Varshangalkku Shesham – My Flash Review!

After his previous films in the same genre, Director and Writer Vineeth Sreenivasan continues to overplay the “old school romanticism, feel good and Madras” theme in his latest film – Varshangalkku Shesham (Many Years later). The result is mixed in my opinion as the film works in parts but largely goes flat.

As the film opens, you get a sense of an Iruvar overhang from the visuals, the music and the characters. Two boys in their teens – one with a penchant for reading and writing while the other a gifted musician while away their time in their village as they grow up without any purpose in life. As is the wont in many Malayalam films, the talented musician is mostly drinking and smoking beedis while composing strands of melody in between. The writer, again as is the wont in many Malayalam films is shown cutting his teeth in leftist literature, Shakespeare dramas and writings of Victor Hugo! They both eventually land up in Kodambakkam in Madras in pursuit of a career in films.  The rest of the film is about how both succeed or otherwise in their lives. Now you must have got my Iruvar reference – the Maniratnam classic that was about two gentlemen who had big dreams for themselves in films and pursued them in different ways. The story in the first half would resemble the actual lives of many tried their hands at Kodambakkam in the 70s and 80s.

The story and the screenplay as you can realise, are as stale and predictable as this. The two characters played by Pranav Mohanlal and Dhyan Sreenivasan have been seen by us in many movies before. A bit of novelty comes only in the second half when the movie shifts from the 70’s flashback to the present social media age. In this half, the director goes on a meta trip exposing a lot of things that happen in today’s film world. But to me, even here, the supposedly loud comedy of Nivin Pauly doesn’t land at all. Nivin plays almost himself – a talented actor who is struggling today after a string of flops and who is being accused of putting a lot of weight and being indisciplined. This character to some extent clicks only because of the meta reference once again to Pauly’s life.

Vineeth bravely takes on the issue of “Nepo Kids” through the character of Nivin when the film itself has an array of Nepo kids. Director and male lead – Vineeth and Dhyan are sons of actor Sreenivasan. The other male lead Pranav is the son of Mohanlal. The female lead is the daughter of director Priyadarshan and actress Lissy. The music director Amrit Ramnath is the son of famed Carnatic vocalist Bombay Jayashree.

With Dhyan and Pranav, director Vineeth tries to re-create the chemistry their fathers – Sreenivasan and Mohanlal had brought on the screen in yesteryears in many films. However, he fails miserably with the story treatment shuffling between comedy and pathos inconsistently. In their elderly roles, both are cringy, struggling with their laboured dialogue delivery and make-up. The women characters one of which is played by Kalyani Priyadarshan has limited scope and fails to make a mark.

The film is almost like a musical. The background score and montage songs play almost like live characters – a technique that Vineeth used successfully in his earlier film Hridayam too. The music score by the debutant Amrit Ramnath is impressive. The songs have a strong Carnatic ring to them but with strong Western orchestration. At times, I felt the music to be too overbearing and repetitive but overall plays a key role in the film.

In the second half of the film which showcases how films are made today, an assistant director character played by Basil Joseph (himself an acclaimed Director in Malayalam) keeps using the term “cringy” to dismiss certain ideas pitchforked by others. Ironically for Vineeth none of his assistants seem to have pointed out the same for some of his comedy writing.

I said this of Hridayam. But for the feel-good, nostalgia-evoking aspects, there wasn’t much novel in the film. Unfortunately, the same holds good for Varshangalkku Shesham as well. At best an okay watch film. It’s now streaming on Sony Liv.