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Rekindling the flame of a bygone era

Gulmohur

Director Jayaraj aptly chose ‘Gulmohur,’ a tree described by poets as the “flame of the forest,” as the title for his latest movie. The protagonist of the movie epitomises the angst, suffering and revolutionary spirit of a bygone era.

The scriptwriter of the movie, Deedi Damodaran, deserves credit for putting together a coherent and comprehensible story without any clichés. Writer-director Ranjith gives a sterling performance as Induchoodan, the protagonist.

Not a strictly period film, ‘Gulmohur’ provides glimpses of the turbulent campus life of the seventies following the emergency and brings it to the contemporary social milieu in the State.

Induchoodan has left social activism and is now the principal of a local school. He is leading a quiet life with his wife and children when an old colleague Harikrishnan (Siddique), who had been a hardcore Naxalite, visits him.

Through a flashback, the viewer is treated to a slice of the Naxal uprising and the ‘public trial courts.’

A highpoint of the movie is the coming together of O.N.V. Kurup and Johnson after a gap of eight years. There is a sprinkling of couplets by poets like Kumaran Asan, Kadammanitta Ramakrishnan, P. Bhaskaran and Balachandrandran Chullikkad. ‘Gulmohur’ produced by P.T. Mathew for Orient Films is a movie worth watching.

G. Jayakumar

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