Catching the flu is never fun, but as I discovered, it doesn't have to be all bad. Being too sick to cook and clean meant that I had all this time to read books and actually catch a movie or two on where else, but YouTube, while propped up comfortably with pillows in my bed. The first book I read was "Rose of Sebastopol" a romantic period novel set during the Crimean War. It was a rather dull book which I almost quit halfway but managed to finish nevertheless. The next one was much better, "DeKok and The Mask of Death" by Baantjer, another police procedural from the DeKok series. Having read other books in this series before, I knew what to expect. While not exactly known for high action and breathtaking suspense, Baantjer's slow deliberate style has a charm of its own. Although I still wish he had a better sense of humor. There was yet another book I read in the past couple of weeks that I don't even seem to remember anymore. Hmm... what does that say about the book.... maybe it will come back to me later. Okay then, on to the movies. I just realized that all of the movies I watched in the past week or so have been in Malayalam. I guess I've been going through this phase of nostalgia about "god's own country" where I spend a considerable part of my childhood and simply also because I just love hearing Malayalam. It has always seemed to me that even though Malayalam films largely follow the stereotype of Indian movie melodramas, the acting tends to less cliched and more realistic. The ones I watched were from the late 80's and early 90's (the so called golden period of Malayalam movies), namely Bharatham, Kilukkam and Chithram. All free and on YouTube (what would I do without YouTube?). These are all Mohanlal starrers and from what I can tell, he really gained his megastar status during that period from these and several more films . It is easy to see how. Pretty much all these movies had excellent music (thanks to that magical combination of Kaithapram (lyrics) Raveendran (music) Yesudas (vocals) and Mohanlal had an opportunity to show his versatility through diverse lead roles in these different films. Of the three, I enjoyed Kilukkam the best, especially the first half, which was a total laugh riot. The second half was unfortunately the mandatory tearjerker/melodramatic bit. I would still really recommend this movie just for the superb first half. Chithram has a light first half with plenty of laughs and just when you start enjoying the music and the comedy you realize that something isn't quite right and soon you find out why in what turns out to be a very intense and atypical end to the movie. I enjoyed Bharatham too, only because it is a movie about a Carnatic musician, and of course, it has lovely music of the Yesudas Carnatic music style. As a lover of pure classical Carnatic music, I can't say I care much for Yesudas singing Carnatic music, there are so many others who do that so much better than him, but when it comes to the filmy variety of classical songs, he is king. Apart from the music, Bharatham is a very intense movie and Mohanlal appears to really enjoy playing the role of the musician, something that comes across in his other movies as well. So, all in all, a good "Lalettan" marathon, and an average as far as the book reading. Cheers!
