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Chekka Chivantha Vaanam: Mani Ratnam playing it to the Gallery!

PUBLISHED DATE : 29/Sep/2018

Chekka Chivantha Vaanam: Mani Ratnam playing it to the Gallery!

 

Chekka Chivantha Vaanam: Mani Ratnam playing it to the Gallery!
Suhansid Srikanth
Of all the off-late Mani Ratnam films, Chekka Chivantha Vaanam has the wide and heavy enough content to be a slow burner.. metaphorical.. epic kinda saga. Senapathy lives like an unopposed king of a kingdom. The brothers are larger than life humans (especially, Varadan) who are always one step away from relishing the animal they are holding within. The women are vulnerable and get tormented in the middle of these macho men's decisions. There is a blow of Karma in the last 30 minutes of the film that makes you wonder how terrific it would have been to know a bit more of who all these men are!
 
I wish he made it into a film like 'Gangs of Wasseypur'.. two parts.. One that establishes the characters, sets the conflict, tells how Senapathy always lives under the shadows and threats of death, who Rasool is, what's his backstory, what kind of friendship he shares with Varadan, the nature of sons, their businesses and their dysfunctional relationship with family & with each other, Senapathy's death! And other part, where the sons face the aftermaths.. turning against each other.. revenges.. and what they pay for it, leading to the final face off!
 
But ManiRatnam opts with the sleek commercial format! Hence all these epicness shining here and there in the characters pops up in pieces. It makes you want more but leaves you half satisfied or in few scenes, barely satisfying. The beauty of the film is in not giving too much details. Yet it becomes a two way sword for the film itself after a point. We don't see the sons really being shattered by the father's death! But that's the family setup Mani Ratnam wants to address. Sort of like how Azhagiri called for a protest in few days after Karunanidhi's death! The kind of dynastic family where the drive for power is too much that it overrides the emotions!

There is still the Mani Ratnam we look upto! In the dramatic prologue that opens the story where we see series of incidents prepping up, leading to the main conflict.. In that interval shot where camera tops over the empty throne with 5,6 pillows all over it (how effectively the frame tells the story to fore-come).. In the storming wind that hits the windows of Rasool's house as Varadan and Chitra come to hide there.. In the placement of sons as they talk to their father in the hospital.. Thyagu, near to him.. Varadan, a bit far.. and Ethi, far away! There are so many abstract images all over that sort of magnetize emotions into a film which in absolute commercial format! Unlike Kadal, where the imbalanced blend of commercial elements spoiled all the metaphors and heaviness of the theme the characters carried.. here Mani Ratnam manages to pull the fiery commercial rush. Thanks to the multi-starrer casting!

There are lines that say much more than what they mean. When goons enter Renu's house and ask her where Thyagu is, she gives back, 'Do you tell your wives about where you are going?'. I was intrigued about the character of Aditi, Parvathy, who suggests Varadan to remove the life-support tube of his father. She says that's what she would do if she was in his place. She has the shades of Kalpana from Iruvar who provokes the desire for power in Anandan. She calls Varadan, 'Nawab' and Varadan feels powerful while he is with her. In one scene, she doesn't resist much when Ethi pulls her close and says he won't bat an eyelid to take what and whatever his brother owns. But.. Mani Ratnam leaves all this behind to talk about the story he is interested in. The siblings turning up against each other!
 
I had and still have a weird feeling that Rasool has some sort of attraction towards Chitra. That didn't pop anywhere else except for their first scene together where he calls him the princess of the kingdom and throws that he is not married because she doesn't have a sister. Chitra is way too interesting for a Mani Ratnam woman. She is commanding. She handles the household and even the power games behind! She is terrific in the scene where she breaks down over phone with Ethi.. repeatedly asking, 'Nallaa iruppiyaa Thambi nee?'. She can remind you of Sasi in being the helpless woman caught in the battles of men. But for that matter, all the women in CCV come across that way!
 
Also, one can sense that Renu doesn't share a happy relationship with Thyagu. She says a tragic news about his parents like an info and leaves in no time. Look at the scene where she has to share the Lift with the father and sons. She looks annoyed about the family talking violence. That comes up even more strongly when she numbly avoids Thyagu in the prison saying, 'This is where you should be! This is a black mark in me!'.
 
I couldn't buy why Chitra had to be taken to the hospital, undergo a surgery to remove the bullet and end up dying while Varadan confesses his biggest reveal. The emotion would have sulked us all had it been on their way to the hospital. Now, one moment, she looks all cured and recovering.. and out of nowhere, she is dead! The film, on the whole, looks like a stitched up piece of a huge story with several segments deleted or left out.
 
Jayasudha's character, Lakshmi, is crucial to the core of CCV. It is her emotions that somewhat stays alive in the otherwise 'no time for emotions' in men's world of a film! She gets one of the most powerful mirror moments of Mani Ratnam's, where she helplessly watches her sons fight over their father's throne. The mirror truly reflects the conscience here! There is a brilliant moment where Lakshmi looks at her sons from a distance. We hear 'Bhoomi Bhoomi' again, with camera slowly rising up as the shadows of a thorned tree falls as reflection in the glass in front of her! This is after the night where Senapathy tells her that one of her sons has set up the explosion. We see an alarming threat in her face.. a strange foreseeing of the tragedy that's intruding the family.
 
At one point, she pleadingly tells Ethi that she has lost his father and husband tragically and before she could finish her sentence Ethi asks her back, 'Then what about Chaaya?'. This agony in Ethi about the family being disconcerned about Chaaya's death comes often. When he meets Thyagu, the first thing he asks for is why he didn't even call and care for Chaaya's death. Even, in the climax, he confronts him about why he never questioned Varadan about Chaaya's death while he could ask about Renu being imprisoned.
  
For all the wavy inconsistency in the initial portions of second half.. the latter part makes up to it. Here the characters burst out to the extremity of the madness they can go for! Varadan, after loosing all that he has.. breaks into this beast who finally cracked his meaning of life as zero. I loved how he called the goon to fight, 'Vaa da Cipher!'. That hit a very different landing altogether. And 'Praaptham', the terrific theme song of the film takes over there. 'Aasai theeyil logam vegumbodhu.. Vaanum, mannum chekka chivakkum!' (How I wish they released this song as first single to set the mood of the soundtrack or film!) 

Also, Thyagu becomes this maniac being driven by the glittering call of power! In one stunner moment, he literally jumps into the throne and feels like the king! The shot that follows as he goes to the terrace of the house has the red sun shimmering all over the glass leading to the bloody bath. The glass house does makes you think about the fragility of safety from threats the family shares.

The usage of songs are interesting. It sounds jarring at the first watch given the number of times the mixed up bits and pieces of 'Sevandhu Pochu Nenju' and 'Bhoomi Bhoomi' pop up. But, perhaps that's what Mani Ratnam wanted to do. The rush in the enmity of the story is driven by the score and editing as well. Vairamuthu effortlessly packs the story in 'Thappu thappaa thappuga senje.. Thappu arinjum thappuga senje.. Sevandhu pochu nenju!'. The dots are connected by the songs.

I would have been super happy if the film was more deeper.. if it ignored the vague parts like one where Mansoor Ali Khan plays like a clown to escape Thyagu and Ethi caught up in Kathmandu.. if it had a clear picture of Rasool's character arc.. if it had more silence and pauses for the moments to linger.. but, as of now, am just sort of enjoying the mainstream appeal and success the film is receiving, given how ruthlessly his flawed but much finer works like Raavanan, Kadal or Kaatru Veliyidai were written off. Or in Rasool's own words.. 'The operation Red Sky is successfully completed with not much collateral damage!'

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