Pradhama Drishtiya Kuttakkar

collin3.5

the way parvathy was moving, i'd have believed she killed her husband to join the force.

ash3.0

20 years of Parvathy.So glad to see her back, with a towering presence throughout the movie. A lot of people consider performances as something that's external, something visible, but here she's extremely restrained for the most part as the conflicts are happening internally. Nobody could've pulled off this role other than her, another role to her list of career best(s).Aleena is not someone who's inherently confident or strong, but it's life and situation that made her rise above her inhibitions. Still we don't see strides of confidence or slyness of outsmarting others because she did it for her existence and for the people who are dependent on her. She turned her vulnerabilities into strength, and Parvathy sells all this in a very unassuming way.Not just the main leads, but almost all characters are written with a bit of nuance, which is both a boon and bane for this movie. While it's useful to make them stand apart from the uniform as common people with real world problems but at the same time it adds a lot into the runtime. There are pacing as well as scene order issues which hinder the experience, every scene is like 10sec longer than it should be. In no way does this justify it's runtime, could've been atleast 20mins shorter. Also I feel some of the people who come and go in scenes are friends or family of the crew, few were kurach over.First half, apart from a few moments peaked, but the 2nd half's exposition dump could've been done differently. It's boring and I almost felt like I'm attending some class or yt clickbait explanation video. This was unnecessary as I feel all of us are capable of understanding and connecting events, Ingane ellam kanikanda aavishyam illa. But the procedural proceedings were interesting to watch, they've tried to ground everything. Nice.Did not expect comedy in this movie, it was fun as I always love vinay forrt doing typical vinay forrt things. Interval block was adipoli, score that actually feels like score and not random sounds, but he's getting repetitive with his soundscape. Cinematography kollam.Strong performances overall, the writing was good enough but some plot points does make you go ayye, the desired impact of the built-up doesn't pay off, only because of the order in which things are revealed. It follows the traditional thriller pattern, especially when it comes to the reveals. This approach fet a bit outdated and a better edit could've made this movie a banger, so it's clear who the real villain is.P.S: There is a blink and a miss cameo, kandit AI pole thoni 😂

Manoj Panicker3.0

There is no perfect crime.What we need is the perfect investigation.Aleena, Divya, Sreenath and Dasan. Three CPOs and an ASI meet the blunt side of a fateful night when a normal night patrol has them confront one of the most notorious active serial criminals of that area. And when an officer's worst nightmare unfolds in front of them with the clock ticking away heavier with each moment, the team must battle every permutation of scenarios possible that would test their survival in the very system that has become their daily bread.Shahad's third directorial, 'Pradhama Dhrishtya Kuttakkar' (Prima Facie Guilty), is an exercise in the anatomy of a cover-up, to watch the lengths to which a team would go to never present themselves as guilty without a qualm of doubt, to understand how the khakhi doesn't automatically separate officers from fighting for survival against the laws they swore they protect in their oath.The rain is not the same for everyone.When you replay the entire narrative after having seen through the whole ordeal, one thing that the story does well in retrospect is how the story carefully discharges information about each character as the first act mostly attempts to establish each person's day-to-day struggle before the inciting incident kicks in. Even when it comes to Aleena, the rookie protagonist in field duty on compassionate grounds, we're only given enough information and bits of a childhood she keeps suppressed that gives us enough motivation to understand the desperation that drives her thought process that tries to solve the trials of a bloody accident.But for a while, the narrative seems to hold back the potential of exploring how different people from this four person dynamic reacts differently to this incident, especially considering how you see Divya cracking under pressure and Dasan repeatedly showing signs of distancing himself from the act initially. After the first few tense moments, the narrative quickly reverts on the latter's attitude and suddenly has every character act coherently like a beehive, which is still a fine idea as long as there's still unpredictable tension within this group. Because the entire weight of the tension of their cover-up depends on the idea of trust, so it's not exactly compelling to sit through a narrative that doesn't challenge that concept.For example - Think of a movie like Martin Prakkat's 'Nayattu', where each character had their own attitude and kept their journey on the run engaging because their distinct characterizations kept reacting to different situations in different ways. In a story where mutual trust is vital to everyone's survival, something like this would vastly improve the pacing. But at least I do appreciate how the movie doesn't assume that these four are excellent at cover-ups by having them fumble and miss little corners here and there, while also having them actively prepare for the worst case scenario to unfold.Some people cannot lie.Others lie with a crack in their smile.I just look at them and smile back.It's really when Harris Meeran enters the story when the screenplay really kicks up the gear, the head of the CBI team reputed for cracking every single case initially thought to be unsolvable. First of all, there's the visual calculus that he plays with his deduction skills and attention to each environment that catches you off guard and makes his investigation thrilling to watch, given how it feels like a hunter inching towards the characters that we've grown to like at this point.Second and most importantly, the student/master dynamic that Aleena shares with Harris where the real meat of this narrative lie in, a constant cat and mouse chase of who understands whom better. The battle between Aleena trying to outsmart her mentor through his work and Harris inching closer with the little threads he latches on to is what makes the entire second half a thrilling watch non-stop. The story does override the need to examine the group's actions by having the victim be an abominable madman himself, trying a little hard to justify them as likeable people, each with their own personal struggles, who just fell upon an unfortunate turn of events. But in a way, I understand why the audience is made to root for the four characters unconditionally, to feel Harris' noose tightening around people like Aleena feel emotionally powerful.And in a way, us rooting for these characters doing anything they can to fight the consequences of an unfair moment does make the ending feel like a satisfying payoff, to watch everything unfold in its place thanks to a character who is stubborn enough that her mind works like a supercomputer under pressure. I also understand how the background of the victim and the sensationalism in his serial crimes is what brings someone as reputed as Harris in the first place. But I still can't help but wonder whether it was possible to have Jayaprakash not be a cartoonish villain and still make all the complicated battle of morality, duty and survival work.A good police officer puts aside their humanity to uncover the truth.I did Roby Varghese's blocking that keeps an intimate handheld like quality to each conversation, alongside Chaman Chacko who knew when to turn up the notch in the pacing and manage multiple timeline switches efficiently. But I'll admit that there's a disconnect between the visuals and the score, the former's grounded progression not staying in sync with the latter's overdramatic and heightened burst of energy. One way to do that would've been actually shooting this in a similar dramatic manner like how 'Pravinkoodu Shappu' handled its visuals, or have Mujeeb tone down his constant need to have every mundane moment have this loud music. But looking at the latter's past works so far asking him to learn restraint might be too much to ask forFor the past one week, people everywhere on the internet have been praising Parvathy's performance as one of the best from this year, and the hype is indeed real. A powerhouse of an emotionally compelling display that meets its equal with a terrific Vijayaraghavan on the other end adding a tangible tension to their chemistry. Siddharth, Mathews, Unnimaya and Azees were decent for the material they were given, though I do think they could've utilized the potential of this ensemble with more attention to the four person dynamic. And of course, Vinay Forrt is massively underrated for how his comedic timing elevates even a character like SHO Prathap who barely has much narrative significance.But one thing that did bring down these performances a tad was how the dialogues didn't sound good during the emotionally charged moments in the story, an issue that's mostly present in the first half. And when you look at certain small scenes like Sreenath's girlfriend getting beat on call, there's a very dramatic stage play-ish handling of staging and dialogue delivery that didn't fit well with the otherwise grounded visual execution. There's also the shot of our boy Asif at the end that felt a little odd, like his movements were handled with generative AI the way it looked wobbly.Overall, Pradhama Dhrishtya Kuttakkar is an engaging crime thriller that manages to shine better at crafting nerve wracking circumstances than when it comes to fleshing out the full potential of its range of characters. It's second half stands out for how it displays the art of maintaining tension throughout in an already over saturated genre for the Malayalam film industry, with a terrific lead performance, promising ensemble, grounded visual language and music that doesn't gel well with any of the above noted qualities.It's rough around the edges. But I do feel blessed to witness both Parvathy and Urvashi, the two paragons in the art of acting in our small industry, rule the box office at the same time❤️P.S. So apparently they censored the visuals where the ex-military gets brutally stabbed and the shot of Aleena intaking MDMA. I'm guessing these were last minute instructions from the censor boards in the GCC and that's why this one week delay happened. It's funny because I don't think even one scene was cut out from 'Marco' and 'Animal' when they came out here, but this was too gruesome for them.Oh and one last thing, one of the most creative title card drops this year🤌🏻2026 Indian Movies Ranked2026 Movies Ranked