Aviyal movie review: Shanil Muhammed’s coming-of-age drama is a mixed bag with a few beautiful moments

2.5/5

Story: After a near-death incident, a father, a musician named Krishnan, narrates four chapters in his life to his daughter – involving the women that helped shape his life from his teenage years to that as an adult. Krishnan’s different love stories also unravel a new side of him, as he navigates through heartbreaks, lust, despair and the demise of the ones he cared about.

Review: Towards the end of Shanil Muhammed’s Aviyal, the protagonist Krishnan’s father tells him that there are things that only a mother can teach a son. It’s a striking line, considering that the film revolves around the women that have helped shape Krishnan’s life – from his teenage years to that as an adult. While earlier this year Malayalam cinema had Pranav Mohanlal’s Hridayam and Shane Nigam’s Veyil that showed the various episodes in its protagonists’ lives, Shanil here takes a rather simplistic approach of telling the story of four phases in its central character Krishnan’s (Sirajudeen Nazar) life, via a series of conversations between a father (Joju George) and a daughter (Anaswara Rajan).

Though the film has cameos from Joju, Anaswara, Dain Davis and Athmiya Rajan, it rests entirely on the shoulders of newcomers Sirajudeen. To his credit, he delivers and the first chapter is the key reason for it. Revolving around the schooldays romance of Krishnan, it serves to make the film’s characters endearing as well as take the audience through a nostalgia ride into the early 90s in a Kannur village. It also establishes the beautiful relationship shared between Krishnan and his father, which becomes pivotal in the succeeding chapters.

The letdown, however, is that Shanil’s writing fails to capitalise on this, and takes a rather tried-and-tested route for the next few phases in Krishnan’s life – be it as a lustful youth who tries woo a married woman or a singer who dives deep into the world of drugs and alcohol after the one he loves leaves him hanging. Through both the middle chapters, the writer-director does make some relevant observations about its female characters from their plight of being tied down in an unhappy marriage to being misunderstood for their actions. However, these do get lost when they are combined with Krishnan’s story and reactions, which at times border on too extreme. The final episode is where the film once again finds it footing, albeit slowly. But by then, what made Krishnan endearing in the first chapter has already lost its shine due to the preceding ones.

Sirajudeen is a fine find and does his best to showcase all four phases of his character, bringing in the difference through his looks and mannerisms. Prashanth Alexander and Anjali Nair also get to play key characters in the film and their experience adds heft to these. Ketaki Narayan’s character as a Malayali-speaking freebird from Pune, is forgettable and Athmiya Rajan too doesn’t get to do much with her role. Both Joju and Anaswara are a delight when they are on screen, infusing the much-needed change of tone between each chapter.

Being a story about a musician, the makers have given music a lot of importance, and it has helped reflect the character’s mindset as well as paint the time period. Sankar Sharma and Sharreth are the two composers of the film, which also has four cinematographers – Sudeep Elamon, Jimshi Khalid, Ravi Chandran and Gikku Jacob Peter. The first chapter was the one that felt distinctive, compared to the rest.

Verdict: Shanil Muhammed’s directorial Aviyal starts off well, but the succeeding chapters in the life of its protagonist cause it to lose the flavour fast. Despite debutant Sirajudeen trying his best to shoulder the film, the movie’s script that often ventures to the tried-and-tested territory make it tedious in parts. Though it has a few good moments, Aviyal doesn’t quite rise up to a few of the other coming-of-age dramas that were released in Malayalam this year.