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Cast:
| Chandrasekhar. |
Jaisurya |
Kavya Madhavan |
| Indrajit |
Vijaykumar |
Rajiv |
| Director:
Vinayan |
 The director seems to have a penchant for stories centered round handicapped people. It’s not only his lead players, but also some of the supporting cast, who are either mentally or physically challenged. If ‘Kasi’ had a blind street singer and a limping crony, ‘En Mana Vaanile’ has a lead pair who are mutes, and a hunch-backed sidekick.
A wealthy heiress falls in love with a youth who paints hoardings for a living. Enter the villain of the piece, the girl’s Mumbai cousin, with an eye on her wealth. He could marry the girl and get his family out of near bankruptcy. The eloping of the
lovers, the chases, the exposing of the villain’s motive, and the re-union of the lovers forms the rest of the story. So what’s new one might ask?
 Just that the director has made his protagonists mutes, the girl being additionally deaf. So while one commends the director for his daring in making his lead players not utter a single word in the film, one cannot but notice that the rest is routine stuff. Further, if you are misled into thinking that the duo being mutes, it’ll be silence most of the time the duo are in the frame, you are soon put right. For the noise and the racket the duo create, more than makes up for the absence of any dialogue for them. And with the hero’s cronies being Vyapuri, Vadivelu and Manivannan, isn’t it unfair to expect a less noisy ambience? Vadivelu plays a hunchback with quite a flexible hump on his back!
In the director’s remake of his own successful Malayalam film (Ooma Penninu Uriyada Payyan) Jaisurya, Kavya and Indrajit re-enact the roles they have played in the original. Jaisurya fits into the role, expressions coming naturally to him. Kavya is a bit too plump for comfort. But is lucky, since the director has rarely let the camera catch her in full form, but moves in quickly for close-up shots of a well made-up face. Performing with his usual dexterity is Chandrasekhar, as the blind street singer.
Malini Mannath
published on 22nd September
2002
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