APPUCHI GRAAMAM MOVIE REVIEW

For all those uninitiated populace, the name Appuchi Gramam may sound a little odd especially the Appuchi part, making one wonder if it’s a children’s film. But, on the contrary, the milieu is something different from the usual.

 

What would happen when a powerful meteor is predicted to hit a village in Tamil Nadu? Would people survive after this disaster? How is this event going to affect the lives and thought process of villagers? What would happen if people had an inkling of their last day on earth? 

 

A sci-fi drama set in a village? One might wonder. But Anand has actually dealt with human emotions and relationships with falling meteors as the backdrop. The characters are believable. There is no over the top heroism or suspension of disbeliefs in Appuchi Graamam. 

 

What works for Appuchi Graamam is its simplistic straightforward narration. There are no pretensions or high level technical wizardry or star power, which might take you away from the core theme. 

 

Appuchi Graamam, a village in Tamil Nadu has no temple, no educational institutions and in fact no anything, thanks to the feud between two step brothers of an important family in the village. People just lead a flat life with no big aspirations or objective in their life. 

 

There is a widow, Meera Krishna who lives alone with her birds and animals, waiting for her son to return from abroad; there is miser Ganja Karuppu who values currency more than human relationships; there is G M Kumar, one of the step brothers, who spends his life getting sloshed.  And there is Singam Puli, a sane man in the village who tries to make people see sense. The lady lead in Appuchi Graamam is strong and is no damsel in distress. It is she who eggs on her timid lover.  

 

Humor runs with the warp and weft of the storyline and is not something that is forced. The scene when a TV reporter describes about the happenings in the village in a much exaggerated way and the villager’s surprise on this is a very relevant example. The songs are pleasant and take the story forward.  Vishal Chandrashekar makes his presence felt with his background score. 

 

There are a few occasions where the film takes on a sermonizing and verbose mode. The manner in which the problems are resolved at the end, appears a little unrealistic. With dialogues at times sounding a little cheesy, the proceedings also do become dramatic. But these are just minor glitches that can be forgiven in the larger scheme of things. At a time when we are bombarded with the same old, done to death stories, Appuchi Graamam comes as a breather and works for its simple, unpretentious narration.