Kaathal - The Core [dir. Jeo Baby]

In my take on Rajkumar Hirani's PK (read HERE), I described it as "...a slipshod, almost insufferable movie that by the theme it tackles and the willingness therein of the people behind it to attach their clout becomes ironically a courageous, even important film." Kaathal - The Core, its clumsy caption notwithstanding, does not require that level of allowance. It is a quiet, measured narrative packed with noble characters and dignified performances. But with all its sincere intentions, it's really more a sermon on Christian kindness and openness to alternate sexual orientations than a credible narrative.

Of course, Kaathal is hardly alone in that aspect. Thirty years ago in Hollywood, Jonathan Demme made Philadelphia, in which a gay lawyer files suit against his employer for having fired him after he had contracted AIDS. Tom Hanks played the lead, one of the first major-league stars to portray an openly homosexual character. The film is an awkward mix of maudlin drama and AIDS info-dump, but is important for bringing a more balanced discussion about AIDS and homosexuality into the mainstream. We can make a similar case for Kaathal.

In the story, star Mammootty's protagonist Matthew Devassy is presented as a pillar of conventional virtue. A sincere and well-liked political worker with the prestigious lineage of a principled father, Matthew is the party favorite to contest the local elections. Prior to the film's main conflict the brief glimpse of his home life - apart from the father there is his long-married wife Omana (Jyothika) and teenage daughter Femy (Anagha Akku) - suggests a harmonious existence. The only ripple on this calm surface is that Matthew and his father barely speak to each other. In a later scene, Matthew himself puts forth that he is in any case a man of few words and when you have lived long enough with someone, you eventually reach a point where nothing much remains to be said.

In a perhaps unnecessarily oblique way, we are told that Omana has served Matthew a divorce notice, citing mental cruelty. Matthew seems more disturbed by the timing of the action rather than its intention - it is not him, but the lawyer who questions her allegation of cruelty. This is because Matthew harbors the guilty secret of being a closet homosexual. In the decades of their marriage, he has denied his wife her right to companionship and sexual happiness, searching for his own occasional comfort in the arms of the mild-mannered local driving instructor (Sudhi Kozhikode). But once the case has been opened, there can be no secrets.

Jeo Baby previously made The Great Indian Kitchen, which aimed to expose the insidious slavery and oppression of women in domestic settings. But it shot itself in the foot by eventually painting its male characters so one-dimensionally vile as to be detached from the more widespread 'cruelty by indifference' that homemakers everywhere face. Kaathal tries to create the impression of a more nuanced narrative. Even after the divorce notice has been served, Omana lives on in the same house and continues her family duties. There are no angry outbursts or hateful standoffs between the spouses, only sad silences. It is suggested that she only initiated the divorce proceedings after Section 377 was struck down in the courts, as her accusation would have previously led to criminal proceedings against him. While he has at least had occasional respite with his secret lover, her life has been an emotional desert. It is a level of nobility and self-sacrifice that makes her less a believable character, more a mouthpiece.  If they had at least shown a degree of friendship and cordial interaction between them as a couple, it would have gone some way to swallow the longevity of the union. In the film's commitment to being 'sensitive' and avoid sensationalizing, there is also a noticeable degree of soft-footing - neither Omana's lawyer or his political opponents in that allegedly conservative society demonize Matthew's sexuality and marital infidelity, which seems too good to ring true.

But for all its flaws, Kaathal is a palatable non-offensive drama with dignified performances from its lead cast, and its star-power gives it the reach to raise more open-minded sympathetic discussions about closet homosexuality in our society, which can only be a good thing.