Skip to main content

To Let

Director: Chezhiyan
Cast: Santhosh Sreeram, Sheela Rajkumar, Dharun 

In a scene from Chezhiyan’s award-winning To Let, Ilango (Santhosh Sreeram) and Amudha (Sheela Rajkumar), break their heads and savings to make ends meet. As Amudha brings out her last ounce of savings that she had stored between the pages of her bible, their son, Siddharth (Dharun), brings out his hundi and places it between his parents. A regular film would’ve made that kid as an unnecessarily mature character who has probably understood the grave situation and is willing to let go of what he has saved for the betterment of the family. But To Let, unexpectedly, does what you’d expect a kid to do. Seeing his mother holding a handful of notes, he had brought the hundi and Amudha too plays along by inserting a hundred rupee note at its mouth, only for Ilango and Siddharth to push it down.

That’s one of the many times To Let’s realism would remind you of Balu Mahendra’s cult classic Veedu – a comparison that you’re ought to see in every review for this film. Set in the year 2007, at the peak of the IT boom, Ilango’s little nest gets disturbed thanks to their landlord wanting to milk more money from their house by renting it out to the new techie crowd. The story then follows the trials and tribulations of Ilango’s family as they try to get along their everyday lives as well as find a new place. Though the storyline might actually sound wafer-thin, Chezhiyan pads up the film with a lot of other issues. There’s the fact that Ilango works in the film industry and how that’s cited to be a reason why they can’t really get a house easily – along with many other factors such as how they’re not ‘vegetarians’.  In a classic problem that arises when trying to elevate one’s social status, the family finds itself in a dilemma of opting for a mediocre place in exchange for better living conditions or actually choosing a better place by tightening up the budget and reducing other expenses such as fuel and mobile recharges.

The way Chezhiyan etches characters that has no glimpse of melodramaticism in them is evitable in more than one occasion. Santhosh fits in neatly as the breadwinner of the family who, thanks to his job’s nature, doesn’t have a fixed salary. His patience in putting up with what life throws at him seems to be something that his career of a wannabe filmmaker seems to have taught him. After a commendable performance in last week’s Malayalam film Kumbalangi Nights, Sheela is a perfect choice for Amudha – the quintessential housewife who is sound enough to make an argument when she loses her temper, but naive enough to think of getting into an MLM scheme in order to do her bit for the family. Her innocence is exemplified every time happiness and sadness in her life is reflected in her innocent smiling and vehement crying. Dharun’s character is a personification of his family’s plight – someone who excels in drawing and painting but is forced to erase his works off the walls – just because he had to.

Despite being similar to Veedu as a one-liner, which was a major selling point for Balu Mahendra film was Ilaiyaraja’s music. But To Let lets go of the tradition once again and relies on the live sounds such as that of traffic and screeching ceiling fan. On the technical front, Sreekar Prasad’s editing makes sure there’s no lag in the slow-moving screenplay. In some scenes, the frames are intentionally not moved despite the characters moving out of it in order to leave it to the audience to determine the intensity of the emotions that the scene carries. Such nifty touches and displaying the plight of a lower-middle-class family without letting go of realism makes To Let a film that wouldn’t vacate your mind for a while.

My rating: 3.5/5

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Vijay and Vijay Sethupathi shoulder a mediocre film: Master Review

A flawed protagonist and a powerful antagonist have always proven to be successful tropes in the world of cinema. The hero, when being anything but perfect, makes way for a beautiful story arc as he convalesces and a strong villain makes the hero’s triumph at the end larger. Despite having both of these, Vijay’s Master feels far from a perfect flick thanks to succumbing to irregular pacing and a middling screenplay. Master follows the trials and tribulations of JD (Vijay), an alcoholic college professor whose valiant effort towards the student community plants a belief in his colleague Charu (Malavika Mohanan) that he would be able to do the same to the kids in a juvenile correction centre that needs… correction. Armed with a just kada, a classic four-wheeler, a Persian cat and a cool pair of sunglasses, JD embarks on a journey that will collide with that of Bhavani’s (Vijay Sethupathi). On paper, Master looks like a failproof star vehicle – the story of a man out there to teach lesson

Munna Bhai Dhaba, Sullurpet, Andhra Pradesh

  This time, we rode almost 100 kms to discover this hidden gem. Located at the ever busy NH16, Munna Bhai Dhaba is one of those places that dishes out some delicious food for you to cherish en route to your destination. Just that, this time it was our destination. After starting at 8:30PM from Chennai, we reached here around 10ish and by that time some items were unfortunately sold out. Out of 10, 6 of us were hardcore carnivores while the rest of them were Eggetarians. We opted for a couple of Chicken dishes which included Munna Bhai special chicken (a yummy starter with sauteed chicken and cashews) and a couple more Chicken dishes which are named after the states of our country. One such dish was the which had an egg base with piping hot Chicken curry on top which was the star of our dinner. A surprise show-stealer was the Onion Pakoda which looked bleh but tasted great. Rotis were so warm and fluffy that we finished 40 of them in no time. Egg Bhurji was apparently good too. Obvious

Sowcarpet Food Walk

The primitive man wandered through forests in search of food to satiate his cravings and I suppose it’s the same primal instinct that makes the modern man wander through concrete forests searching for delicious quick bites in order to satisfy his hankering. This is the essence of a food walk and as far as Chennai is concerned, Sowcarpet is the Mecca for food walks. Sowcarpet is the most tried and tested place for these walks and thanks to a number of foodies who are seniors and predecessors in this topic, we were able to plan our trip perfectly and we executed it flawlessly.   The options of commuting: 1. Parking is a huge issue during weekdays but not a problem on a Sunday morning in the Sowcarpet area. You can drive your cars through those narrow streets and you would be able to find a sidestreet where you could park. Alternatively you could park near the Flower Bazaar police station and walk down too. Just be aware of the one way roads in the area. Mint Street is one way starting fr