Raghu Thatha movie review: This Keerthy Suresh starrer elicits few laughs and is a tiresome watch ullu-web-prime.com

Raghu Thatha movie review: Writer Suman Kumar (who has worked on Guns & Gulaabs, Farzi and The Family Man) makes his directorial debut with Raghu Thatha starring Keerthy Suresh and an ensemble cast. One wonders why the title is Raghu Thatha (Grandfather Raghu), when the story completely revolves around Raghu’s granddaughter, Kayal (Keerthy Suresh) and her life. (Also Read: Keerthy Suresh was supposed to play a ‘human’ role in Kalki 2898 AD but said no. Is it Deepika Padukone or Disha’s?)

The plot

Set in the late 1960s/early 1970s, Raghu Thatha takes us to the small town of Valluvanpettai in Tamil Nadu, where 25-year-old Kayalvizhi Pandian, or Kayal as she is called, lives. Now, Kayal is not a simple village belle – she has a degree, works in the Madras Central Bank and has some staunch principles that she lives by. She resides at home with her parents, brother and her beloved grandfather Raghu Thatha (MS Bhaskar).

Interestingly, Kayal, a feminist, is also a well-known author, who goes under the pseudonym K Pandian, as she believes people won’t read work by a woman. So, is there more to Kayal? Well, yes. She detests Hindi and has fought against the imposition of Hindi in the town and shut down the Ekta Sabha that opened there along with her grandfather. She follows Periyar. For her, Tamil is supreme and an identity she strongly holds on to.

While Kayal enjoys her writing success and her independence, constant parental pressure to get married hampers her happiness. And things take a dramatic turn when the family shockingly discovers that Raghu Thatha has stomach cancer. Her grandfather states he has three simple wishes to fulfil before he dies – to eat Buhari biryani in Madras, to take a photo with MG Ramchandran and to see Kayal’s marriage. Kayal finally succumbs to family pressure and decides to marry her friend Selvan (Ravindra Vijay), an engineer who works for the benefit of the people and believes in all that holds dear. The entire family is ecstatic when Kayal gets engaged and her future seems to be all that she had dreamt of. Or so it seems, till an anonymous letter stating that Kayal was author KP Pandian shatters her peace. Who sent that letter and why? What happens to her marriage?

What works, what doesn’t

Do you remember director Visu’s or K Balachander’s female-centric films where the heroine was a feminist and dealt with patriarchy and social themes? Suman Kumar’s Raghu Thatha takes us back to those films which had strong, independent and intelligent women as its central characters. Unfortunately, that’s where the similarity ends. The screenplay/ writing of Raghu Thatha combines politics, feminism, patriarchy and a social theme or two with logical flaws, which makes the end result chaotic.

Sample this – Kayal will not tolerate patriarchy but when it comes to standing up to her fiancé, she turns into a mouse. For someone who has fought against Hindi imposition and upholds Periyar’s principles, she doesn’t think twice about taking a Hindi exam for her convenience. It just looks Kayal is really confused as to what she really stands for. Further, this film is touted as a comedy and yet, there are hardly any laughs in the film – except perhaps in the last 15 minutes. Dialogues that have been infused with supposed humour don’t really work as well and fall flat.

Keerthy Suresh as Kayal has done what is required for the role but it’s not a standout performance given the poor writing. Her character was flat and there’s no big transformation over the course of the film as one would expect. Again, Ravindra Vijay’s character Selvan should have been better penned to bring about the stark contrast between the first half and second half. MS Bhaskar, as always, does a good job as the grandfather, and Devadarshini shines as the maami. The rest of the characters don’t have much to do in the film.

Two aspects of the film that one does appreciate is the music by Sean Roldan and the cinematography by Yamini Yagnamurthy. Sean Roldan’s songs and BGM are typical of that era and Yamini has captured the vivid sceneries and life of that time beautifully in her frame. Editing a film well also adds to its success and that seems to be missing in this film. Some scenes were randomly inserted (e.g. Raghu Thatha meeting Selvan under the coconut tree), affecting the continuity of the film.

On the whole, Raghu Thatha is a misfire and a tiresome watch that neither makes us laugh nor cheer for Kayal.