Minnal Murali – Kerala’s 1st superhero

1. Minnal Murali is a 2021 Malayalam movie directed by Basil Joseph that talks about the use and misuse of powers by superheroes.
2. Jaison (Tovino Thomas) is a tailor who works in his fathers’ shop and is planning to move to the USA so that he could marry his girlfriend. But the girlfriend and her father Saajan ditch Jaison. On a Christmas day, Jaison and Shibu (Guru Somasundaram), a tea-stall worker are hit by lightning, in 2 different places and unknown to each other. They develop superpowers, which they notice over the next few days. Saajan beats Jaison’s father. Jaison takes revenge by covering himself in a mask and using his superpowers to beat Saajan. On the same day, Shibu robs a bank so that he could help Usha, his one-sided love. The robbery case is also pinned on Jaison a.k.a Minnal Murali. Shibu starts to misuse this further. He kills Usha’s brother who was against their relationship and Minnal is blamed for the same. The cops lookout for their real killer and are able to get a CCTV recording which is stolen by Shibu and this leads to a fight between Minnal and Shibu. The next day, both of them are able to know the identity of each other. The villagers arrive to kill Shibu, who beats up everyone. At his house, Usha is waiting to take the relationship forward. The villagers arrive at Shibu’s house and they kill Usha and her daughter. This angers Shibu and he becomes a maniac. At a local festival, he tries to kill the villagers assembled there. Minnal Murali arrives there and kills Shibu and saves the villagers.
3. This is the first superhero movie in Malayalam and it turned out to be pretty decent. It touched the local aspects and used the fiction elements to show a good-over-evil story. The movie but did not stand up to the hype that it created before release.
4. The acting by the cast was good and the direction also. Maybe it was part of the storyline or something else as the villain of the story did not get much recognition before the release of the movie and was a well-kept secret.
5. Minnal Murali, the superhero is a combination of mostly Flash and a little bit of Thor. From the ending, it looked like the 2nd part would be coming too and then a series will there for sure, like any other superhero movie.
6. The hero and the villain were both affected by the person that they loved. Whether it is fiction or non-fiction, Indian stories are incomplete without a bit of love story in it. Though the love story in this was not stretched in sentiments and emotions only.
7. The movie is funny in many instances and is violent in some. It is a mix of everything but the thing that was lacking was the music. There was not a single song that could have stayed in everyone’s mind as the movie hangover part.
8. Minnal Murali’s greatest success was that it did not go for high-tech DC-Marvel type stunts/actions or gadgets and did stand for power that any local man/woman from Kerala could understand. It was a typical Indian family movie full of powers.
9. A critically acclaimed movie that was a Netflix release.
10. A must watch one and I say it was GOOD.