captivity – Movies of the Soul

Vampire Owl: This reminds me to show you my new pet.

Vampire Bat: I don’t think that this is that kind of a movie related to the real pets.

Vampire Owl: You mean to say that there is no live-action version of The Secret Life of Pets.

Vampire Bat: Not at all.

Vampire Owl: And there will be nothing The Street Cat Named Bob?

Vampire Bat: Absolutely not.

Vampire Owl: So, we are after the wrong kind of pet here.

Vampire Bat: This is supposed to be a thriller; so you know the kind of pet.

Vampire Owl: The psychological kind.

Vampire Bat: Yes, and you know more psychos than I ever will in this life and the next.

[Gets three cups of masala tea with gobi paratha].

What is the movie about? :: Seth (Dominic Monaghan) works at the local Animal Control Department, and as a shy person doesn’t talk to many people, and has not many friends. Even those who works with him hopes not to get to talk much to him. One day he comes across Holly (Ksenia Solo) who is supposed to be someone he knew a long time ago, but she doesn’t remember him at all. After their meeting in the bus, he becomes more and more obsessed with her, and feels the need to get noticed more. But she doesn’t even remember meeting him for the second time in the bus, as he visits the restaurant that she works in. He tries to seem confident after looking for her interests on her social media profiles, as he asks her for dinner, but that doesn’t come out right, and she clearly shows her lack of interest in him. He is disappointed, but doesn’t give up.

So, what happens next? :: Holly goes on to meet her ex-boyfriend Eric (Nathan Parsons), but Seth continues to follow her, and in the process, gets beaten up by Eric. Despite being bloodied, Seth does manage to steal her diary which has all intimate details of her past. But as he keeps on reading the same, something takes a drastic change. He spends his time setting up a cage in an abandoned side of the animal shelter, and even as it affects his work, make sure that he could create something different and strange at that side to which nobody makes a visit. There seemed to be something in that diary that motivated him so much to finally kidnap her, and get her to that cage. But after kidnapping, he reveals to her that his wish is to save her, and this is all part of his secret plan for the same, much to the surprise of Molly who sees no way to escape from the steel cage.

So, how does the big mystery reveal with its twists? :: Soon, she finds out that Seth knows all her secrets which were written in the diary, and there are no longer secrets between them. There is a big secret that involves her best friend Claire (Jennette McCurdy), and Seth tells her that he loves her, and understands that there is not just one side to Holly. He tells her that it is only him that can help her, and asks for nothing in return as he is her one true love, and not Eric. It is then that the security guard of the animal shelter, Nate (Da’Vone McDonald) grows more and more suspicious of him due to his absence from work, and his roaming into those less explored areas. He makes his own way through those abandoned areas, and is shocked to find the young girl locked up inside cage in her underwear. Now, Holly tries to manipulate him into murdering the guard, and soon the question evolves into who the crazier one is, and also about who the real psychopath is.

The defence of Pet :: There is certainly something different with Pet, as one had already noticed with the posters and the trailer itself. This one emerges and becomes more than just having a girl in captivity by a stalker. There is that madness in this movie that only gets stronger as the movie progresses. Pet had so many opportunities here to become just the usual tale of a “damsel in distress” captured by the man who has been stalking her for long, but surely adds enough in there for the divergence. It is Ksenia Solo who impresses at moments with the way her character approaches everything, and Dominic Monaghan also leaves a good effect on this one, even though more situations could have been added to bring even more of these characters outside rather than leaving too much to be guessed. There is a lot of manipulation going on in this particular flick, and the twist is ready to get to you.

The Claws of flaw :: More was certainly possible with Pet, and surely a better finish was expected, considering how things were made stronger with the progress. You will also feel that there is a little bit too much of repetition with the talks that go on between the two protagonists, and we also see that the cage is also less used as the property, and there are moments when the leading lady does act so less like the character that she is – maybe, it is also part of the character, but that leaves the audience rather confused. The whole manipulation thing could have also used a little more drama rather than keeping the captive without much of emotions – it is something that will go as a negative mark in the performances. The lady also doesn’t get even a real cut on her, and will also get to be out of the cage without any trace of being a captive, and that also adds no positive to the genre. There is also that slowness in the middle, which is not converted to anything interesting.

How it finishes :: Pet‘s divergence is not something that we can question. But its leading lady character might be one for many. There is also a little bit of predictability that comes in, and that is also due to the lady protagonist, and by the end, people are just going to guess that final twist, considering how the so called stalker was proceeding with the things. You are going to wish that this movie was something more, but the variety in treatment that this movie brings will also be catching your attention – there are two sides to this movie, and thanks to its leading performers living up-to the expectations whenever there is the need, we have Pet as a movie that can be watched for not being like the others of its kind. In a movie which has no real hero or heroine, how much you can like the flick is dependent on what you want – a very high rating will be difficult, but liking this movie is not. The best thing about this movie is that it does take off the masks of some people who pretends to be good and nice to others, but being close to be good or in control is not what that particular person is all about, even when in a cage.

PS: For the lighter minds, there are reviews on movies like Kubo and the Two Strings and Kung Fu Panda 3.

Release date: 2nd December 2016
Running time: 94 minutes
Directed by: Carles Torrens
Starring: Dominic Monaghan, Ksenia Solo, Jennette McCurdy, Nathan Parsons, Da’Vone McDonald, Denise Garcia, Janet Song, Alasdair Martin, Gary J. Tunnicliffe

@ Cemetery Watch
✠ The Vampire Bat.

What is the movie about? :: Sameera (Parvathy) is a divorced nurse who is trying to work hard in the local hospital and pay the debts of her family, as well as ensure that the studies of her younger sisters are also dealt with. She was formerly married to Faisal (Asif Ali), and has a child, but they were separated due to problems in both families related to her work as well as the differences in way of seeing things. Shaheed (Kunchacko Boban) who works as a male nurse in the same hospital, is in love with her, and is hoping to marry her if she agrees some day. Both of them are expected to go to Iraq for work soon, and in that way, earn a better salary. Sameera finally decides that it is better for her to marry Shaheed and move on, as he is also moving to Iraq, and her relatives would make her get married to someone else anyway; at least she finds Shaheed as a good person and he is in love with her.

So, what happens next? :: After marriage, Sameera gets pregnant, but they soon have to move to Iraq and join the new job. They have heard that the place is not that safe, but there are other nurses who work there and earn a good salary. It is the year 2014, and ISIS has launched itself into the major cities of the nation. It is at the same time that Sameera’s son Ibrahim a.k.a Ibru (Master Eric) comes to live with her. Their location, Tikrit, as well as Mosul where Shaheed had traveled to with the military, all are under attack despite the repeated assurances that the army of the country will keep them safe. Sameera is shocked when she realises that Mosul is captured by the extremists and has become impossible to reach on phone. She approaches the Indian ambassador to Iraq, Manoj Abraham (Fahad Faasil) who assures her that he will do his best to find her husband.

And what is to follow between the chaos and destruction? :: It doesn’t take the ISIS long to take full control of all significant landmarks in the city of Tikrit with the military falling and later becoming a non-existent force there. The militants also make it inside the hospital and keeps the nurses as hostage. Shaheed is still in Mosul, captured by the militants there. But Manoj is determined to rescue and bring all these people back to India in one way or the other. For the same, he works with Ranjan (Prakash Belawadi), his superior officer as well as Jayamohan (Prem Prakash) who is a rich Malayali businessman with many connections in the Middle East, especially Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Bahrain. With the External Affairs Minister of India and the Chief Minister of Kerala in contact with him, he will try a plan which is claimed to be risky by more than one person, but is considered to be the best option to bring the nurses home by Manoj himself.

The defence of Take Off :: The movie is based on the captivity of forty six Indian nurses by ISIS, and their evacuation by the Indian government, which was one of those celebrated events and a major achievement for the nation – it takes a lot of effort to recreate and add something extra for the creative and cinematic side, and still keep it simple and real. The director has succeeded in doing the same here. The movie has nicely handled the situations of war, and also related to the hostage crisis – with terrorism to be worked with here, things could have gone different ways, but all goes well in this movie; we see balance and maturity in everything here. The emotional side is also strong, and things are kept realistic as well as interesting at the same time, a quality which has been only fakely attributed to certain movies these days.

Positives and negatives :: The first half of the movie is more about the family drama, with the final few minutes getting the protagonists to reach Iraq, with the terrible disaster of a war waiting to happen. From there, it is a thrilling adventure, and the movie works as two here. This movie is visually geat, and also has some nice music as well as background score to go with the same. The movie, despite not trying to bring anything out of the box, got all of us interested, with how this tale is told, and how the characters feel simple and real as the common man who wishes to make money for their families while protecting the same. Even with its smaller budget compared to the Bollywood movies like Airlift which deals with the evacuation of Indians too, Take Off can easily give a fine competition – in simple words, it is surely better than the Bollywood movie dealing with this. There is a better re-imagination here for you to watch.

Performers of the soul :: There is no shortage of interesting performances here, and Parvathy manages to keep her character at the right place, even living through the war on most of the occasions. The different stages of life of her character are nicely portrayed, and this is sure to bring more and more applause as the movie runs in the theatres and will be watched by more followed the highly positive opinions – following Charlie and Ennu Ninte Moideen. Kunchacko Boban has a controlled performance here as he once again plays a character who will appeal really well for the family audience, after Kochauvva Paulo Ayyappa Coelho. Then there is Fahadh Faasil who arrives in the second half, and steals the show – there are so many moments for him as he goes strong after Maheshinte Prathikaaram once again, and the last few moments are undoubtedly his. The child actor Eric is also too good. Prakash Belawadi, Prem Prakash, Asif Ali and Alencier Ley Lopez also catch our attention with their smaller roles.

How it finishes :: We had the Akashay Kumar and Nimrat Kaur starrer Airlift directed by another Malayali, Raja Krishna Menon, which had dealt with a similar crisis and somewhat same kind of situation which released in 2016 and had received many positive opinions. While Airlift was based on the 1990 Iraqi invasion of Kuwait, this one is based on the 2004 ISIS invasion of Iraq. Both are about evacuating the Indians left in the nation torn by war, and both has the patriotism as well as the final success that goes with the same – both have also received a lot of critical acclaim, and has been in the news even before the release. The comparisons maybe many, and it is certain that what we need are movies like Take Off and Airlift which deals with the situations related to common people who struggle anywhere in the world, and it is also significant how realistically their tales are told. This is the best movie of the year so far, as it joins C/O Saira Banu, Alamara and Honey Bee 2 which are running in the theatres stronger than the rest.

Release date: 24th March 2017
Running time: 139 minutes
Directed by: Mahesh Narayan
Starring: Kunchacko Boban, Parvathy, Fahadh Faasil, Prakash Belawadi, Asif Ali, Prem Prakash, Alencier Ley Lopez, Parvathi T, Anjali Aneesh Upasana, Master Eric, Joju George, Sidhartha Siva, Devi Ajith, Divya Prabha, Prashant Nair, Rukhsar Rehman