Kerala Cafe Movie

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1. Comment by sujith chandran:
   October 29, 2009 @ 5:23 am

   waiting for the new experiment in our cinema. itz very hopeful dat such noval ventures r happening n our industry too!! im sure these kind of films can shape a genere f new generation viewers in keala. our viewrs r tuned in such a way to fit for the same old monotonal masalas crap action which is far away frm life. kerala caffe wll b a grand sucess if it can atleast create an idea to those steriotyped viewers that films can be possible like this too… i guss it wll b beautiful too, as we all r verymuch familiar about d crux f most of the talented directors who made this film possible…. thank u ranjithetta…. may the film b a big success… cheers…!!!

2. Comment by Aravind:
   October 29, 2009 @ 10:35 am

   ..neither had any plans for watching the movie nor was there any hype…got a leisure time and went just for fun…but alas!!!I cant resist friends…My first day first show paid off. Fabulous experiment ever done in Malayalam Film industry…u need to watch it if u want to get the right feeling of what i meant…it wont be a waste of time for sure if u are a true movie lover!!

   This is history!! Renjith sir…hats off…and the Bridge is the best!!!

3. Comment by Vineeth VS:
   October 29, 2009 @ 5:20 pm

   Superb…Brilliant..My expectation didn let me down..It was a wonderful experience…
   I feel that out of the 10 films only on that doesn’t fit in to the frame is Mrithyunjayam..It was not a good story…Rest all was good…My rating is in the order
   1) BRIDGE
   2) Happy Journey
   3) Off Season
   4) Nostalgia
   5) Lalitham Hiranmayam
   6) Makal
   7) Aviramam
   Puram Kazhchakal
   9) Island Express
   10) Mrithyunjayam

4. Comment by Sreejith:
   October 30, 2009 @ 12:10 am

   very nice experience..
   congrats for all.

5. Comment by nikhimenon:
   October 30, 2009 @ 2:17 pm

   watched two mvies this week…

   Kerala cafe and swa.le

   since i m too lazy to rite a detailed review..

   here s my ratings of short films in kerala cafe….

   the outstandin ones: bridge,happy journey,island express

   good ones: makal,aviramam,

   the okay types: puram kazcha,off season,nostalgia

   the bad ones: lalitham hiranmayam and mrityunjayam

   on the whole: kerala cafe should not be missed..7.5/10

   Thank you Renjith sir

6. Comment by melvin sam:
   October 31, 2009 @ 6:08 am

   watched kerala cafe in kottayam.
   my heartfelt thx to ranjith and friends.
   this is the change we were looking fwd to…and an awesome song…pure malayalam is back. our mother is getting back to health.on the whole it was an outstanding exp.ppl had problem in settling down for the first 2 films.nostalgia and island express.
   lalitham hiranmayi kind of let teh audience down. but mrityunjayam !!! gosh brilliant film. now this is what a short film shud be like!!!
   this is what a film shud be. happy journey was again excellent which really reconfirmed the faith of the audience.that was the interval point.
   aviramam was a very matured film from b. unnikrishnan. again a very gud film which left the audience with a lump in the throat.next was off season-less said better.
   then came another best one among the lot- bridge.
   but the uncanny resemblence to iranain film is evident.
   makal was supereb almost perfect. but lacks something . cant figure out what.
   puram kazhchakal was average. could have been much better,had much better possiblities
   the ranks.
   1. mrityunjayam
   2.bridge
   3.happy journey
   4.makal
   5.aviramam
   6.puramkazhaka
   7.nostalgia
   8.lalitham hiranmayam
   9.island express
   10.offseason

   best director-anwar rashid
   best actor- fahad faazil/jagathy sreekumar
   best actress-swetha menon
   promise of kerala cafe-shankar r.(director of island express)

   rating-7.75/10
   its a must watch film…..

7. Comment by abhi:
   November 1, 2009 @ 1:25 am

   watched kerala cafe @ cochin savitha
   great experience. greatworks. malayalam cinema come backs with a vengence
   the best are
   1.mrityunjayam( sheer brilliance)
   2.bridge(cinema craft)
   3.happy journey(truly witty)
   4.island express(freshness)
   5.makal(perfection)
   6.puram kazchakal(humanity)
   7.aviramam(reality)
   8.nostalgia(reality)
   9.offseason(pass)
   10lalitham hiranmayam(fake)

8. Comment by nikhil:
   November 1, 2009 @ 5:46 am

   welcome change in our film world-KERALA CAFE
   i happened to watch the movie in sri padmanabha tvm.
   the most welcome change i seen here is that the movies are being talked about in the directors name -rather than stars- so instead of putting names of the films let me put in in the order of directors-
   as far as my understanding goes from previous reports and an interview of ranjith – each director was given a particular budget and 10 – 12 minutes of screen time. lets check who are the best

   1. anwar rashid & uday ananthan( anwar has taken longest time i felt. otherwise he was clear best)
   2. anjali menon
   3.revathy
   4.sankar ramakrishnan
   5.laljose
   6. b.unnikrishnan
   7.shyamaprasad
   8.shajikailas
   9.padmakumar

9. Comment by sujith orkattery:
   November 1, 2009 @ 12:12 pm

   bridge&puramkazhakal is supeb

10. Comment by Raveendran:
    November 1, 2009 @ 12:53 pm

    There has been a plethora of movies in the world that string together a series of related, and at times unrelated tales together, to form a resplendent whole. Kerala Café is one such attempt in Malayalam films, a maiden one perhaps, that strategically places ten shorts around a railway Café, linking them together in subtle ways, and juxtaposing major issues as love, betrayal and calamity with apparently unconnected ones as black magic, the global economic meltdown and senility.

    Kerala Café starts off with a prologue by Sathyan Anthikkadu, who confesses that he’s there to clarify those lingering doubts that he believes exist within our minds regarding the plot of the film. He assures us that the stories would be as different as they possibly could be, and makes an exit. There seems to be no obvious reason for him to be there, nor for the preface. Almost akin to the author scribbling down on his opening page what he wants his readers to expect and not to expect, this is a shaky start to an otherwise fantastic experiment.

    Nostalgia that is loosely based on Venugopal’s poem Naatuvazhikal is the first film that unfolds. Johnykutty (Dileep) is a millionaire based in the middle east, who dreams of being back in Kerala some day. On a vacation back to India though, he despises the government and the potholes on the road, the bureaucracy and the people. Having signed a deal to sell off his ancestral mansion, he flies back to Dubai, to commence his nostalgic laments all over again. Padmakumar does manage to strike a few random strokes here and there, but for most of the part, lets the story run its course and wrap things up on its own.

    A strikingly dashing Prithiviraj zooms down and starts whispering to us about Jesus, Frankenstein and Mangalassery Neelakantan, the idol trio who have had a say in his life. With his ‘editor-publisher bitch’ hanging around his arms, the writer that he is, speeds off to Kerala, promising her that he would get a ‘paavada’ to cover her up when they reach there. An aged woman (Sukumari) waits around for her bus to arrive in some bus station, while an army officer (Jayasurya) sitting near by dozes off, his head resting gently on her shoulders. A disheveled looking man in his fifties (Maniyanpillai Raju), brushes aside the advances of a teenaged girl in a shabby looking lodge, as he gets all ready to go somewhere. Shankar Ramakrishnan’s Island Express splendidly bonds together these diverse characters and more in a dramatic climax that makes this film one of the best in Kerala Café. Competently scripted and shot in brilliant tones, Island Express marks the spectacular debut of a highly promising director.

    We move on then to a world of infidelity with Shaji Kailas and his Lalitham Hiranmayam. Unfaithfulness somehow sounds a theme strangely out of place in the director’s hands and sadly our doubts never turn out to be too far away from truth. Ramesh (Suresh Gopi) is caught between his wife Lalitha (Jyothirmayi) and mistress Mayi (Dhanya) and has to take the big decision now. The turmoil that goes on inside the man’s mind is slickly edited and trendily depicted on screen, but none of it transcends across, beyond the cigarette stubs that blaze between his fingers or the grimace on his face. There is simply nothing here that would make you feel for Ramesh; instead with all the razzle dazzle on screen, and Shaji at the helm of affairs, you almost expect some imaginary gun to go off any moment.

    Uday Ananthan’s Mrityunjayam has a journo (Fahd Fazil) doing an investigative story on a spooky old ‘mana’ that in its owner’s (Thilakan) own words is a ‘very different and peculiar place’. Sounds interesting, except that he falls in love with a girl (Reema) who peeks out of the door there, and pops the question if he could marry her. If that is strange, (love could make you do insane things for sure), stranger are the events that follow. The thrills are of low intensity, and the mystery never intriguing enough. A great idea that never really works, Mrityunjayam seems to have fallen under the spell of ’some forces that are beyond our understanding’. It never quite comes to life, and the whole film totally falls apart.

    Perhaps the best on-screen chemistry between two actors in Kerala Café builds up between Jagathy Sreekumar and Nithya in Anjali Menon’s smartly scripted short, entitled Happy Journey. Anjali’s film is a hilarious take on the psyche of a Malayali middle aged man, who delights himself with a bit of flirting with a young girl who sits beside him on a bus to Kozhikode, and perhaps hoping for a little bit more. Edging his way into the girl’s seat and engaging in worthless conversation, he is all optimistic about the night that lies ahead. The girl on the other hand is visibly uncomfortable, and all on a sudden composedly takes on a different garb that stuns us and the man alike. Against all odds, she would keep her head above the water, and a calmness descends on her that is at once creepy and confident. A psychological combat between the two ensues that concludes in an impressive climax, that has the signature of a brilliant director all over it.

    Aviramam talks of life that would go on, even as one strives to put an end to it all. Devi (Shwetha Menon) wakes up to find her doting husband Ravi (Siddiq) beside her with a cup of tea. Gulping down the tea, she talks of ‘how horrible a kisser’ he was. There is talk of the recession eating into the IT sector and Ravi’s business in partcular before they get ready to leave for the railway station with their kids. Having seen off his family on a short vacation of three days, Ravi heads back home and gets a noose ready to finally call it a day. B.Unnikrishnan brings in a passion into his narrative that skillfully throws a thin shroud of hope and optimism over all the desperation and helplessness that lie beneath. The characters are downright authentic and honest, and coupled with exceptional performances from its lead actors, Aviramam tells a pertinent tale.

    Off Season that starts off on a very promising note, soon collapses under the weight of its emptiness, as absurd as it may sound. Kunjappai (Suraj Venjarammoodu) gets all pepped up as he comes across a foreigner couple on an almost empty Kovalam beach. His hopes of earning some quick money are dashed when he learns that they have traveled all the way from Lisbon looking for work. Shyamaprasad’s film looks distinctly different, but despite a compelling concept, turns out to be quite shallow. Visually gripping for sure, but there is little else about Off Season that is captivating.

    I know it’s extremely difficult to pick favorites from this collection, but I was on the lookout for my Tuileries in this Paris je t’aime. And along comes Anwar Rasheed with his Bridge that literally blew me off, with its magnificent imagery and bitter drama. Anwar bridges together two absolutely dissimilar tales, as severed off from each other as they possibly could be, and creates a near subliminal effect in the process. There is an outstanding technique at work here, that illustrates the very obvious symbols of loss, misery and desolation. Anwar’s vignette takes on a radical stand, and dares to create a surprising amount of complexity, even as it appears to narrate the simplest of stories. Wrenching out the best performances from his leading actors, Anwar’s film is right at the top of the barrel in Kerala Café.

    Makal could have been more deeply involving, had it pushed aside those time-honored clichés while journeying down the realist road. It does dramatize the terror that hovers over a girl child with its assertions, and the story is painful in itself. But when the director shoves in a peacock feather into the girl’s palm, the film falls into an all too familiar rut that it could very well have done without. It’s a customary method of story telling that Revathy adopts here; downright straightforward and clear-cut. There is little that we can do here except stand a distance apart and impassively watch the girl being carried away, it becomes almost impossible to be with her or with the film, to draw ourselves into its core.

    There is something enchanting about C V Sreeraman’s Puram Kazhchakal that Lal Jose adapts for the big screen. Seldom does the focus of a story shift so vagrantly across from an individual to the next as in this notable film that portrays a nameless man (Mammootty) aboard a bus trudging along a hill terrain. His anger and impatience at the slow moving vehicle is being amusedly watched by a fellow passenger (Sreenivasan) who gulps down his own memories with a sigh. The last scene is harrowing and quite unforgettable, and leaves a lot of questions that form a part of this intense film’s power. It banks on some of those vital moments in our lives when we pause and experience reality; reflect on what had happened before and on what is yet to come. A brilliant way to sign off the anthology, Puram Kazhchakal doesn’t disappoint a bit.

    This collection of ten shorts never depends on star power to get its message across. And there are instances when a director surprises you, moving totally away from his benchmark and cooking up a revelation, while some others stick on to conventions. It’s to be noted that it’s too fleeting a glance that each one of these stories offers us, even as they reflect on the grave reality around. And with such varied themes floating around, the results could only be mixed as well.

    There is a little bit here to suit every viewer’s taste, and hence it’s unlikely that any viewer would walk out of the theatre let down. What falls flat for me, works for you and it might even be the other way round. Open up this box of assorted candies, and you see them all laid out on a salver, quite uneven in manner and matter, posture and perspective and yet it all builds into something quite incredible that makes this ambitious enterprise a fascinating filmic feast.

    http://www.nowrunning.com/movie/6976/malayalam/kerala-cafe/review.htm

11. Comment by Prem S G:
    November 2, 2009 @ 9:00 am

    First of all thanks to Renjith for this brave attempt we had got a different teater
    experience
    ANWAR RASHEED’S Bridge the most prominent film the mom & the cat grabs a corer in the viewers heart
    Also makal, puramkazhchakal,island express, Happy journey, Off Season All are
    well maked (I dont want blame the Lighting in makal is OK )

    The Mrithunjayam was not fit for the theme But Not so bad

    Shaji kailas once again disappointed us Lalitham Hiranmayam is zero among this

12. Comment by Anand:
    November 2, 2009 @ 12:59 pm

    Watched kerala cafe @ TVM Sri Padmanabha… Great work.. Ranjith ji..
    My Rating:
    1:Bridge
    2:Island express
    3:Puram kazhchakal
    4: Happy journey
    5:Makal
    6:Off season
    7: Mrithyunjaya
    8: Nostalgia
    9:Aviramam
    10:lalitham hiranmayam

13. Comment by anu jefin:
    November 4, 2009 @ 4:11 am

    hello all

    went through a wonderful experinece called kerala cafe’
    very proud to say i am from calicut\sam etown of ranjith

    who else wud have dared to make a film like this? i challenge…

    on the whole it felt like a single film but for one- horror film

    it was not gelling with the whole scheme-
    but again ranjiths decision to have a horror film or a different film is justified.

    my picks
    1.bridge
    2.happy journey
    3.mritynjayam
    4.makal
    5.puramkaazhchkal
    6.aviramam
    7.island express
    8.offseason
    9.nostalgia
    10.lalitam hiranmayam

    4.

14. Comment by ramesh chandran r:
    November 12, 2009 @ 2:53 pm

    kerala cafe has done a commendable performance.
    The best among ten short movies is “BRIDGE”..scripted by ANWAR RASHEED…its a great work …..

    ratings

    1)**********BRIDGE 10/10***********(superb)
    2)HAPPY JOURNEY 9.5/10
    3)MAKAL 9/10
    4)PURAMKAZHCHAKAL 8/10
    5)MRITYUNJAYAM 7.5/10
    6)ISLAND EXPRESS 7/10
    7)NOSTALGIA 6/10
    8)AVIRAAMAM 5/10
    9)OFF SEASON 4/10
    10)LALITHAM HIRANMAYAM 2.5/10

    these kind of works are expected more in future….
    the audience should encourage these type of movies…
    the new gen youngsters will get a chance to meet the reality through these films
    kudos to renjith sir
    special congraz to anwar rasheed for a master work…
    and special applause to salimkumar,kottarakara shantha,
    jagathy and mamooty….
    this is a must watch movie
    the rating is 9.5/10
    shyama prasad has let down the audience….off season is a bad work

15. Comment by ചെലക്കാണ്ട് പോടാ:
    November 16, 2009 @ 2:57 am

    yes a movie to be watched
    a different treatment 10 diff stories, or 10 different ways of story telling

    bridge and puramkaazchakal stands aloof(excellently)
    closely followed by Happy Journey(best perfo by jagathy) Makal, Island Express(at first we miss a lot, but climax, it brings back us)

    Aviramam a simple story told in a simple way, which could happen in our life

    Avoidable flicks : Offseason(worst of the lot, a rotten apple spoils the whole), Lalitham Hiranmayam and Nostalgia(plot was ok, but dileep failed miserably)

    and one thing which still haunts me : Mrithyunjayam, Wat did he mean by tat.
    May be he cud create a film which discloses what he meant

    Go watch Kerala Cafe……..

16. Comment by jenson:
    December 4, 2009 @ 8:06 am

    bridge was d best. mammooty rocks with his sheer performance. happy journey and makal comes next best. shajikailas movie is a letdown.