Jithindurden

A thoroughly entertaining movie that cleverly infuses fantasy and campus movie shenanigans into one. It's filled with so many fun pop culture references that don't feel forced, like they would have been 10 years ago, due to the change in culture in general. These pop culture references are cleverly used in the progress of the plot without sticking out. Body control and body swap stories haven't been too much in Malayalam cinema, nonetheless, this is probably the best among those. I expected Suraj and Sharafu to give great performances that are fun to watch, but Sandeep Pradeep surprised me with his shift in the second half. Just after Alappuzha Gymkhana, he's able to show what he's capable of here. I do think there are aspects of this movie that could've been better. Still, it's after some time that I am quite satisfied with a movie that is just meant to be a fun entertainer without delving into anything serious thematically or cinematically. The song "Whisitlu Bigilu" is still playing in my mind after the credits rolled out, it's so catchy and energetic and encapsulates the whole feeling of the movie.

So Top Gun Maverick was actually giving homage to this movie with its opening scene.

A very well-made movie that tries a lot of things and succeeds in them. My problems with it are all in the intentionality itself. I expected the movie to be very close to the true story because of how much it firmly stands by American exceptionalism while subtly and smartly satirizing everything wrong with that in America. I'm already too fed up with such "American" stories in the first place, but then I found out that there are too many historical inaccuracies, too.

The way the movie tries to make the prologue and epilogue portions poignant was very well directed, but still felt weird, especially because of how different the rest of the movie is, but still, it was a nice change of pace.

I was surprised to see Ed Harris and searched for his age. At least he was able to look exactly the same for the next 30 years after this movie.

People expected this to be another Suicide Squad, but it turned out to be a suicidal squad. Trauma-bonding of superheroes was just what I wanted. Florence Pugh and Lewis Pullman broke me, and I was trying my best to keep my tears in. The way the whole movie is about mental health, while tackling the kind of relevant enough politics that can be expected from this type of movie, as well as executing pretty cool action sequences, all came together beautifully. The mental health aspect, especially towards the end, really made me give this four stars instead of a 3.5. It's not devoid of problems, but when they get it good, it's really good. The 3D felt very unnecessary though, and the aspect ratio switching in Imax didn't feel very impactful, but that may be because the last film I saw was Sinners, which was incredible.

Julia Louis-Dreyfus is so easy to hate here, just like how easy it was to hate everyone, including her, in the final seasons of Seinfeld.