Oru Marubhoomi Kadha Movie Review: Gone with the Wind!

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Cast: Mohanlal, Mukesh, Bhavna, Lakshi Rai, Nedumudi Venu, Suraj
Directed by Priyadarshan
Music by M G Sreekumar

The team of Mohanlal-Priyadarshan is undoubtedly one of the most accomplished of duos in the history of Malayalam cinema. The comedy capers that they have attempted have all went on to rewrite box office records back in the 80s and 90s. But their last two outings – Kakakuyil and Kilichundan Mambazham were both commercial duds.

Now with this team back together, viewers anticipate the magic to be recreated once more to usher back the golden age of Malayalam cinema. But the question remains – do they still have that Midas touch?

For starters Oru Marubhoomi Kadha make those earlier mentioned duds look like classics. At least there were some noteworthy scenes or sequences in those movies but Priyadarshan’s latest offering boasts of none even remotely close.

Oru Marubhumi Kadha (translated as A Desert Story) starts off promisingly with a voice over from Sreenivasan (one that is bound to make your hopes rise).

Then we are introduced to the character of Madhavan Nair (Mohanlal) who is going to have an eventful day. Not only is he going to get that deserving promotion from his Hindi-Malayalam-English speaking Arabi boss (Shakti Kapoor), but he also shall reunite with his love interest Meenakshi (Lakshmi Rai) whom he believed would never cross his path again. Not to worry, for all this is explained in detail through some poorly set up romance sequences and a song.

Also he does meet up with an old accomplice of his, Abdu (Mukesh) who comes to his office seeking a job.

Yet what looked to be a perfect life goes for a toss one night, when Madhavan walks in to his girl friend’s house to find her cheating on him. In the ensuing rage, he drives off only to find a burglar waiting for him in the car. Madhavan recognizes that the man is none other than Abdu and thanks to the altercation that follows, they soon find themselves stranded off road, in the middle of nowhere.

Now Madhavan and Abdu tries to find their way back by foot through the desert and as luck would have it, they not only manage to find the main road, but also an unattended car. As expected, they take the car but little do they realize that what they have in the trunk of the car is going to give them a nightmarish time.

Story and screenplay from Abhilash Nair is all wrong from the word ‘go’. The initial scenes are the most juvenile version of the ‘Serendipity’ sequence ever captured on screen. Then the film decides to shift into a ‘road movie’ mode with a plot conveniently borrowed from the Alicia Silverstone-Del Toro starrer Excess Baggage. Mix it all up with some traditional Priyan slapstick and the makers, unfortunately, believe that they have a movie somewhere in there.

Oh yes, they do have a movie, all right. Only if it wasn’t so ridiculously staged. It is undoubtedly an embarrassment to see Lal and Mukesh, once masters of their trade, try hard to pull of the comic moments. There is little in the script for them to weave any magic and whatever attempted becomes just that – lame attempts. Bhavana, Laxmi Rai, Innocent, Nedumudi Venu all put in their bits to a losing cause. Even Suraj ends up doing his tomfoolery act but none of it gets things going.

Priyadarshan’s mix n match, cut n paste policy falters big time. Even if you keep aside the Hollywood influences, there seem to be a lot of uncanny resemblance to some of the well known Malayalam flicks. The whole road trip with two guys trying to get rid of the girl reminds you of the good ol’ Killukkam days, and then you even have a similar subplot from the same film, where the family members are out to grab the wealth from the girl. The kidnapping plot too ends up on a note similar to the one seen in Ramji Rao Speaking and putting Mukesh in a similar spot does not help matters.

Camera work from Alaghapan is good, but the music from MG Sreekumar is strictly ho-hum. The script, as mentioned earlier, is unforgivably banal and utterly predictable and the dialogues, hardly memorable. Even all the experience of Priyadarshan is unable to save it from its eventual destiny.

Outright plain, dry and barren, Oru Marubhoomi Kadha is a story that Priyan should not have bothered to share. Trust me, if you saw the movie, you would learn that Picasso isn’t the only piece of art that gets destroyed here!

Rating: 2 / 5

-Joxily John

Jox John

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