On Feb 22, Chidambaram and team gifted Malayalam film lovers with a surreal theatrical experience: Manjummel Boys. For starters, the film is a survival thriller based on a true tale of 11 friends who encountered an unforeseen mishap while tripping at Kodaikanal in 2006.
As I walked out of the theatre, I was thinking about all the survival thrillers we’ve hitherto seen in Malayalam – Malooty, Carbon, Helen, Malayankunju, etc. Nothing felt more correlated to MB than Malayankunju; both films were centred on underground rescue missions carried out by laymen who weren’t trained for the event.
Now, I watched both these films on the first day, entering the theatre with the same level of hype and reading zero reviews. And while both films were technically sound, I couldn’t help but reckon that MB was way more engrossing to watch than Malayankunju. (Obviously, the level at which a film engrosses the viewer is a subjective metric and this opinion is based on some reflections and some preliminary conversations with friends. If you think otherwise, feel free to express your views in the comments section).
But what makes Manjummel Boys so engaging?
The Backdrop of Friendship
Malayankunju and Manjummel Boys can be termed as survival thrillers, of course, but at the core of it, they are different films. The former is a political film that addresses modern-day casteism, and the latter is a film about the depth (pun intended) of friendships. The hearts of both films are in the right place, but the stories hit at different amplitudes – MB hitting home harder.
Malayankunju‘s one-liner: “A casteist man encounters a deadly landslide that changes him into an egalitarian human being.” It’s a pretty basic story, so if they were to make it interesting, there had to be some parts of Anikuttan’s characterisation that intrigued us pre-landslide. But Anikuttan was a fairly one-note, plain unlikeable character for a large part of the film, and hence the actual survival portions of the film aren’t able to evoke a sense of unreal fear in us. Because one, we don’t like this guy. And two, the guy will end up saving the lower-caste girl because that’s the moral of this story.
Meanwhile, Manjummel’s story of camaraderie is more palatable, relatable and therefore emotionally engaging. We have all been on trips with our closest set of friends, and we’ve all seen bursts of manic energy on these trips. There are always a couple of extra-daring (or extra-inebriated) blokes who try to up the ante with some risky paripadis. MB pushes you to reflect on how nostalgia and trauma are just an unforeseen mishap away from each other.
You root for Subhash, because you do not – even in a pop culture sense – want to associate trips with tragedy. Moreover, you root for – and low-key aspire to have – the solid friendship that binds these 11 boys together through the storm. We often hear this one dialogue (or its equivalents) from our moms – “Avan kuzhiyil chaadiya neeyum chaaduo?” MB is that rare story where a friend forsakes all logic and dives into a fatal space for the sake of friendship. My colleague Shahabas, in his poignant IG review of the film, mentioned walking out of the theatre with just one thought: “Do I have one friend who would risk their life to save mine?”
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Intuitive set design
The real pulp in survival thrillers is the third act, where the audiences are given a shotgun seat as the characters desperately attempt to rescue the victims (or themselves). Coincidentally, it is the third act that MB nails to near-perfection, while taking the audience along the precarious path taken by Kuttan (Soubin Shahir) to rescue Subhash (Sreenath Bhasi). MB had a well-planned trajectory for the rescue mission. Full props to art director Ajayan Chalissery and cinematographer Shyju Khalid for designing and capturing an easy-to-follow, yet realistic downward trajectory in the cave.
I have a theory: when the rescue trajectory is clear in the audience’s head – almost like a mind map – they are better connected to the narrative. (One of the reasons A Quiet Place worked for me was the neat set design and the clarity that the film gave us about the layout of their house. Made things way more engaging.) In MB, we get to see – from top to bottom – the journey that Kuttan takes to get to Subhash. We are familiarized with the ups and downs he encounters in the rocky terrain. So when Kuttan starts off on his journey to the top – carrying a near-unconscious Subhash – we are on the same page as him; we have a fair idea about how tedious it’s going to be.
In the case of Malayankunju, we closely followed Anikuttan (Fahad) through all the haphazard directions he scrambled through in search of Ponni, but it became difficult to build a mind map or even gauge how close or far he was from victory. (Yes, a landslide situation is intrinsically more chaotic than a kuzhiyil veena situation. Not holding it against Malayankunju.)
Sushin Shyam’s approach to scoring in Manjummel Boys
Disclaimer: I am a huge AR Rahman fanboy, so don’t consider what I’m about to say as Rahman-bashing.
If you look at 127 Hours and Malayankunju – the two survival thrillers scored by Rahman – there is something in common. He likes to retain his musicality in scoring films. In 127 Hours, he bases his score heavily on the guitar (which he believes is a representation of the lead character’s resilience and energy). On a similar note, the score of Malayankunju is heavy on keys. The melody adds an element of drama to the proceedings. In many instances, it is aimed at tugging at your heartstrings while in others, it is to emphasize the emotions that Anikuttan goes through during the rescue mission. All in all, fairly musical – reminding you constantly that this is a film and there’s nothing to be too tense about.
Coming to MB, Sushin designs a soundscape that makes the viewer feel the cold, the darkness and the uncertainty in the cave. We do not get music, but ‘sounds’ that contribute to this chilling effect, almost akin to those used in a horror film. In an interview last year, Sushin talked about how he and his associates made an instrument for this film’s score. Chidambaram later talked about the nightmarish sounds that this instrument produced. This approach to the genre elevates the mood, especially in the second half.
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The aforementioned were 3 factors that I believe were most crucial in elevating Manjummel Boys. Upon further thought, I realized there are other aspects too – probably not as significant, but still contribute to the superiority of the final product:
1. The inclusion of only value-adding dialogues in the rescue portions of MB as compared to dramatic rehashes of the same dialogue (“Ponni! Karayalle mole!” x 500) in Malayankunju
2. The “true story” tag, which makes viewers genuinely curious about how the boys overcame what seemed like a logistical nightmare
3. The comedic, light-hearted approach in the first half of MB that works well as a snapshot of the boys’ friendship (as opposed to some done-to-death drama in Malayankunju)
After the Manjummel Boys experience, I’m really piqued to see more films in the survival drama genre – hopefully more true stories; stories of resilience and grit that inspire us more than any Ranjith Shankar- Jayasurya movie could. Hmmm, speaking of true-story survival dramas, the much-awaited Aadujeevitham is coming in March. Will AJ take over the “Scene maattum” crown from MB? Drop your thoughts and expectations in the comments below!
