Director: Santosh Nair
Cast: Fahadh Faasil, Renji Panicker, Joju George, Niveda Thomas
Five minutes into debutant Santosh Nair’s ‘Money Ratnam’ and you go ‘Wham! Not one of those new-director-old-story movies again!’ and steel yourself for two or more hours of stiff boredom.
But thankfully, this tale of a bag of currency notes and a precious jewel (‘money’ and ‘ratnam’ of the title) gets its act together quickly and manages to be an average fare that keeps you in your seat and yawns at bay.
Events that occur over the course of a single day seem to be the rage among new directors and ‘Money Ratnam’ too jumps onto the 24-hour-plot bandwagon.
The story begins with an ambitious young sales executive Neil John Samuel (Fahadh Faasil) waiting at a bus station late at night to catch a bus home.
He gets involved in a brawl with a few gangsters and has to flee the city.
Meanwhile, a superstitious businessman, Isaac Anakkadan (Renji Panicker), his astrologer (Sunil Sughada) and forgetful secretary (Kochu Preman) are out to buy a precious jewel from a group of men. The bag with the currency notes changes hands, upsets plans and sets the various characters out in pursuit of their respective goals.
There is also Neil’s fiancé Pia (Niveda Thomas) who is striving to raise a huge sum of money for charity.
Despite a wafer-thin plot and ordinary direction, the film manages to stay a notch above the scores of Malayalam movies hitting screens every week, thanks to Fahadh’s performance. Had the protagonist been played by a lesser actor incapable of handling comedy with élan, this film would have fallen flat.
Performances by Renji Panicker, who seems at home in his new role of actor, and Joju George as the gang leader Makudi Das also hold the film from falling apart.
‘Money Ratnam’ has its moments, offers a few laughs, does not give you one of those splitting headaches and is your money’s worth.
