Love clicks, new age or vintage

If you look at movie listings on newspapers, you will find Premam in some little corner, a matinee, or a late night show. Four months to the day, and the movie still has people coming to watch it for the second or third time. Three days ago, another major love story has released, and is already pulling crowds in.

Ennu Ninte Moideen is in a lot of ways the opposite of what Premam has been. Beginning with the fact that Moideen is a real life story, and Moideen is decades before Premam.

The language has changed, the ways of youth and romance have changed, but what seems to have worked for both the movies is the underlying emotion of love, say film experts.

“The success of both these films tells us that good films will always be accepted by the Malayali audience,” says veteran filmmaker Sathyan Anthikad. “The making may have been different but we have always had films that reach out to your soul, films by Fazil, Priyadarshan, Hariharan, Bharathan and others. Premam would have worked even if there was no excessive drinking or smoking in the film. It has a simple language that people could understand, it has good humour.”

The fact that Moideen too is accepted in these times comes as a relief to Sathyan. “Love is so beautifully presented. It gives you a nostalgic feel. Both movies worked because both the directors — Alphonse Putharen and R.S. Vimal — have done their homework.”

Premam is also a love story that spans through a couple of decades. It begins at a time mobile phones had not come into the hands of lovers, who these days are busy texting each other night and day.

But as it proceeds, it tells the story of a man who moves on, after failing in his love, not once but twice. Moideen, in contrast, is about two people who never managed to be together, but stuck through all the tests life throws on them, and never gave up on each other.

“People can connect to both. There have always been men who failed in love. We have lived in times when men were afraid to express their feelings because even that was considered ‘wrong’,” says Madhu Janardanan, founder member of the Montage Movie Club in Manjeri.

“Both films explore the basic emotion of love that people of all times could identify with. In Premam, the hero George has to depend on land phone to call a girl he likes, something kids today would not have experienced. Love then has been thrilling. But it is too easy today when you can message if you can’t talk. There is also the ‘new generation nonsense’ with meaningless lyrics that seems to work with the youngsters. But that has always been the story, conventions are always broken. Moideen, on the other hand, is a classic romance, a tragedy. There is no physical relationship, not even their fingertips touch till in the climax, they hug just once. What’s interesting is they do not seem to wish it either. But even though it is a classic, it is taken commercially, with songs and punch dialogues. And terrific acting especially by Parvathy as Kanchanamala.”

Classic or new-age, stories of love will always attract people. Filmmaker Lijo Jose Pellissery and scriptwriter P.R. Arun make the same point. “The commonality in both the films is love. It is just taken in two different ways, end of the day, we discuss the same thing,” says Lijo while Arun feels that the love shown in these films will be accepted universally, connecting to anyone anywhere in the world, at all times. “That is why a song like Manasa Maine about lost love is still so popular.”

Parvathi Menon, actor, feels it is unfair with a capital U to even compare the two films. “Premam is still trending in full swing and at the theatres. Moideen is a true story. That’s the only difference I see. Both are magical in their own sense and comparison is pointless.”