Butterflies, veshtis , full beards, red velvet cake and curly hair – 2015 was all of that and much more with the release of the Alphonse Putharen’s Premam back in May 2015. The Nivin Pauly-Sai Pallavi starrer became extremely popular, not only in Kerala but also in Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh, running for several months.
Now, even after a year since the release of the film, the video of Malar breaking into an impromptu dappankoothu in front of her bemused students is still getting cheered on madly by Sai Pallavi’s fans.
With that in mind, we pick our top five favourite moments from
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5. Beating up Celine’s ex
If earlier the fist-fight in the film was all raw teenage aggression, this one is definitely more calculated. And infinitely one of the funnier moments of the film.
We don’t get to see the sequence of Roney getting tied up, nor does the sequence flow in its entirety. Instead, we get to see the trio walking up the stairs (with that Kalippu soundtrack) and there’s a single slap — cut to the wedding. When the scene cuts back to Roney, he’s already tied up and our heroes are already halfway through interrogating him.
The back and forth between the Roney scene and the wedding scene is what makes the ending so interesting. There’s so much dry humour in the questions for which Roney gets beaten up, ranging from why there are so many potholes on the road to why someone was arrested for wearing a Bob Marley t-shirt – that it takes the cake.
4. Unfinished hope
The entire scene comprising George’s bike to Kodaikanal, the subsequent meet up with Malar and the revelations that follow, is just heartbreaking. It is also precisely why it is one of our favourite moments in the film.
There is no overt melodrama, but combined with that excellent soundtrack by Rajesh Murugesan, the sequence is easily one of the best we’ve seen in recent times.
3. The ‘Mava’ classes
The computer science teacher at George’s college, Vimal sir, falls for Malar. He falls for her hard enough to lose track of what he’s saying in class — with the amusing result of his Java classes turning into ‘Mava’ classes. We want to feel sorry for him, but his hilariously floundering pursuit of Malar just made us laugh harder.
He gets teased mercilessly about it, with his students calling him ‘Mava’ wherever he goes. There’s possibly nothing more satisfying than that, in our opinion.
2. Rockankuthu
This brings us back to our earlier statement — the impromptu dappankoothu from the soft-spoken teacher.
Our second best moment from the film in this list is also the favourite moment for most Sai Pallavi fans, not only for her dancing skills but also for the looks on the students faces at the end of Malar’s little demonstration.
The students are gobsmacked at Malar’s talent. George even goes as far as to ask her for some easier steps for the boys. And like Malar, we can’t hide our smiles at that too.
1. Kalippu!
The word says it all. Everything about the song — right from the cigarettes hanging loosely off the corner of the trio’s lips to the veshti , (or should we say mundu ?), tucked around their waists carelessly — screams of ‘rebel’.
The fist-fight in the mud is one of the highlights of the film. Has there been any other fist-fight such as this that has been romanticised so much by fans — both by the men and the women?
The scenes mimic the pace of the song – the trio saunter into the auditorium, there’s a bomb just as the rhythm picks up, it reaches a fever pitch when the two groups break out into a fist fight and finally reaches a crescendo when we see the words ‘SUSPENDED’ flashed across the screen.