C U Soon - A Malayalam cinema experiment which works
One of the perks about being a malayali is that you can watch good quality cinema without the need for subtitles.
That brings me to Fahad Faasil. better known as FA FA to his fans. Fahad is easily one of the top 5 leading man in all of india, right up there with Nawaz, Rajkumar Rao, Ranbir Kapoor and Manoj Bajpayee.
While bollywood is waiting for the lockdown to end so that they can start work. The Malayalam industry is not one to sit quite and wait. So Mahesh Narayanan and his team set out to take on the challenge of making a movie completely during the lockdown
The Result is - CU SOON
CU soon is a simple love story. Jimmy a banker based in dubai is essentially a Casanova who always swipes right, one such swipe matches him to Anumol a simple, down to earth but mysterious girl. Our man is smitten and falls head over heels for this one. so much so that he decides to get married, In steps Kevin Thomas who is tasked by Jimmy's mother to investigate the whereabouts of this mysterious simple girl Anumol 
what does he find out? is there more to the story than meets the eye? what is she hiding?
intriguing answers to these questions form the rest of the film.
this by no means is a novel story line, we have seen, heard numerous takes and versions of this. but you haven't seen any like this.
Director Mahesh Narayanan whose previous work is the fantastic TAKE OFF copied and butchered in hindi as TIGER ZINDA HAI... he visualizes this story completely on screens, Laptop screens, Mobile screens, CCTV etc. by choosing to tell the story like this, he has restricted himself of the many elements a director usually used to communicate his vision. its like juggling with one hand tied to your back. 
Yet Mahesh who has written, directed and edited this film pulls it off fantastically, using the disadvantage of the lockdown and the "only screens approach" making it an advantage. One can imagine the hardwork on storyboarding and editing that would have gone into making this film - Not for one moment does Mahesh let your mind wander off. the film demands your complete attention.
With each new detail, that Kevin's character finds out about Anumol a new possibility emerges and you along with kevin are in this roller coaster ride. 
Again, This type of storytelling - Using screens only is also not new. Movies like "Unfriended , Face to Face and more recently Searching" has also used this technique, but in all movies except searching this aspect feels like a gimmick. Searching is a 2018 film about a father looking for his missing teenage daughter. It was i believe one of the first f
ilm to organically use screens to convey the entire story.
ilm to organically use screens to convey the entire story.
now it is obvious that CU Soon would be compared to Searching, and rightly so, both are investigative thriller drama's but to me CU soon is a far superior film and that is because of its emotional core and the way it conveys it thru its characters within its limited set up. Most importantly its performances. CU Soon has some knockout performances and top of the list is Darshana Rajendra who plays anumol.
The way she conveys hurt, shame, anxiety and depression on a handheld camera at 1 feet distance is astounding.
Roshan Matthew as Jimmy is superb too... he has the best arc in the film, from being a love struck romeo to a angry, disgruntled man and back. He is terrific.
While CU Soon might not be his best performance, he is still in top form. giving us a well rounded character who while initially come off as arrogant and misogynistic eventually shows us his sensitive and vulnerable side.
One of the cheat sheets into watching great quality cinema without having to research much is to just blindly follow - Fa Fa;s recent filmography the man has absolutely no bad films there...
I can go on and on about this film and about Fa FA
but to cut it short - all i can say is CU SOON is an achievement in film making, a minor miracle if you please. Its a must watch.
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