Any way this is what I would give, if I was a member of any award jury.

Best Director – Lijo Jose Pellisserry – City of God
Best Screenplay – Shyam Pushkaran & Dileesh Nair- Salt N’ Pepper
Best Actor – Indrajith – City of God
Best Actress – Kavya Madhavan – Khaddama
Best Cinematography – Shyju Khaild – Traffic & Salt N’Pepper
Best Editing – Manoj – City of God
Best Music (bgm) – Prashant Pillai – City of God
Best Supporting Actor – Jagathy Sreekumar – Urumi
Best Supporting Actress – Parvathi Menon – City of God

Best Film – Traffic- Listen Stephen
Best Popular Film – Indian Rupee – Prithviraj, Santhosh Sivan, Shaji Nateshan

Special Jury Mention:
Jayasurya – Beautiful (actor)
Sameer Thahir – Chappa Kurish (director)
Anoop Menon – Beautiful (screen writer)
Santosh Sivan – Urumi (cinematographer)

Editor’s Note: Reader comments are welcome. Any comments with words ChinaTown, Tejabhai etc would be deleted- vc

What is it with Malayalam Cinema these days?  Is it the ‘OLF’ invasion(my friend whose dad runs a theatre in Ernakulam district says that except for Vijay’s Velayudham’ all the OLF released in recent times have failed miserably after the initial hype and hoopla died down and will cause heavy losses to it’s kerala distributors!) that’s doing the damage?  Or should theMalayalee film makers who make outdated stuff be blamed?  Or is it a problem with the Malayalee audience who prefer watching everything via Youtube or Torrent to going to a nearby cinema hall?

Maverick film maker Ram Gopal Verma recently said:  ’when a movie flops,itdoesn’t mean that all the money that a producer invested in it has vanishedinto thin air but it simply implies the poor guy could nt make the public pay for the losses that he had incurred from a director ,actor(s), and the technicians involved in making a movie’.  This year we have not only seen many producers going bankrupt making super star disasters like ‘Doubles’(Reels On Wheel Entertainment), Train (Harvest movie makers),  Bombay March 12(RedRose Creations), Teja Bhai Family (Anantha Visions),  Orma Mathram (HorizonMovies ), Arjunan Sakshi(SRT Films) but also some really promising debutant investors making a mark with meaningful yet commercially succesful ventures like  Traffic(Magic  Frames), Salt N Pepper(Lucsam Entertainment), Indian Rupee, Urumi(August Cinemas). One of it’s offering even made it as the country’s official entry to the Academy Awards(Adaminte Makan Abu). So definitely things are not that bleak . It’s easy to write it off by saying ‘Make good movies,we will watch it’. But then were movies like  Sandesham,  Thaniyavarthanam (now considered as cult classics)  hits at the time of their theatrical release?  The answer is a big, emphatic  No!  Here  we try to analyse some possible ways which can at least help the aspiring producers/film makers in  not making big flops  in the future!

1.Make Movies based on realistic/contemporary/innovative themes:

Be it Traffic, Salt N pepper, Indian Rupee, Urumi, Seniors(a sex comedy with a some what innovative premise) all the movies which  made a mark this year had something fresh to offer. The same Malayali who booed and trashed stale stuff like ‘Kudumbasree Travels, Teja Bhai, Ulakam Chuttum Valibhan flocked to cinemas and made movies like Seniors, Urumi hits. Remember, at least 50% of movies success is based on how good the script is, script should be the super star!

2. Recognize your target audience and time the release accordingly:

Like in any other bussiness, movie making should also be based on market requirements. You can’t expect a sober movie like Pranayam (even if how good/bad it is) to do well in a festive season when some quality entertainment is what every one is looking for in theaters. Had it not been released in the long summer vacation period, we don’t think an utter nonsense like ‘China Town would have made this much money. Similarly the lack of competition helped a    not-so-great offering like Make-Up Man a success.

3. Make Movies within realistic budgets:

Malayalam Cinema is a small entity.It’s high time that our beloved filmmakers realised this. Any Malayalam  movie made with a budget of over 4-5 crores(unless it’s a multi lingual with a Pan Indian cast) spells danger(Anwar,Saagar Alias Jackey,Dubai,Pattalam-to name a few). Moreover no Malayali watches a malayalam movie to see gimmicks/pale imitations of their western-North Indian counterparts being played out. What’s the point inwasting crores when all that you have got to show is a hero(the middleaged,out of shape one or the Young/handsome one) dressed in super cool clothes walking in ultra slo-mo  or him riding a royal enfield motor cycle multiple times? The relevant thing here is that even this year’s blockbuster ‘salt N Pepper’ was a super success only in terms of it’s ROI(5.5-6 crores total gross against an investment of 1.7-1.8 crores). No onereally knows what the real figures of big budget starrers like Christian Brothers(rumoured to be around 12-14 crores), China Town(rumored to be around 8-9 crores). If aMalayalam movie is made within a realistic budget (somewhere around 2.5-3 crores) even if the movie fails in the box office ,the chances of the producer recovering his money through the non-theatrical revenue (satellite,Home video,misc rights) are very high. Which means a producer can even go on to make money out of a movie which had done only average business in it’s theatrical run(Manikyakallu – Gowri Lakhmi movies;Janapriyan -SpotlightVisuals;3 Kings – VNM creations ).

4.Sell your movie in un tapped markets:

There is a saying that’ even in Moon,you might see a Malayalee running atea shop. So far the major chunk of overseas revenue for a Malayalam moviehas been from the middle east. Thanks to the ultra quality youtube, Torrent prints we have lost many markets like the U.S. and U.K.where large number of malayalis have found themselves as migrants. However what the producers don’t realize is that if they make the legal prints of their movies available for the NRI users (i.e for IP addresses except Indian and the middle east)in reputed  websites/you tube on a pay-per-view basis they can still make money out of it).

5.Working on the remuneration of the lead actors:

In Malayalam Cinema, it’s often said that more than 60 percent of the Cost of Production(COP) lies in the remuneration of the lead actors. The 2 superstars of Malayalam Cinema are said to charge about Rs.1.5 crores. So for an average Malayalam superstar movie which costs about 4-5 crores , the effective fund for making the movie is somewhat between 1.5-2 crores. We all know that Kerala is not a place where people would simply flock to theatres just to watch a Mohanlal romancing a teenager half  his age or a Mammootty playing a hide and seek with a North Indian actress. If that wasn’t  the case movies like Alexander the great,  Doubles would have atleast got an opening. The other day someone was heard saying:  ’Don’t make movie with a Superstar unless you have got the kind of money that they ask for’!  But what these people don’t realise is that this concept of ‘superstardom’ is not working in Kerala anymore! Most of the mainstream (higly paid)actors in Malayalam Cinema have their own production houses. From the bussiness point of view don’t you think it would be more viable if the producers (of the 2 M,Dilip,Prithviraj movies) can strike a deal with the production houses of their lead actors and work in a ‘symbiotic’ manner. This means a movie which cause loss to it’s  producer would also mean loss to the actor’s production house(i.e a reduction in the actor’s  standard remuneration) and a profit  means an incentive to the actor also(in addition to his existing remuneration,of say 1.5 crore he would receive a part of the profit also). I believe that If such a system comes  the bigger stars with all the experience that they have got would at least refrain from doing shits like ‘College Kumaran‘, The Train etc and stop betraying their ever loyal audience.

Wishing Malayalam Cinema all the best!
References
1. http://www.sanscinema.com/malayalam-movies-of-2011/

http://www.sify.com/movies/salt-pepper-is-a-blockbuster-news-malayalam-li1mv0jdeeb.html

http://www.sanscinema.com/2011/11/malayalam-top-5-week-ending-october-27-2011/

2.The film producers association list of the succesful films list of 2010.
3.The converstion that i had with Mr Nandakumar,Nandanafilms(Thaniyavarthanam,Yadavam et al)
4.The conversation that i had with  my friend who is the son of a leadingfilm exhibitor in the ekm district.

The film was originally titled Arabiyum Ottakavum P Madhavan Nairum (Arab, Camel and P Madhavan Nair) and the addition (In Oru Maruboomikkadha–A desert tale) was added after certain groups raised objections to the word Arab.

What else was happening in Kerala at this time?

Every sector in Malayalam film industry is gunning for each other and in the process there is total deadlock.

The film industry organisations have various reasons to go on a strike.
First the Kerala Film Exhibitors Federation (KFEF), the powerful organisation which controls the theatres in the states ‘A’ class centres, refused to screen new Malayalam releases.
They wanted the Minister in charge of cinema Ganesh Kumar to withdraw his statement regarding the scrapping of service charge on cinema tickets.

The Kerala Film Distributors Association (KFDA) hit back and said that they will stop the release of OLF (other language films) from November 11. The move is in protest against the KFEF’s decision not to screen Malayalam films from November 1. KFEF had screened OLF Diwali films- 7aum Arivu, Velayudham and RA. 1 etc successfully in Kerala which irked the Malayalam film industry. Adding to that:

Production has also come to a standstill as films that were originally planned for Christmas like Mammootty’s King & Commissioner and Mohanlal’s Casanovva will now get pushed to January 2012.

And that is when we found the right terminology to explain what is happening in Malayalam cinema. It is called Dunning-Kruger effect. Wikipedia explains it as follows

The Dunning–Kruger effect is a cognitive bias in which unskilled people make poor decisions and reach erroneous conclusions, but their incompetence denies them the metacognitive ability to recognize their mistakes.[1] The unskilled therefore suffer from illusory superiority, rating their ability as above average, much higher than it actually is, while the highly skilled underrate their own abilities, suffering from illusory inferiority.

If this does not explain Malayalam cinema we don’t know what does.

We hope the same groups which objected to the word ‘Arab’ are made the in charge of MACTA as soon as possible.

The Kerala theatres which used to screen mostly Malayalam films will be taken over by Other Language Films (OLF) from Diwali day (October 26). OLF means Tamil and Hindi films.

The two major Tamil films releasing for Diwali are Vijay’s Velayudham and Suriya’s7aum Arivu. Plus the Hindi film of Shah Rukh Khan RA One. Vijay, Suriya and Shah Rukh are very popular in Kerala, and all the three command an opening.

The OLF Diwali movies have taken over most of the screens in key towns. They are releasing big and as per trade sources Vijay’s Velayudham is opening in 111 screens, Suriya’s 7aum Arivu too is opening in 111 screens! SRK’s RA One at the last count is opening in 81 screens![OLF takes over Kerala box-office!]

It is like playing the same tape over and over again. The various alphabet soup organizations like MACTA, FEFKA, PEPSI, COKE etc need to stop banning people and get out of family feuds and prepare and five year vision for Malayalam Cinema. You know, do some kind of serious thinking. Can bringing back the studio system help? Will getting bigger movies with the involvement of UTV like money bags help? Will investing in more multiplexes help? That kind of thinking. You can find some such posts in our archives. But if you release movies like China Town, Christian Brothers or Arjunan Sakshi, people will seek refuge in OLF.

[coauthored with Nikhi Menon]

In the finale of Munch Star Singer Junior Mr. Jagathi Sreekumar made a speech in which he came out against the anchor Ranjini Haridas. Mimicking her style of speaking, which is Malayalam with an English accent, he said that the anchor should just do anchoring and should not have any opinion on the singing. You can see the video to realize the scorn he has for this anchor.

We have watched many finale episodes of Idea Star Singer and Munch Star Singer and never have seen a guest speak like this. Usually people come and say a few mild words of encouragement, show some stardom and go away. Jagathi instead gave a speech in which he went on and on and defined how people should behave. He praised Sujatha and Venugopal and ranted on Renjini who was standing next to him. In her own words:

Just the other day I was the victim of an individual who took advantage of his right to freedom of speech to publicly embarrass and ridicule me. Moreover, all this happened on national television! The man in question, who from now I shall refer to as Mr Moon, clearly overstepped the limits of what to say when and where, and to my agravation, had no regard or respect for the event at hand or the people concerned

Now you may like or dislike Renjini’s style of compering or her way of talking or having her own opinions. She is a very competent compere very able to handle any situation thrown at her. When some singers stop singing or have trouble, she very ably handles it. She is very opinionated and if you have watched her retorts at Sharath and ‘Sree Kuttan’, you will know she can handle herself quite well. It this personality that makes her a memorable compere compared to others who just utter what is told or do the bare minimum as Jagathi wants.

What Jagathi wants is not her to stop such things, but to stop passing judgement on the songs. He says only judges can pass judgement. Why? As someone who does not know to sing and is not musically trained, she is just like us. She is the common man. Her opinion is from that side and so far we have not found it ‘arochakam’. It never felt odd to us. So why this outburst? Is there another story we are missing here?

Now if she wanted to retort, Renjini could have said that Jagathi should stop acting in all those semi-porn movies, but she did not. She in fact wrote a weak piece in Deccan Chronicle. It is not for her to suggest what Jagathi should do, but such basic courtesy was not extended to her. This is a new low for Jagathi in the past year. We saw this is a new low because this is a man who wallows in the depths of civil behavior. To give another example, last year he was on television talking about his marriage to Mallika Sukumaran. At some point they divorced and he explained that the divorce ‘may’ have been due to their caste.

So the anchor asked once more if she ever mentioned anything like that and he said she did not. So in reality, he still has no idea why she left, but by throwing a caste issue into the mix he muddied the water. You can say, he did a Thilakan at that moment.

So we have few options for analysis. We can do the whole ‘savarna-avarna’ thing. Or we can notice that Jagathi rants mostly against strong women and dump some anti-feminism on him. But then this would be like trying to write a review of ‘Pokkiri Raja’ or ‘Sagar Alias Jackie’ when in fact there is a simpler explanation.

Nelbin raises an interesting point:

It was absolutely a scandalous behaviour from Jagadhi to say scathing comments about Ms.Haridas and the program she is hosting at such a big ceremony watched all over the world .Jagdhi managed to pull in great crowd support for his outrageous remarks on Ms.Hardis as they booed and jeered at her with the every word he uttered. Sadly Jagathi and those guys represent the last generation of malayalees with parochial attitude who take pleasure in taunting others in public

Yes, Jagathi does have the right to express his views and no one can blame him if he believes that Renjini and co are abusing our mother tongue with her ‘manglish’ but is this the way to show his disapproval? Shouldn’t he had shown the courtesy to tell her his views in person?

At this point, let’s look how Ms Renjini reacted to this insult. She could have easily retorted to him in the same manner or could have even did a ‘Sreesanth’(remember the bhajji-slap-incident?) but the brave girl that she is,maintained her calm and carried on with the show as if nothing had happened..!(C’mmon,thats’ what we call dignity,isn’t it?.)Mr. Jagathy instead of blessing and enlightening the ‘junior star singer’ winners about the potential film offers that could come their way(whom in all probabilities will be forgotten by every one,including jagathy by the next season of the show) chose to play it to the galleries and win himself some cheap publicity by dissing Ms Haridas in national television.

Jagathi is one of the greatest actors of Malayalam cinema on par with Nedumudi Venu, Thilakan, Mohanlal and Mammotty. But that does not make him a great human being. During the time of Prem Nazir, Jayan and Sathyan we did not have this much media coverage and we did not know how they were in real life. Now thanks to the 24 hour media and due to the willingness of these stars to throw up whatever comes to their mind on TV, we know what kind of scumbags they really are.

Rough looking chronic-bachelor Kalidasan(Lal)is a government employee working as an archaeologist at the museum. And heavyset chronic-spinster Maya(Shweta Menon) is a dubbing artist in the movie industry. The younger generation is represented by Manu(Asif Ali) who is Kalidasan’s nephew staying with him while job-hunting in the city and Meenakshi(Mydhili) who is Maya’s rental roommate at the home-cum-beauty parlour owned by Mariya(Kalpana). Kalidasan is a food lover and is practically married to his dexterous resident cook Babu(Baburaj). Maya finds solace in her lonely life through cooking and savoring memories of her lost mother. A wrong cellphone order for “Thattil kutti Dosa” connects Kalidasan and Maya and the rest of the story unfolds in front of our eyes in the most hilarious way possible.

Few of the scenes that stand out for their innovation and/or boldness:

• Maya being a dubbing artist enables the movie to directly poke fun at the typical cliched romantic scenes found in Malayalam cinema. Maya herself is laughing at the outdated dialogues that she is told to dub. The question raised “Nammalenthaada ingane?” in the movie-within-movie is actually addressed to the whole Malayali community.

• Being a foodie, Kalidasan’s bride-seeing event at the girl’s house ends up with him instead falling in love with their resident male cook who had prepared unni-appam for the event. The cook elopes with the groom-to-be!

• I really liked the guts of the director to show a very realistic scene where Maya, Meenakshi and Mariya are celebrating new-year with booze. Maya eventually passes out drunk, lamenting about her life. Yes, we have seen intoxicated heroines in prior movies like Spadikam etc. but the intention there was solely comic relief.

• Did we witness the first ever romantic lip-to-lip kiss shown in a Malayalam mainstream movie? The director’s effort to innovatively use props like a tire-swing, a bridge across rivulet etc. to decently picturize a kissing scene that advances progressively from head to forehead to lips needs to be applauded. This historic first kiss executed in any other way probably could have be irked conservative family audience who are not used to such visuals in public. I am talking about picturization of the melodious duet “Kanamullal” composed by Bijilal and immortalised by Shreya Goshal and Ranjit.

• The audience were chuckling at the light-hearted purdah jokes that occur at the beauty parlour. Glad that it is coming from a Muslim director like Ashiq Abu himself.

The writer duo Syam Pushkaran & Dileesh Nair reminds us that script really is the king. Two movies old Ashiq Abu can now relax and enjoy the success of his path-breaking movie which is going to be heralded as a milestone in Kerala’s pop culture. In the acting department, Lal and Sweta Menon did a wonderful job, etching their characters to perfection. It felt like the character of Kalidasan was tailor made to suite Lal’s star persona. With Amina, Cheeru, Rathichechi and now Maya under her belt, Shweta Menon is becoming an irreplaceable asset to the Malayalam industry during her comeback innings. Asif Ali and Mydhili also did a convincing job portraying cupid-struck lovers who are attracted to each other but are also anxious because they are forced to hide their true identity. The surprise package of the movie is definitely Baburaj, who the audience is used to seeing only in villain roles. He was literally living as the skillful cook who is a perpetual bachelor practicing Hanuman-seva and body-building, and shares a very strong emotional bond with Kalidasan. There are gay undertones in the way in which the cook is presented and so is the case with Mariya’s assistant at her beauty parlour. It is truly a tribute to Bhagyalakshmi that the voice for Maya, the very first dubbing artist portrayed in a movie, is dubbed by the very first dubbing artist-cum-activist in the world. To Bhagyalakshmi’s credit, she has given a slightly different voice suiting Sweta’s character and body language.

National jury might have awarded the best film of India tag to ‘Adaminte Makan Abu’ which was released last month. But I would rate Salt n’ Pepper as the best movie that came out in 2011. The movie’s message put forward by Kalidasan & Maya is simple and straight forward: “Live to Eat, Live to Love”. Majority of Indians can not relate to hyper-religiousness and nearly suicidal spirituality of Adam’s son Abu. But Food and Love are two things that all of us, including Abu, can relate to. If you haven’t seen this gastronomic-romantic-comedy yet, go sprinkle this Salt n’ Pepper in your soul!

(The author, Kishor Kumar, is well known in Malayalam cyberspace through his RagaKairali web site. He can be reached @ http://ragakairali.blogspot.com )