You first see Marykutty after the sex reassignment surgery, her anatomy partly redeemed by silicone and hormones. There is the faint shadow of a stubble and newly-gained curves, but she is definitely no drag queen. She stands there clad in a sari, queer and beautiful. The best part about Ranjith Sankar’s Njan Marykutty is the sheer dignity and subtlety with which he treats his subject. You have seen them as crass, loud-mouthed cliches or inferior caricatures - Malayalam cinema’s only accredited format of depicting transpersons. But in Njan Marykutty the director bares the real crux of translife in Kerala through Marykutty, his eponymous lead lady.
- Director: Ranjith Sankar
- Starring: Jayasurya, Joju George, Jewel Mary
The film unravels in high-range, a small town that has never heard of LGBT rights and pride walks, inclusion and equality. It’s a patriarchal world where a young woman running a business is nothing but a slut and transphobia the norm. And when Mathukutty returns there as Marykutty, she finds herself in a storm of verbal, physical and sexual violence. Despite her privileged background and education, she is humiliated and hunted repeatedly.
And, since Idukki is no metro, there are no NGOs or media crews who rush to her rescue. She is often alone in the melee as the system keeps deactivating her minimal support system.
Jayasurya essays Marykutty with utmost finesse. A slight incline of the head, the vulnerable line of the shoulders and those self-deprecating smiles - they all melt into his character like notes into music. In one of the scenes you see a stray tear trickling down his otherwise static face and the agony is so apparent that you can almost taste it. In another, his features crumple with naked pain, but on no occasion the actor takes you on an emotional overdrive. Often his eyes reflect hurt and hope in equal measures, giving you an impression that this woman will not buckle under the pressure of patriarchy or hate crimes. While Joju George excels as Kunjipalu, the bad cop, all others including Innocent and Jewel Mary deliver neat and nicely-trimmed acts.
Ranjith Sankar, who is also the scenarist of Njan Marykutty , creates his narrative arc in such a way that the film takes a real and detailed look at the issue. He makes sure that Marykutty is never lost in an inflated version womanhood and portrays her as an individual with enormous inner strength. Despite the mounting malevolence, she doesn’t wallow in self-pity, but stands up and takes control of her life.
No preaching here
Though there are moments when the narrative veers too close to melodrama, the script has no excess baggage of ideas, nor does it indulge in heavy-duty preaching. At the editing table Sanjan goes for an unhurried flow instead of a breakneck tempo while the BGM, at least at parts, turns out to be a major letdown. Njan Marykutty is not a cinematic masterpiece, but a marvel on its own right for its innate tone of sensitivity.