Silence has answers : Director John Mahendran

Munnariyippu

Silence has answers.

Every time my phone rings at wee hours of a day I will be sure my Dad (Director Mahendran) would have watched some amazing movie and would want to speak to the Director immediately and appreciate him.

This time it was the Malayalam movie Munnariyippu, directed by Venu starring Mammooty and Aparna.

The movie takes off with Nedumudi Venu , a jail superintendent who is looking for a ghost writer to write his Autobiography. Aparna walks in to take up the offer, during when she meets up with Mammooty who is in prison for a Double homicide.

Aparna feels that prisoners speaking about jail superintendent will be more interesting for her write up.

This is when she comes to know that Mammooty though released few years back insisted on staying back in prison. Picking up a conversation with him, she is baffled at Mammootty’s philosophy about freedom and life. Lines like “Does the reflected image in a mirror look back at him or does it accepts him and comes along with him”, “A Prison should be a place for people to understand their mistakes and correct them rather than a place for punishment”, “Life as a struggle before death”.

Aparna gets excited as a writer after interacting with Mammooty, she goes ahead to write an interesting article about Mammooty in a magazine, which attracts attention of many.

This is when Aparna is given a offer by a publisher from Mumbai, asking her to come up with a biography about Mammooty, as to why such a unusual philosophical man would have killed two women, what was the reason behind it or did he really kill? Aparna who has been Ghost writing finds this offer tempting to create a name for herself.

Excited by the offer, Aparna persuades Mammooty on the project and manages to take him out and board him in a mansion away from anyone identifying him.

She offers him a bundle of papers and a pen asks him to write about his life or whatever he remembers about his life outside prison.

Mammooty keeps fidgeting with the pen lost in thoughts, as if scared to confront his past.

Days pass by, Weeks Pass by, Mammooty doesn’t place a dot on the paper.

Pressured by the publisher, Aparna loses control and lashes at Mammooty telling prison is the right place for him to be, during when, to her shocking surprise Mammooty hands over a bundle of paper which has his writing all over it.

Taken aback by this turn, Aparna instantly starts reading. As she reads the content in the papers, she reacts with shock beyond belief and finally slips the paper down and looks at Mammooty who is standing near her with an innocent smile, one brutal blow with an iron rod, Mammooty kills Aparna.

Mammooty is seen lying in prison, with three photos stuck on the wall behind him. One photo is that of Aparna now.

The beauty of this movie was, we are never told what Mammooty wrote or what Aparna read.

It’s left to our mind…its left to our interpretation…its left to the dark side inside us.

John Mahendran

Film writer/Director