Shalabam Malayalam Movie
A very different story and a brave attempt - that's what Shalabham, directed by debutante Suresh Palanchery is. But the film, though worth a watch, leaves much to be desired.
Shalabham tells the story of a young girl and her mother. Young Meera is the daughter of Sharada. Meera, though she is a grown-up girl, has not come of age in physiological or biological terms. This creates problems for her. It becomes difficult to get a suitable alliance for her. It is a small village that they are living in. The people of the village are very superstitious and tend to relate everything to superstitious beliefs. They make superstitious interpretations of Meera's plight and this makes life miserable for Meera and Sharada.
Meera likes a young man named Hari, the son of Kumaran who runs a tea-shop. But Hari, who is friendly with Meera, is in love with another girl. The story of Meera and Sharada moves towards a climax with things happening in a rather complex way in this little village.
Ramya Nambeesan gets her best role till date as Meera and she has tried to give a controlled performance. KPAC Lalitha as Sharada is also good. Mala Aravindan as Kumaran and Sudheesh as Hari have done justice to their roles. The two persons who haven't done justice to their respective roles are the scenarist and the director. The story takes off in a reasonably good manner, but about half-way through things seem to get out of control for the scenarist and he seems to lose grip over his story.
The debutante director seems to be rather insensitive on many counts. He has perhaps thought that a good and different premise is enough to make a movie. Little does he realize that such a bold and different theme needs an equally bold kind of treatment from the side of the director as well as the scenarist. M.J. Radhakrishnan has put in whatever he could as the cinematographer. There's nothing much to be said about the other aspects.
To sum up, Shalabham is a film which could have been much better if the scenarist had paid more attention to the development of the plot. And it would have turned out to be a memorable film if the director had been more careful and adept. Films such as this make you wonder why directors don't care to work harder and put in more effort to make a good film out of a good subject.
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