The Kerala Story movie review: A marveling story ends up with a middling, manipulative treatment

Cast: Adah Sharma, Yogita Bihani, Sonia Balani, Siddhi Idnani, Vijay Krishna, Pranay Pachauri, Pranav Misshra

Director: Sudipto Sen

Language: Hindi

Spoilers Ahead

There have been instances of the screen going blank (and black) and deep silence filling the room in many end credits of Hindi movies- Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s Devdas (2002) and Vishal Bhardwaj’s Omkara (2006) in particular, both which end on tragic notes. In Sudipto Sen’s The Kerala Story, this happens right at the beginning. You don’t have to wait till the end for tragedy to strike, it’s right there in the ethos of the narrative; it’s based on multiple true events. It talks about the college girls in the state of Kerala being brainwashed into converting to Islam and joining the ISIS organization. Many of them were turned into suicide bombers; this happened by systematically brainwashing them into believing Islam was the most supreme religion in the world and that all the other Gods are flawed and merely humans.

The film also strikes a conversation about communism, and religion being the opium of the people. We have theories by Karl Marx and questioning of the Ramayana. It’s interesting these terror groups chose Kerala as their state of their operandi. Considering it has the highest literacy rate in India, for them to convincingly brainwash as many as 32,000 girls is appalling. Some of the talks about Jehad and Kurbaani are now done-to-death, but what catches your eye is how even in 2023, these conflicts and conversations continue to exist. I guess the targets were chosen based on their naïveté, more the gullibility, easier the scapegoating.

But when has correct intent made the correct film? The Kerala Story is the story of three girls whose lives are demolished at the hands of the ISIS. The film also shows the Love Jihad propaganda as well where Muslim men manipulated these girls to convert into Islam and abandon their families. At the center is Adah Sharma, who plays Shalini Unnikrishnan who later becomes Fatima Ba. There are multiple close-up shots of the actress during her interrogation scenes and otherwise, where she’s visibly bruised and broken, emotionally and physically. And despite the fluctuating accent, she does own few scenes, particularly one where she’s raped by her own husband despite being pregnant. The other discomforting scene unfolds at a police station with Yogita Bihani’s chocking monologue about the missing girls, the aftermath of their systematic brainwash, and the political silence of the people in power. This is the closest the film comes to possessing a soul. Bihani plays Nimah, the only girl who doesn’t fall into this trap and in one scene, a very crucial scene in the film, informs Shalini she knew it was a trap, but for some strange reasons, she disappears midway through the story.

Since the film is inspired by true events, the story doesn’t permit the vulnerabilities of the central characters suddenly bloom into heroism. Right till the end, the suffering doesn’t end; there’s no pain they are not inflicted with. What’s also intriguing is how the film shows both the powerful and the powerless possessing the same emotional fragility. If the ISIS play with the girls’ innocence, they too give it back by stabbing right at their brittle egos. All they have to do is utter a two-letter word- NO. One of them even does, and calls his perpetrator an impotent. It all ends shockingly for the girl more than the man but it also shows how these supposed monsters are so easy to break.

But The Kerala Story turns too melodramatic and manipulative due to the excessiveness of its background score, which literally highjacks the actors’ performances to inform us about the intent and turmoil of the characters. Even the glimpses of the real victims and their footages in the end isn’t convincing enough to create that uncomfortable stir that was required for a story this horrific. It’s always great to have debates around films and whether they are well-made or not, whether they are propaganda or not, but just like great intents, great debates don’t make great movies either.

Rating: 2.5 (out of 5 stars)

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