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Film: "Arabikatha"; Director: Lal Jose; Cast: Sreenivasan,
Indrajith, Zhang Shu Min, Jagathy Sreekumar and Samvritha Sunil;
Writer: Iqbal Kuttipuram; Ratings: *** Director Lal Jose has again
come out with an offbeat subject in "Arabikatha". The film tells
the tale of Keralites working in the Middle East from a totally
different angle. Iqbal Kuttipuram narrates the story of a staunch
Leftist migrating to Gulf to earn money.
'Cuba' Mukundan, played by Sreenivasan, is an idealist. His
title is a testimony to his faith in the reality of his ideals. He
fails to see how corruption has crept into his comrades and their
plot to remove him from the path of their material progress.
They trap 'Society' Gopalan (Nedumudi Venu), Mukundan's father
and the founder of the Leftist movement in his village, in a case
of financial fraud. This shatters Mukundan, who suspends his father
from the membership of the party.
Mukundan also accepts the amount involved on the alleged fraud as
his personal debt to be repaid to the party. But, for that, he has
to go and work in the Middle East, a country which he has always
discouraged his comrades from going.
In the Gulf, Mukundan finds people working and living in terribly
inhospitable conditions to send money back home. When he lands
there, he has big ideas about improving the condition of the people
but no one is ready to lend him an ear.
He is also thrown out of a couple of jobs for displaying his
revolutionary zeal.
The scriptwriter and the director deserve kudos for the film's
realistic depiction of the conditions in which many Keralites work
in the Gulf.
Sreenivasan's performance as Mukundan is subdued and restrained.
He does not go overboard as one feared after seeing his recent
roles.
Indrajith, as a true follower of Mukundan, is earnest. Chinese girl
Zhang Shu Min, with whom Mukundan is besotted, does a good job but
one wishes that her characterisation had been sharper.
Lal Jose succeeds in giving us a film that is way ahead, in quality
and content, of what the Malayalam film industry churns out these
days.
Indo-Asian News Service
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