Cast: Anoop Menon, Murali Gopy, Indrans
Director: Sooraj Tom
Anoop Menon and Murali Gopy’s latest outing Pa..Va was marketed as a simple family entertainer. The movie sure was simple drama, but not a entertainer. Tipping the scale towards boredom, Pa..Va has very little to hold the audience’s attention throughout. Pa..Va has Anoop Menon’s very old and very positive Varkichan and Murali Gopy’s old and fretting Devassy Pappan as the central characters. In fact, half an hour into the movie, the story begins to revolve around Pappan and his impending death. Pappan and Varkey grew up together in pious Christian households, set in one of those hilly regions surrounded by picturesque landscapes and acres of rubber farms.
Whatever they did, they did it together and loved it. They even fall for the pretty village lass Mary played by Prayaga Martin. The movie takes a turn with Varkichan’s demise. A heartbroken Pappan is tormented by the thought of his own death and even begins to interact with Varkichan’s apparition, which sometimes acts as Pappan’s conscience or alter ego. The drama rolls out when Varkichan’s apparition begins to advice Pappan to buy land for the family grave where he was born and bought up rather than where he is living now.
The second half of the movie cuts back and forth between Pappan’s memories of his younger days, a closure for the unrequited love story from the past and the dilemma over family graveyard. The movie soon begins to revolve around Pappan and his family’s decision regarding the family grave and how it becomes a bone of contention between two churches. Pa.Va tries to deal with the philosophy of death and afterlife without being preachy, but there is no particular message to look forward to.
Even the introduction of humour could not lighten up the dragging bore the movie was turning into. Murali shines as the 80-year-old Pappan. Anoop struggles to become Varkichan. Even his make-up fails to convince the audience. Renji Panicker reminds everyone of the late Cochin Haneefa, but in a wasted appearance. The talented cast does very little to save the movie. Director Sooraj Tom took up a script apt for theatre and not big screen.
