Film Review:
Cast: Kalabhavan Mani, Siddique, Nedumudi Venu, Innocent, Suraaj Venjaramoodu,
ShammiThilakan, Bijukuttan, Vijayaraghavan, Saadique, Augustine, Sreehari, Irshad,
Iswarya, Sreelatha Namboothiri, Ambika Mohan, Poornima
Direction: Chandrashekharan
Music: Kailas Menon










Bits and pieces of investigative drama, that we have seen umpteenth times with the other super star movies, too sleepy paced narratives, Kalabhavan Mani in usual maneuvers, and an outdated presentation style- These could be the taglines of 'Kerala Police' which doesn't offer anything refreshing in terms of visuals, presentations or narratives..

The skeletal of the story is the same as in any Mani film of the past decade and half. Only the garb of the characters has changed to the police uniforms. Despite half a dozen movies to his credit, it appears that director Chandrasekharan ,after a long gap to filmdom ,still needs to work on updating his film making techniques .He doesn't try to experiment much, simply tweaking formulaic stuff a little to claim originality of plot.

The film is as usual about an honest cop Circle Inspector of Police Satyanath, bogged down by the system in his fight for righteousness. Just because of his backward class, many like Mukunda Varma (Baiju) and Venugopal in his same grade sidelines and ridicules him and takes credits of everything that Sathyanath does. He being an upright officer faces a lot of troubles from official circles, but with the help of his god father and Superintendent of Police, Philip Tharakan (Innocent), he survives in service.

As he smells some mysterious links in the death of a Goan based freelance photographer Bimal Roy, whose body was found in a tile factory, Sathyanath follows in close steps with the incidents that led to the murder and spots popular actress and a national award winner Sanjana ( Lekshmy Sharma) , behind the murder. On the further investigations Sanjana admits her part in the murder .But Sathyanath is not convinced that she alone can commit such a dreaded act and refuses to arrest her.

This leads to the case being wrapped up and taken away from state police to be handed over to the CBI group headed by Nandini Verma (Swarnamalya). She is highly critical about the way the police department is run in the state and from the day one, the stage is set for confrontation between Sathyanath and Nandhini. Sathyan now take leave and start a personal level investigation on the case with the able aid from constable Balram. The movie follows how the Kerala Police and the CBI race it to the finish to grab the enshrouded killer.

In this obvious attempt at making a formulaic masala movie, the resulting experience is far from satisfactory. The narrative loses steam post interval with the arrival of C B I , as it becomes a typical murder mystery without much momentum, which leaves the movie to be just an average one .More over, the liberal use of the caste cards even in punch lines and the related generalizations is not a case to be encouraged, even though they appeal to a very few .The only highlight of the movie is that the creators has managed to keep the suspense till the finale, even though the ultimate find is not a matter of bigger surprise.

As usual with the Mani movies the script by Vinu Narayanan based on a story by Anwar Abdulla doesn't offer much for him to improvise. The proceedings are not so gory that people in the movie theater along with this reviewer often have to search for the clocks. As far as histrionics go, the less said the better. Kalabhavan Mani has his way through, with nothing worth mentioning. Swarnamalya catches our attention once in a while as Nandhini but Lekshmy Sharma as Sanjana doesn't fit too much to the bill. The other saving grace of the movie is Biju Kuttan who provides a little comic relief. The technical crew also doesn’t give any mentionable outputs.

All in all, the movie doesn't offer anything extraordinary in terms of content and performance. You can be a part of it, if you still have an appetite for investigative movies that appear at least in dozens, every year in Mollywood.