Directors Now and Then: Sathyan Anthikad

The first step, and undoubtedly the most difficult, is to decide who is meant to be a Good Movie Maker. Over the time I have provided myself with a whole range of answers, more by implication than by definition. One among those was a fairly straightforward one. A Good Movie Maker is someone who makes a movie, which is not only better than his competitor’s current release, but also better than his own previous movie. So in that case, who are the good moviemakers we now have in Malayalam film industry? Who challenges himself in creating motion pictures, which out-bests his own previous works? Lets bypass this hurdle for the moment, instead of tripping over it without a name to hold on to, and take a look at what happened to our veterans who created magic out of film rolls. Among the notions that follow, I have aimed to focus on a single director per feature, who he was and what he have become. The script or the story is irrelevant here as I am just expressing my thought on the directors and how 30+ years of movie making experience didn’t make them learn the fundamental rules of cinema. 

Lets boot up this feature with the graph of an experienced director of the Malayalam movie industry,

SATHYAN ANTHIKAD (Years Active: 1982- Present)

Then: Sandhesham, Sridharante Onnam Thirumurivu, Nadodikattu.

Now: Rasathanthram, Innathe Chinthavishayam, Katha Thudarunnu.

This is one filmmaker for whom I have the best of my respect. He made many contributions to Malayalam film industry by promoting natural acting, sensible humor and developing character actors. I can’t beat that with 29 years of life experience and a word processor, but as a fan and still a viewer, have to admit and justify my terrible disappointment on his latest movies. 

Sathyan Anthikad used to be a master in Light feel-good movies. He used a linear narrative for his movies, which dealt usually with an average man’s dream. We laughed as we saw ourselves in his leading man. We followed him from start to end. It was a perfect sync. Then something went really wrong. As a matter of fact, I know exactly when it all went really wrong for Sathyan. I read an article in a film magazine in the early 2000s by Sathyan Anthikad. He was praising the conceptual freshness he witnessed on the current Tamil release, ‘Kathal Kondein’. It was that influence that led Sathyan to visualize the flashback sequence of his next movie, “Achuvinte Amma’, in a darker premise as shown in ‘Kathal Kondein’. (Kathal Kondein itself was the debut feature of Selvaraghavan, which had a lot of flaws in its script). Sathyan Anthikad brought back Ilayaraja to do the soundtrack. Without a doubt, Ilayaraja is one of best musicians of our time and he has produced some quality soundtracks for Malayalam, but his sounds always resonated a natural Tamil vibe and it was really superfluous on Sathyan Movies. Sathyan Anthikad was on his way of becoming an example of bad influences. He stopped believing in single narratives and started bringing in parallel storylines and character branch-outs, which were really unnecessary. 

In the movie ‘Sandhesham’, there is a scene in which Siddique says, in a very few words, the story of his life. It was very subtle and at the same time relevant to the main story. It was that scene which makes Thilakan to consider Siddique as his Son-in-Law.  Years later when it comes to ‘Katha Thudarunnu’, there are life stories for every single character who has a screen time.  The subtlety is gone and so is the relevance. Another bad influence, which makes Sathyan thinks that this is attention to detail but in actuality it is disorienting the focus on the main story. This is not a debatable statement but a fact. The average man we loved and related to became a know-it-all demigod in the average man’s disguise (Rasathanthram, Innathe Chinthavishayam). 

Sathyan also got influenced from several mainstream international movies and his movies became nothing but just a platform to arrange all the inspired sequences and social messages. (For inst: My Sassy Girl & Vinodhayathra; Pursuit of Happiness & Katha Thudarunnu).  ‘Katha Thudarunnu’ was a non-directional parade rather than a movie in which all the characters addresses at least one social issue per line.  Another major flaw of the recent Sathyan Anthikad movies are the way leading ladies are portrayed. With all due respect to women, It’s a known fact that presenting women in Indian cinema in a non-cheesy manner is a job which can be achieved only by a very few geniuses (For eg: Padmarjan, Mani Ratnam). Sathyan is not an expert in this, which is very evident in ‘Achuvinte Amma’, ‘Rasathanthram’ and ‘Innathe Chinthavishayam’. At some scenes, I was embarrassed of looking at the person sitting next to me, even though I am in no way connected to the crew. This wasn’t a problem at all in his old movies as it was all about men and their emotions. Women played secondary or supporting characters, which was a safe option for him given that his potential to direct a woman without being irritating/over dramatic was limited. (Nadodikattu, Sandesham, Santhanagopalam, Sridharante Onnam thirumurivu, Golantharavartha etc). 

Since I spend most of my time arguing that we should judge what a film-maker actually gives us rather than worrying about what we thought he was going to give us, its perhaps inconsistent of me if I am not putting forward a suggestion to Sathyan Anthikad before he makes yet another messed up movie. Its hightime that he defines a frame for his potentials and makes a movie, that actually is his forte. We need more movies like Sandhesham, Santhanagopalam, Nadodikattu, Pingami and Sridharante Onnam Thirumurivu.