Sahasam Movie Review: This comedy of errors fails to lift the mood

Malayalam cinema has been experiencing a dry spell for the past few weeks, with very few films making a mark in theatres. The audience and stakeholders alike are pinning their hopes on the big-ticket films lined up for this Onam season, which begins by the end of this month. It is during such a time that Sahasam, with its youthful appeal and the viral 'Eth Mood' song that captures all the new-age Onam vibes, promised to set the mood as the perfect appetiser before the sumptuous sadya. However, despite all the spices and colours, the film is just stale and distasteful.

Director: Bibin Krishna

Cast: Ramzan Muhammed, Babu Antony, Shabareesh Varma, Yog Japee, Narain, Gouri G Kishan, Varsha Ramesh

Rating: 1.5/5

In Malayalam, they say, "yuddhangal eppozhum nadakunnath penninu allenklil panathinum vendiya" (wars are waged either for women or wealth), and Sahasam follows this adage. While the primary storyline in this hyperlink narrative is about a youngster trying to unite with his soon-to-be married girlfriend, another major track involves a bunch of gangsters fighting over access to crores of cryptocurrency.

Director Bibin Krishna, who debuted with Twenty One Gms, a thriller noted for its twists, flips the mood completely this time to make a crime comedy with an army of characters. On one side, we have Jeeva (Ramzan) and his IT colleagues, trying to figure out ways to get his girlfriend, Sera (Gouri Kishan), out of her home. Parallely, we are introduced to underworld gangsters Victor (Yog Japee), his former ally-turned-foe Wolf (Babu Antony), and Rajeev (Narain), a narcotics control bureau official who is on a hunt for them. There is another track involving a trio of catering workers, which is the most absurd of all. After devoting the entire first half to registering these characters and their storylines, the second half is where they all come together for an adventurous night of confusion, coincidences, and convenience.

Despite these many characters, none of them have the privilege of a proper arc or depth. Babu Antony is perhaps the only reassuring presence amidst all the chaos. Lately, filmmakers have been increasingly avoiding spoonfeeding to respect the audience's intelligence and ensure they also participate in storytelling. However, when even crucial information is not provided, it only keeps us distant. Here, we don't know much about the past of Babu Antony's character, which is perfectly fine, but it's still important to know why he is so desperate for the money so that we root for him. Without that basic understanding, we hardly care if he wins in his endeavour to find the password to the cryptocurrency. It's also odd to see Jeeva and his friends going to the extent of risking their lives for him, because they, like us, hardly know him. Sahasam might be a film that's not supposed to be examined so closely, but such basic concerns are always bothersome.

The film is loaded with drugs, guns, action, shootouts, car chases, romance, bromance, and more, yet the substandard writing never makes us feel invested. It mistakes lazy, insipid writing for convenience and cinematic liberty, relying excessively on technical gimmicks to inject some energy. But at the end of the day, there's only so much that flashy cinematography and EDM-heavy music can do to cover up for the overall vacuity. It aims at madness, but there's very little method to it.