Film: Avihitham (Affair)
Cast: Renji Kankol, Unni Raj, Rakesh Ushar, Dhanesh Koliyat, Vrinda Menon
Director: Senna Hegde
Screenplays are over-rated.
We have heard repeatedly that screenplays are the most important aspect of a movie. Some go so far as to call them the nervous system of the movie body. If your screenplay is not good, you are dead in the water. There is only so much the other professionals can do to salvage the film.
Is it, though?
The auteur theory claims the most important creative voice on a movie is the director. His is the vision that defines the final product. To be fair, most of the new wave directors also wrote their own films. Not sure that is the case with directors for hire. Also, how many of the films feature directors going off script and improvising? (Incidentally, do you know that ‘improvise’ is the most commonly misused word among Indian English-speakers? They tend to use it when they actually mean ‘improve’!) Most importantly, the final cut is very rarely exactly what the original screenplay was.
Senna Hegde burst into the Malayali consciousness in a big way with his 2021 film Thikalazhcha Nishchayam (Betrothal on Monday). That was his third film, but the first to really strike a chord across the masses. Shot in Kanhangad, a town in the northernmost Kerala district of Kasargod. Kasargod borders Karnataka more than the rest of Kerala. The Malayalam spoken there is very unique and a bit hard to grasp for the rest of Malayalis. But, rather than try to expand the reach with a more accessible accent, Hegde embraced the location’s uniqueness and told a simple tale that could have happened anywhere. The curiosity factor and the laughs drove hordes to theatres and even more to the smaller screen. I am not ashamed to say that I watched that movie with subtitles!
His next two follow-ups didn’t exactly hit the mark with audiences or critics. But with Avihitham (Affair), Hegde decides to go back to small-town storytelling.
Avihitham shows how the accidental witnessing of a late-night romantic tryst sets in motion a set of events that prove how, in small towns, someone’s private business is everyone’s business. We are introduced to Prakasan, a good-for-nothing. While returning late one night from a drunken soiree, he sees – in silhouette – a man and a woman in a tight embrace. While he was not able to see their faces clearly, he understood that it was happening in the compound of Madhavan, a carpenter. Madhavan and his sons were away working on a temple project and the only young woman in the house was his daughter-in-law Nirmala. The man turned out to be the next-door neighbour Vinod, who jumped the boundary wall, threw a bone to the dog to keep him quiet, and retreated with his paramour to the external bathroom for further activities.
Being a single man in possession of very little brains, Prakasan immediately seeks the help of his favourite elder, Venu. A tailor specialising in ladies’ dresses, Venu possesses a keen sense of proportion. The next night Venu and Prakasan return to the scene to confirm the tryst. Despite the darkness, Venu recognises the figure of Nirmala from the size of the blouses he had sewn for her. It’s time to let Madhavan and his sons know. Soon a plan is afoot to catch Vinod and Nirmala in the act and expose the illicit affair.
Avihitham features a lot of laughs. Actually, it is more smiles than laughs. Smiles when you recognise characters you have met before in life. Smiles when you realise Malayali men everywhere bond more with alcohol and beedi than anything else. Smiles when you catch some really smart word play in the dialogues. (Once you hear ‘serial killer’, you cannot unhear it.)
But it also makes you squirm. Because very few people faced with this situation would react differently. Because we are quick to justify gossip in the guise of helping someone. Because we would rather distrust someone instead of implicitly trusting them.
But Avihitham is also a feminist parable. One that you will not see coming. Unlike The Great Indian Kitchen, which wore its feminist flag proudly and loudly, Avihitham catches you unawares. You believed you were watching a fun episode of ‘How I Caught the Adulterer’. You never wondered why all the main characters were men. You thought Nirmala was the only one at fault because she was the one who was not supposed to stray. There is one small instance where Hegde pandered to the predominantly male audience that would watch it in theatres. But I can’t bicker about that.
Senna Hegde and Ambareesh Kalathara weave a short tale of commonness. They cut a slice of life and show it on screen. None of the characters seem exaggerated, none of the dialogues sound wooden. The scenes flow from one to another. There is never a feeling of being rushed, but you marvel how the entire thing got over in a little more than an hour and a half.
The acting is spot on, despite most of the cast being relative unknowns. You do not hear a false note in the dialogue that is spoken on screen. It is hard to believe that the actors would have practiced it to get it so natural. That is the power of the dialogues that were written.
Once the credits start rolling – and after an unnecessary mid-credits scene – you pause. This is not what you signed up for when you sat down to see the movie. Everyone you trust with giving an opinion said it was a fun watch. And it was fun. But you are not walking away smiling. There is a part of you that is irritated at what happened on screen. You feel slightly cheated of a really good time. You were just manipulated into using your grey cells a little more than usual. But you can’t complain.
Me: Screenplays are overrated.
Senna Hegde: Hold my beedi!
