Bougainvillea

Amal Neerad directorial Bougainvillea. A predictable action-thriller saved by the performances of actors involved. The mystery element of the film reminded of the recent Channing Tatum starrer Blink Twice (sans the usage of drugs). Books is based on Ruthinte Lokam by Lajo Jose.

Bougainvillea is jointly scripted by novelist Lajo Jose and Amal, while R J Murugan has penned the additional dialogues. The film is co-produced by actors Jyothirmayi and Kunchacko Boban under the banners of Amal Neerad Productions and Udaya Pictures, respectively. The director has retained almost the same technical crew from his previous outing for Bougainvillea, including cinematographer Anend C Chandran, editor Vivek Harshan and composer Sushin Shyam.

Spoiler Alert:

The story revolves around Jyothirmayi who has short memory loss and hallucinations. And she tries to remember things and finally understands that all the kidnappings of the girls around the town are done by  her Husband and he uses her to lure in girls and he kills everyone after raping. At the end of the film she shoots her husband and finds out that she was also abducted and made her believe that she was his wife.

Worth a watch for the amazing songs:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AhjUbDCCojk

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=exkJKrAVzAc

"Bougainvillea" directed by Amal Neerad and produced by Jyothirmayi and Kunchacko Boban, has hit the screens over the weekend and marks Jyothirmayi's return to acting after more than a decade. 

The film is about Dr Royce (Kunchacko Boban) and his wife, Reethu (Jyothirmayi) who have survived a near fatal car accident and Reethu has been suffering from retrograde amnesia ever since. She forgets things, imagines things and manages to survive only because of Royce's emotional support and the help provided by Rema (Srinda), her househelp and Rema's husband, Biju (Sharafudheen) who doubles up as her driver-on-call. The only constant in Reethu's life is her paintings and she continuously paints bougainvillea flowers on canvas for reasons best known to only her. Their life in a hillside plantation courses along peacefully until ACP David Koshy IPS (Fahadh Faazil) and his assistant CI Suresh Rajan (Shobi Thilakan) enter their lives enquiring about a college girl gone missing recently. They are suspicious of Reethu since they have obtained CCTV footage of Reethu following the missing girl and when they learn about Reethu's condition, they seek the help of a criminologist Meera (Veena Nandakumar) to get reliable information out of Reethu.

Are the cops able to find the missing girl? Is Reethu involved in the incident? What does Meera find out about Reethu? Answers to these questions are provided during the 140 minute odd narrative. 

Adapted from a 2019 novel "Ruthinte lokam", "Bougainvillea" is scripted by the director along with Lajo Jose who wrote the novel the movie is based on. The movie starts off quite promisingly as a slow burn thriller but fails to achieve its full potential due to a multitude of reasons - a slow first half that spends way too much time establishing characters, serious logical flaws in the second half and the audience's ability to guess the culprit way before any of the other characters. These aspects impact the entertainment quotient and in spite of all typical Amal Neerad tropes and technicians - well conceived shots with excellent lighting (Anend C Chandran is the cinematographer), good looking actors in good clothes (Ronex Xavier and Sameera Saneesh handle make up and costumes respectively), good background score (Sushin Shyam with that viral "Sthuthi" song playing out during the end credits), that "high on dopamine" feeling is missing when the end credits roll. 

Jyothirmayi handles her complex character well and it is good to see her on screen after long. Kunchacko Boban is also in good form. Srinda and Veena Nandakumar are impressive in their small yet significant roles. However, you feel cheated to see Fahadh Fazil playing an extended cameo in a role that is underdeveloped, underwritten and plain juvenile. Sharafudheen also seems to have been shortchanged by the director. 

To sum up, "Bougainvillea" seems to be a lazy effort on Amal's part and does not count among his best. It is not entirely unwatchable but we have come to except better stuff from the creator of iconic movies like Big B, Iyobinte Pusthakam, Varathan, Trance and Bheeshma Parvam among others.