It's been a good year at the movies.
Subhash K Jha picks his favourite films of 2023 from down south.
Sapta Sagaradaache Ello – Side A
Language: Kannada
Where to watch? Amazon Prime Video
This is a labour of love. In the coming years, it will be acknowledged as a work of art with every component falling flawlessly into place.
True love never felt truer. And more compelling.
Side A takes us on a pilgrimage across a love relationship between two working class dreamers: He is a chauffeur and she's an aspiring singer.
It is a truly unforgettable journey, so immersive that I sat profoundly moved and helplessly unmovable in my seat, waiting for Manu to come out of prison for a crime he didn't commit and be reunited with his soulmate, Priya (Rukmini Vasanth).
The emotions and visuals are beautiful. Hats off to Director Hemanth Rao and his co-writer Gundu Shetty for weaving the two protagonists' lives with threads of compassion and empathy, creating a timeless romance.
The sequel did not communicate the same passion and intensity, but together, the two films are a monumental achievement.
Kaathal: The Core
Language: Malayalam
Would Dilip Kumar or Amitabh Bachchan have agreed to play a closeted gay man stifled in a heterosexual marriage? The answer is an emphatic no.
It is no coincidence that most of the truly pioneering contemporary cinema is emerging from Malayalam cinema. The actors and film-makers in Kerala are fearless.
Mammootty is not short of a miracle. He has already had three releases this year (of which the recent Kannur Squad was a big disappointment).
But his Kaathal: The Coreis flawless in its rendition of a closeted homosexual in a heterosexual marriage, a topic that Indian cinema still shies off.
In spite of going into uncharted territory, the self-congratulatory tone is dexterously eschewed in this excursion into the unmentionable secrets of the heart.
Baby
Language: Telugu
Where to watch? Aha
You may hate this film's characters and their self-serving behaviour, but deep down, you come away with a grudging admiration for the creators of this candid gaze at ordinary lives.
Breaking the rules of the Indian romcom, the Baby of the plot, Vaishnavi, is no damsel in distress.
Played with spunk by Vaishnavi Chaitanya, she is a wannabe social climber (wannabe, because at the end of the long and unsettling film, she doesn't really climb to anywhere), who has been in love with her slum-beloved Anand (Anand Devarakonda) from Class 8.
There are many sequences in this thought-provoking and well-crafted film that leaves a deep impression.
The scene that this reviewer cannot get out of his head is the pre-climax, last meeting of Vaishnavi and Anand on a railway platform bridge where she pleads and pleads, Anand bleeds and bleeds.
It is heartbreaking to see two people in love destroying each other.
King Of Kotha
Language: Malayalam
Where to watch? Disney+ Hotstar
Crafted with the sharp edge of a harpoon, King Of Kotha is a brilliant bloodbath. Bestial and unsparing, it goes through several eras and auras of transformations of skull duggery with transfixing passion.
It is vast in design and spectral in its emotional dynamics.
Starring Dulquer Salmaan and Aishwarya Lekshmi, King Of Kotha is a well-crafted period gangster drama with every actor staying in character.
Director Abhilash Joshiy maintains a sense of rhythm in the narration even when the plot falters.
Month Of Madhu
Language: Telugu
Where to watch? Amazon Prime Video, Aha
Month Of Madhu is a work of immense strengths and some weaknesses. Its ongoing jumps in time passages convey the brutal seamlessness of time.
At the same time, the constantly jugglery made me wonder about the need for so much restless rumination. Perhaps this nervous energy manifests Madhu's (Shreya Navile) temperament.
This is a film about Lekha (Swati Reddy) and Madhu's love and its gradual and irreversible erosion.
There are some exceedingly moving moments between the couple where Madhu rages, Lekha pacifies, her eyes trembling with unshed tears and unspoken remonstration.
Madhu's last meeting with Lekha precipitates a collective meltdown in the audience.
Otta
Language: Malayalam
Oscar-winning sound designer Resul Pookutty's directorial venture Otta (meaning One) is an outright winner.
Emotionally plush and engaging, this is the story of three abused children, who grow up to be a trio of tragic runaway misfits trying to survive, since fitting in seems impossible.
Pookutty and his outstanding writer Kiron Prabhakaran never try to soften the blow. Yet, these are not crybaby victims whining for our sympathy.
They are determined to crawl out of that hell hole which destiny has gifted them. As the narrative travels from Kerala to Tamil Nadu, there is abuse everywhere in Otta.
He plunges into this world of irredeemable grime and punishment with a sensitivity and honesty that make Otta the film to watch out for.
Por Thozhil
Language: Tamil
Where to watch? SonyLIV
There is something solidly engaging about Por Thozhil's fabulous deconstruction of the formulaic cinema.
Sarath Kumar and Ashok Selvan make perfect fits as the cantankerous, unfriendly, cynical senior cop Lokanathan and a shaky rookie Prakash, who learns the ropes from the senior.
The writing in Por Thozhil, a serial killer police procedural with balls, brains and brio, is so focused and original, it feels like a first although we have seen so many films in this chilling genre, right from the time when Hannibal Lectar inspired Raman Raghav, and Anurag Kashyap made a career out of bloodthirsty sagas soaked in blood and marionated in mayhem.
