Saaradhi Review

Taking liberal clues from films like Traffic, the new movie 'Saradhi' is a one film that has another road mission at its heart. This time it is the attempt of an ordinary ambulance driver to keep his heads straight to get an abandoned corpse reach its parents. The movie which keeps you reasonably engaged  has a poor start, but moves into tracks as the mission progresses.

Directed by debutante Gopalan Manoj, the movie has Sunny Wayn as Christy an ambulance driver who runs a private ambulance. One fine day he is called upon to take the dead body of an youth to a far away place which may demand a travel of half a day. The close relatives of the youth and his aged patriarch also accompanies the body. Christy is also thrilled to be a part of the journey as he has got a chance to to visit one of his lady friends'  Rejani 's home situated on the way at Kulirmala , whom he had met on a similar situation earlier and has been maintaining a rendezvous there after.

In another part of the city A S I Subran(Sreenivasan) , an upright police officer is having verbal  fights with his boss,S I Sathya nathan(Baiju) on an every day basis, which are mostly about the corrupt nature of the later. At a decisive political party meeting is the M LA Joshy Janardhanan being asked by his party boss to relinquish his position and the post of the M LA for engaging in a corrupt deal.
            
Christy as usual with his everyday chores, behave dispassionately with the other relative on board, talking boisterously on phone and cracking jokes . But as he continues with his journey he realises that there are more things with this dead man than he has ever thought off. Now it is all left to him to take the body of this unknown man with him safely to his family, carefully listening to the directives of another unknown voice on phone.

The movie has a very slender but fresh subject which is fashioned just like the thriller 'Traffic', with every meritorious characters of the latter in place in similar roles.Here Sreenivasan takes the role of Anoop Menon in traffic, while Sunny Wayn is clad in the driver's seat as did Sreenivasan in Traffic.Comparison's apart, there are some loose ends in Saradhi which may not  fit into the logic.But putting them aside, the movie opens in a mediocre way with an unwanted item dance in 'kuthu pattu',But once the journey is on, you are into an engaging thriller which keeps you interested till the finale, with some fine twists, too.

There are few attempts to create laughter and the movie' tracks a single linear plot which helps it to achieve its intentions. But the overall making is in old patterns  and the frames are mediocre at best. Had it been in the hands of a seasoned director, Saradhi could have worked wonders. But as a first time director, Gopalan Manoj shows some directorial flourishes at times.

Sunny Waye is in a difficult role, for which he has been very natural and  loyal to most of the times.  Sreenivasan is in his usual tones and lines while others including Baiju, Vishu Raghav,Madhupal and Sunil Sugatha play to the demand of their roles. The ladies i the fray appear in minuscule roles and their roles holds little importance to the narratives.

The technical sides are mediocre with cinematography and  editing rated average . The BG scores by Gopi Sudar are impressive while the songs are visualized averagely. The 'mazhamukile' song is an interesting hear.

Rating- 6.2/10