is that the movie changes tone within the drop of the hat so organically. Its a difficult thing to do but the writing, acting and direction work together wonderfully and make it look so effortless.
Given the film’s length and the amount of fluff around the core plot, the film does feel a little long and stretched out. The way it presents the climax is one way it could have ended and thus, it leaves us with questions like why a particular character was not put to use to go for a better ending (and also resolve the hasty writing for that character). Well, the upside here is it makes us forget our problems for a while and got us invested in Pachu’s problems to ask such questions. Further, this is done in a manner which makes us smile, cry, laugh and feel good as long as it lasts. Indeed a solid feel-good film from a industry known to be masters in it !!
3.6/5
Post Scriptum : This is a list of the 2023 Indian movies I enjoyed watching. Of the 10 films till date, 4 are from Mollywood. There are still a few acclaimed malayalam releases this year that I am yet to watch. Gonna be tough when I rank these films at the end of the year I guess!
Hello reader! In case, we have not met ..
I am Ganesh and I love talking, reading and writing about cinema. You can read more about me here.