Thattathin Marayathu

Thattathin Marayathu
Official teaser poster
Directed by	Vineeth Sreenivasan
Produced by	Mukesh Sreenivasan
Written by	Vineeth Sreenivasan
Screenplay by	Vineeth Sreenivasan
Starring	Nivin Pauly Isha Talwar Aju Varghese
Narrated by	Nivin Pauly & Vineeth Sreenivasan
Music by	Shaan Rahman
Cinematography	Jomon T. John
Edited by	Ranjan Abraham
Production company	Lumiere Film Company
Distributed by	Lal Jose Films & PJ Entertainments Europe
Release dates	6 July 2012 (2012-07-06) (Kerala)
Running time	127 minutes
Country	India
Language	Malayalam
Budget	3.5 crore
Box office	18.9 crore

Thattathin Marayathu (English: Behind the Veil) is a 2012 Malayalam musical-romance film written and directed by Vineeth Sreenivasan, starring Nivin Pauly, Isha Talwar and Sreenivasan in the lead roles. The supporting cast includes Aju Varghese, Manoj K. Jayan, Sunny Wayne, Sreeram Ramachandran, Bhagath Manuel, Manikuttan and Niveda Thomas. The film was produced by actors Mukesh and Sreenivasan.^[1]

The film is the story of Vinod Nair (Nivin Pauly) and Aisha (Isha Talwar), belonging to Hinduism and Islam respectively, falling in love and the conflict arising out of this. Upon its release, it became an addictive cult among youth, and was declared as a blockbuster at the box office.^[2] The movie was remade in Telugu as "Saheba Subramanyam".

Plot

The film opens with a flashback in which two little boys, Vinod Nair and his friend, are standing at the Thalassery pier. Vinod sees a Muslim girl (Isha Talwar) who he finds to be very attractive. He prays to God to get her as his wife in the future.

The scene shifts to the present where Vinod (Nivin Pauly), who hails from a middle class Hindu family, is jailed by the police. He has been nabbed for trespassing the property of a rich and influential Muslim politician called Abdul Khader (Ramu). Realizing that he went there to meet the Muslim girl, Aisha (Isha Talwar), the politician's niece with whom he's madly in love, Sub-inspector Prem Kumar (Manoj K Jayan) and his men request him to tell his love story. He begins his story by telling them the first time he has seen Aisha, was while attending his friend's marriage. He is blown away by her at the first sight and accidentally collides with her making her fall down a staircase and she ends up in hospital. Vinod goes to the hospital and finds a little girl besides Aisha's bed. With her help, Vinod leaves a 'sorry' letter to Aisha, written using a stencil. Vinod begins to love her deeply and he along with his friends Abdu (Aju Varghese) and Mustafa (Ahmed Siddhique) tries to win Aisha's heart for him.

For getting a chance to meet Aisha, Vinod tries to participate in Daffmuttu in Kannur University Cultural Festival in which Aisha also is participating. For that he goes to a trainer Najaf (Manikuttan) with whom he has an old story. While doing 12th standard, Vinod's friends Nijad (Sreeram Ramachandran) and Majid Sunny Wayne had a gang, Smartboyz. Majid was in love with Fatima (Niveda Thomas) and he's heartbroken to see that Fatima is in love with Najaf. They decide to take on Najaf and beat him with covered faces. After beating Najaf up, to show some heroism Majid accidentally threw away his driving license along with some money which gets them a payback from Najaf.

Despite this history, Najaf who is now married another girl (Khadeeja), accepts to teach him Daffmuttu. During the cultural festival, Vinod gets a chance to meet Aisha and wishes her on her birthday. After the festival is over, Vinod goes to Aisha's house late at night and confesses his feelings for her. There is no reply from Aisha, but after a few days Aisha reciprocates his feelings by writing a letter for him. Eventually one day, Vinod gets caught after trying to meet Aisha and he winds up his story.

S.I Premkumar lends him his full support to Vinod to help him unite with Aisha. Meanwhile Vinod tries to find a way in exchanging letters with Aisha. He finds Hamza, Aisha's tutor (Bhagath Manuel), a friend of Abdu. Hamza is in love with Vinod's sister and he wholeheartedly agrees to help Vinod. To find a way for living Vinod opens a Purdah shop with the help of Sub-inspector Premkumar. He asks Aisha to inaugurate the shop. She agrees to come on Friday afternoon, when she's alone in her house. Aisha inaugurates the shop and meets Vinod's parents. While returning, they are blocked by some men, when they see Aisha in the car. After reaching home, Aisha is put into house-arrest by her Uncle Abdul Khader. Meanwhile, an accident happens in Khader's factory, which leads to a communal riot leading to which Aisha's father Abdul Rahman (Sreenivasan) getting attacked. While in hospital, Khader informs his brother that they are shifting to Trivandrum the next day. Abdul Rahman agrees and Aisha sees Vinod for one last time in the night leaving both them heartbroken. The next day, early morning, Abdul Rahman realises that he should allow Aisha to live with the one she loves. Despite being silent for most of his life to his brother, Rahman says to Khader that Aisha will live with the one she loves. Khader departs and Aisha happily calls Vinod. But she doesn't get him on phone. She calls Abdu who informs SI Premkumar. Premkumar with the help of his friend from telephone care finds that Vinod would be in the sea bridge.

They find him in the sea bridge and Aisha proposes him to marry her. Delighted, Vinod asks to kiss her which she agrees. The scene then shifts back to the first scene at the same sea-bridge where Vinod prays to God to get that beautiful girl he saw, as his wife. After that it is shown that the girl is called 'Aisha' by someone implying that Vinod has got what he has prayed for. The film ends on the note that "God is quite a guy; even if we forget some of our wishes, He doesn't."

Cast

• Nivin Pauly as Vinod Nair
• Isha Talwar as Aisha Rahman
• Sreenivasan as Abdul Rahman
• Aju Varghese as Abdu
• Manoj K. Jayan as S.I. Prem Kumar
• Bhagath Manuel as Hamza
• Aparna Nair as Mehru
• Ramu as Abdul Khader
• Vanitha Krishnachandran as Vinod's mother
• Srinda Ashab as Sandhya, Vinod's Sister
• Deepak Parambol as Manoj (the youth communist)
• Ahmed Sidhique as Musthafa
• Sunny Wayne as Majeed (Smart Boyz Gang)
• Sreeram Ramachandran as Nijad (Smart Boyz Gang)
• Manikuttan as Najaf
• Niveda Thomas as Fathima
• Joju George
• Subheesh Sudhi
• Ramakrishnan as Pari
• Actress Apoorva Bose (voice for Isha Talwar)

Production

Thattathin Marayathu is Vineeth Sreenivasan's second directorial venture and was produced by Lumiere Film Company, a production house owned by Vineeth's father Sreenivasan and act or Mukesh. Costumes were designed by Sameera Saneesh, art direction was by Ajay Mangad, social media promotion by Mohammed Abdul Kalam & Mohammed Anas T.A and makeup by Hassan Vandoor.

Casting

Nivin Pauly, Aju Varghese, Bhagath Manuel were cast once again to work with Vineeth Sreenivasan due to their friendship, while Isha Talwar was introduced by the cameraman Jomon T. John and was selected. Isha Talwar took a four month voice training class and went through a course to learn Malayalam to ensure her debut was smooth.^[4][5] Ahmed Siddique was chosen to play a very similar character like the one he played in the film Salt N' Pepper as K. T. Mirash, Although the differences are he plays a typical Muslim guy with an impeccable Thalassery accent.^[6]

Filming

The film began its shooting in April 2012 at Thalassery and Kannur. Jomon T. John is the director of photography; he had previously showed his talent in films such as Chappa Kurishu which had Vineeth Sreenivasan playing one of the lead roles and Beautiful which starred Jayasurya.

Critical response

While local websites and viewer blogs gave a unanimously positive response, rating from professional reviewers in online journals and movie websites were mixed.

Moviebuzz in Sify.com rated the movie "Very Good", saying: "With a cute, simple storyline, which is meant to be enjoyed like of whiff of pure fresh air, the film just keeps you engaged all along, quite effectively."^[7] One India.com's Smitha gave a positive review, saying: "If you enjoy reading simple Mills and Boons kind of romantic love stories, you might just like Thattathin Marayathu."^[8] Similarly, Indiaglitz.com also mentioned that the film is "advised for all who enjoyed reading Mills and Boons kind of romantic love stories, at some point of your adolescence", rating the movie 6/10.^[9] The Times of India rated the movie saying "Vineeth has crafted his dialogues with a highly laughable sense of humour".^[10]

However, Veeyen of Nowrunning.com rated the movie saying: "Performances of the lead actors often come to the rescue, even as the script holds few surprises."^[11] Rediff.com's Malayalam movie reviewer Paresh C Palicha also gave a negative review, rating the movie .^[12] "The screenplay does try to be interesting going back and forth in the first half, and even has cheeky humour punctuating the proceedings. But, after a while, it feels as if the story is stuck in 'no man's land', not knowing whether to adopt a serious tone or go with the humorous flow," he said.

Similarly, the reviews in vernacular media was also contrasting. While Mathrubhumi Online's Shahina K Rafeeq^[13] and Movieraga's G Krishnamurthy^[14] gave positive reviews, online Malayalam journal Naalaamidam's movie review column First Witness gave a negative review.^[15] Malayalam movie and music database M3DB.com's Nanz gave a positive review,^[16] and an alternate review in the same site by Sanil Kumar^[17] criticised the film for focusing more on the presentation than giving a credible storyline.

Soundtrack

The film's score and soundtrack are composed by Shaan Rahman. Song lyrics were written by Anu Elizabeth Jose, Engandiyoor Chandrashekharan and Vineeth Sreenivasan. The audio release of the film was held on 8 June 2012. Popular actors Mammootty, Dulquer Salmaan, Kunchacko Boban and Fahadh Faasil and the actors of the film released the audio by handing over the CD to Mathrubhumi director M. V. Shreyams Kumar.^[18] The audio is published by Mathrubhumi Musics and Sathyam Audios.

Accolades

References

External links

• Thattathin Marayathu at the Internet Movie Database