Written and directed by: Chidambaram
Cast: Soubin Shahir, Sreenath Bhasi, Balu Varghese, Ganapathy, Jean Paul Lal
Runtime: 135 minutes
Available in: Theatres
In every Indian neighbourhood, located in any one of the thousand tiny towns, there exists a group of boys no one seems to find any value in. To the outsider, these boys are nothing but trouble, just one sip of brandy away from picking a fight with the world. They have nothing to do except land up at their usual hangouts with an urgency someone with purpose might find comical. And that’s pretty much the same outsider gaze with which we look at the boys from Manjummel, when we meet them for the first time in Chidambaram’s absolutely devastating second film. They are the type that land up en masse, when you extend an invitation to a party, strictly out of obligation. Yet despite the judgement we’ve already passed, we catch ourselves wanting to be a part of the gang, trying to latch on the one member we feel most attached to.
Manjummel Boys, based on a real-life incident revolving around the same gang, can be as deceptive as what we first think of them. Chidambaram writes a series of light-hearted sequences that introduce us to each of them. At times you wonder why they’re telling us something as innocuous as one of their obsessions with neatness (he doesn’t even serve water). Later, you get a scene written around a boy who has to deliver a photo album to their rightful owners. These details run so deep that you end up calculating the maximum number of people that can fit into a Toyota Qualis.