‘Kumari’ movie review: Immersive fantasy-horror drama pulled down by a shallow script

A sense of inevitability, of the unleashing of evil forces at some point of time, pervades Kumari right from its beginning. That, of course, has to be expected in a film belonging to this genre, combining elements of fantasy and horror. The prologue — with an extended narration of a grandma’s tale — of the curses that have befallen the wealthy Kanhirangat family, also adds to this feeling. Kumari (Aishwarya Lekshmi) is about to arrive at this household, after getting married to Dhruvan (Shine Tom Chacko), the younger son of the family head.

Nirmal Sahadev is somewhat successful in immersing the viewer in this tharavadu, and the village around it, which is steeped in superstition. It seems almost cut off from the rest of the world, with even Kumari not stepping out of it, after entering it. The only character who visits her from outside also does not return. The slow build-up towards doomsday works up to a point, but the script does not have anything in it to live up to the anticipation that has been carefully created.

This is evident in how things start going south immediately after the halfway point. Three characters, who had stood out in different ways, get killed off in quick succession. Different evil forces are invoked left and right, with someone suggesting Kumari release a third one to save the household. Just a couple more and we could have had a major conference of dark forces, with the huge tharavadu having enough room to accommodate all of them. The writing is listless in the latter half, squandering all the hard work in production design, which adds to the mood that the director is aiming at.

One interesting sidetrack is the portrayal of the family’s oppression of the tenant farmers in the village, making the upper-caste elites appear more evil than the dark forces residing deep in the jungle. However, this angle is not pursued much. More time is invested in the family’s black magic practices, including human sacrifice, that has eerie parallels to some recent news reports. The film does not have a rational counter to these practices; rather, Kumari counters it with other superstitions that are much less harmful. In that respect, it is quite old-school and different from recent horror attempts in Malayalam cinema, many of which had left the window open for rational interpretations too. The horror elements don’t work much either

Aishwarya Lekshmi ably anchors the film with support from a set of actors including Surabhi Lakshmy, who is almost unrecognisable. However, Shine Tom Chacko — an otherwise brilliant actor — appears a shadow of his usual self, with an over-dramatic performance, and dialogue delivery reminiscent of some of his recent infamous interviews.

Director Nirmal Sahadev, who debuted with Ranam, an action drama set in Detroit, has improved his game marginally, but a shallow script pulls Kumari down.