White Boys Review

It is interesting to note that even a seasoned asst. director like Melila Rajasekaharan is forced to go for a remake of Hollywood hit like ‘Funny Games, while he attempted for an independent debut with the new movie 'White Boys'. Such is the dearth of good stories in Mollywood, that the director religiously follows the plot, and dutifully sticks to the original, as if in a fear to commit mistakes if he attempted a change. Melila has placed almost all of his characters in  the fog filled landscape of a hill station somewhere in Kerala, creating an impact, but he fails to rework on the scripts to a needed detail which seems to be the  downside of the movie.

Vijayaragahavan is cast as C P, a prominent politician with a penchant for playing golf. He takes a break from his busy life and plans to have a weekend with his wife Geetha (Anjali Aneesh ) and their son Vivek (Gourav Menon) in a colonial style bungalow at a hill station. C P had been a regular in taking this sort of retreat, once a while. But this time it has to be different as two young guy,s Dattan (Kaushik Babu) and Balu (Lijo Krishna) turn up at the bungalow in the guise of golfers. As they welcome the new guests, they have no idea about the disaster and stress that they will be having soon, because of them.
 
The movie which rightly thanks for its inspiration from ‘Funny Games’ for its base content, is but a faithful replica of the original , with a very few innovative scenes added by Elias Kathavan and Nandan, who are credited for the rehashed story. And those are the  ones that doesn’t work that well  for the movie. Slowly building up on the thriller quotient, the inability to sustain with the initial momentum is what pulls the movie down, at times. With his experience over two decades showing , director Melila Rajasekharan has attempted to replicate the eerie hillside to the dying dog  of the original, that adds to the mood of the film. Had the movie been adopted more fairly giving a little bit of thought to the local tastes and topics (like reworking the ‘golf’ with something more local), it would have been more  creative and more engaging watch.
 
Vijayaraghavan is in his regular elements and often looks not that sound in the role that he is  playing. But the rest of the performances are impressive especially that of Anjali Aneesh who looks credible as if a  seasoned actress. The youngsters, the white boys -Koushik Babu and Liju Krishna are in ease playing the impressive roles, giving the air that they are here to stay.

The technical sides are also topnotch with cinematography by Rajesh Narayanan quite effective. He has been able to make the most out of the picturesque locations , adding a groovy mood to the suspense ensue. Background score by Biji pal adds to the mood of the movie . The song “Aditya Kiranangal…”by Ramesh Narayanan  is a fine hear but doesn’t add to the totality of the movie.
 
As of now for all those who hadn’t been with the popular original from Micehal Hanake, these 'White Boys' will not extremely down you. A movie which could be  prescribed for all lovers of thriller genre, though a different treatment and rework on the original scripts could have done more wonders..
 
Rating - 6./10