A tragic love story. Review on Sethu Movie

When Sethu was released, it became a flop. Nobody wanted to see a movie made by a debutant director with a flop hero and an unknown heroine. Many walked off during the middle of the movie. But those who stayed on till the end were in for a surprise. The ending left them too shocked to even sit up and react.

Word slowly spread about this movie, with people telling their kith and kin the whole story, except the ending. The ending was to be experienced, they said. The crowds increased. Sethu became a hit.

Sethu changed the course of Vikram’s career, which earlier was down and almost out. He had been in the industry for well over a decade, acted in a lot of movies, but had not achieved stardom. Sethu brought about Vikram’s resurrection. Vikram hasn’t looked back ever since.

Sethu tells the story of a final-year college chairman, Sethu, who is in love with Abitha, a first-year girl. He’s a short-tempered rogue, she’s a very soft-spoken person. After much persuasion, she reciprocates his love. While day-dreaming about her, happy that she loves him too, he gets beaten up by rivals whose prostitution racket he earlier busted. They smash his head on a rock, numbing his brain.

He is admitted to a mental asylum at Yerwadi which doesn’t exactly have the best sanitary conditions. Patients are healed with traditional therapy. Sethu’s life at the asylum is brought forth very beautifully by the intensely sorrowful song, Enge sellum indha paadhai. He gradually gets back to normal. He pleads to the authorities that he’s back to normal but his pleas turn to deaf ears. He tries to escape but gets hurt in the process and is brought back.

She, in the meanwhile, is worried. She hasn’t seen him since his head injury. She visits the asylum but he’s asleep. As she leaves, he wakes up and calls out to her but she can’t hear because his screams are drowned by the noise the other patients make.

He escapes the asylum one early morning, limping his way to freedom. He goes straight to her house, in the hope of seeing her. But then…

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The story, screenplay and direction by Bala is superb. The movie does not look like the work of a newcomer.

The performance by the entire cast is good. Vikram has put his heart and soul into Sethu’s character. His body language is realistic. He apparently lost a lot of weight for the Yerwadi sequences. Abitha, who plays Abitha, has done an ok job. Sivakumar, who plays Sethu’s elder brother, delivers a mature performance. Sriman as Sethu’s friend, is brilliant.

Ilayaraja enhances the movie watching experience with his songs. The songs, though not that popular with the masses, are simply beautiful. I can very easily say that without the songs, Sethu wouldn’t have had this much of an impact on it’s viewers.

The first 20 minutes of the movie have 3 songs, including the title track. Though irritating, it otherwise means that there aren’t that many songs left in the movie, which means that the story progresses without many interruptions.

The graphics are simply awful. The graphics supposedly show the inside of a brain. When Sethu is brain-numbed, this one blob of brain-flesh (or whatever brains are made of) gets torn into two and we are taken down this brain passage like how one descends while on a rollercoaster ride. The pink and purple surroundings give it a kind of psychedelic atmosphere: not like the good ones they show in Pink Floyd concerts, but like the cheap backgrounds shown in drug-related hindi movie songs. When Sethu gets back to normal, the above-mentioned graphics sequence is played backwards. We go up the rollercoaster, backwards and the blob of brain-flesh closes.

Sethu, to conclude, is a very good effort by a new director. It contains mature performances by the entire cast. I’m not sure if many will enjoy this, because of the very depressing ending. But for those who don’t mind depressing endings, this is a good watch.

PS: This movie was remade in Hindi as Tere Naam. I haven’t seen the movie but have seen the promos. Salman Khan's ''hair-sprouting fountain'' hairstyle put me off. My friends, who’ve seen both movies call Tere Naam a disaster.

Credits:

The “No Quarter” album - Jimmy Page and Robert Plant