Sahasam Review | A Complex, Chaotic Comedy That Succeeds in Parts

The idea of chaos comedy is a tough one to pull off, especially when there is a pool of characters. You need to create links that would make things look plausible on screen, and at the same time, take care of each individual track. The new film from Bibin Krishna, who previously made Anoop Menon-starrer Twenty One Grams, is a fairly good attempt to become a chaos comedy, and there are certain sequences in which almost all the characters are on screen, which will make us laugh out loud. But like I said in the beginning, maintaining all the tracks with the same level of excitement is a tough task, and some of the elements in the Story are not landing smoothly. Having said all that, this comedy of errors and coincidences is enjoyable on the whole.

Jeevan is a techy who is working in Kochi, and he is in love with Sera. Knowing their relationship, Sera’s family decided to get her married to another guy, and the only option for the couple was to elope. What we see in the movie Sahasam is the couple’s efforts to get married and all the unexpected events that disrupt that plan, which make it a chaotic adventure.

The script here uses the professional background of the hero to bring in a parallel track featuring the Mafia and the Police into the narrative. In a way, the zone of this movie is similar to the Hindi classic Delhi Belly. The normal life of some losers goes through some unimagined chaos when a series of confusions and errors puts them in the middle of something big they have no idea about. Coordinating all these tracks to create that reckless fun is the challenge in terms of writing. Some of the character designs with small details are extremely hilarious, like the one featuring Baiju and Bhagath. However, there are subplots, like the one featuring Narain, where the Shikari Shambu act feels a tad overdone. Then there is a romantic track other than the main leads, which wasn’t really in sync with the overall vibe of the film.

Ramzan Muhammed is doing the role of Jeevan in this movie, and interestingly, the character has nothing to do with dance. I wouldn’t say it wasn’t a particularly challenging role. But Ramzan is able to keep it real on screen. Gouri G Kishan is the female lead of the movie. Even though the character is important for the Story, the screenplay is such that her screen time is relatively less. Shabareesh Varma, as one of the roommates, was fun to watch as that womanizer character. Babu Antony is yet again doing that action hero role, this time with some tenderness. The screenplay wants to make fun of the fake masculinity through the character played by Narain. While the caricature nature of that character is hilarious in that flat scene featuring a major chunk of the cast, in other bits, the performance feels clumsy. Baiju Santhosh, as always, is hilarious, and after a really long time, Bhagath Manuel gets a memorable, funny character. Alappuzha Gymkhana fame Karthik and new face Hari Sivaram, or I would like to call him the version of Madhav Suresh, who knows how to act, are extremely good. Yog Japee, Sajin Cherukayil, Varsha Ramesh, Tessa Joseph, etc., are the other names in the elaborate cast of this film.

Bibin Krishna has opted for a totally different genre for this film, and he gives it that funky attire visually. The overall production quality of the movie is on the superior side. The vibrance in the visual tone by Alby is making the film engaging to an extent. Like I already said, writing something like this with multiple characters and parallel tracks is not an easy task. There are some outrageously funny moments where everything falls in place, and then there are moments where the logic is questionable, and you feel that the makers are thinking the viewers will overlook some stuff. The music is mostly on the peppy side. Still, there are some softer tracks as well, and it reminded me of an old song. The use of the song “Oru Mutham Thedi” from Independence in this film was hilarious.

If you are someone who likes the chaos comedy genre, Bibin Krishna’s Sahasam will have moments that will work for you. It was one of those movies where I felt tweaking the treatment given to some of the tracks would have made it that unmissable rollercoaster comedy. With some set pieces having abundant humor supported by impressive performances from familiar and lesser-known faces, Sahasam is enjoyable in totality.