Chathikkatha Chanthu

Chathikkatha Chanthu (transl. Chanthu who do not betray) is a 2004 Indian Malayalam-language comedy film written and directed by Rafi Mecartin and produced by Lal. It stars Jayasurya in the title role, along with an ensemble cast including Vineeth, Lal, Navya Nair, Bhavana, Madhu, Cochin Haneefa, Salim Kumar, Vinayakan, Siddique, and Janardhanan. The songs were composed by Alex Paul, while Berny-Ignatius did the scoring.

Chathikkatha Chanthu
VCD cover
Directed byRafi Mecartin
Produced byLal
Written byRafi Mecartin
StarringJayasurya
Navya Nair
Bhavana
Vineeth
Lal
Cochin Haneefa
Salim Kumar
Janardhanan
Music byAlex Paul
Berny-Ignatius (score)
CinematographySaloo George
Edited byHarihara Puthran
Production
company
Lal Creations
Distributed byLal Release
Release date
14 April 2004
Running time
130 minutes
CountryIndia
LanguageMalayalam

The plot follows Chanthu, an aspiring screenwriter. The film was released on 14 April 2004. It was remade in Kannada as Kal Manja.

Plot

The story begins with a young struggling script writer named Chanthu, whose mother works in a huge mansion owned by her master Thampuran. Apparently, Thampuran's daughter Indira is in love with Chanthu, but Thampuran finds out and demands Chanthu to end his relationship with Indira by forcing him to write letters describing his love with an imaginary woman named "Vasumathi" in a fictional "Thottakkattukara" village, which left Indira brokenhearted. However, unknown to both Chanthu, Indira and Thampuran, there exists a real Vasumathi in a real Thottakkattukara village, where she is about to commit suicide. Upon receiving the letters, Vasumathi begins to expect a savior by reading between the lines of it, and tells this case to her friend in hopes of getting the details of Chanthu. Following the direction of the letters, Vasumathi decides to await for Chanthu on a bus trip to Madras. Before Thamupran gets Chanthu to leave for Madras, Chanthu reveals the truth behind the letters to his old school friend Pappan.

As Vasumathi and her friend wait for Chanthu at the bus station, Vasumathi explains the whole story to a choreographer named Krishnan and several others just before Chanthu arrives. While the bus heads towards Madras, Vasumathi tries to impress Chanthu, but he doesn't realize who she really is. During the halt for dinner in a restaurant, Krishnan asks Chanthu about his journey, to which Chanthu explained the truth about his journey and tells Krishnan that even if the real Vasumathi were to turn up, he would not accept her because of his relationship with Indira. Hearing the story, Krishnan and the passengers in the bus empathize for Vasumathi, so Krishnan takes Chanthu and Vasumathi with him to his cottage, where Chanthu meets Romeo, who assists Krishnan there while Vasumathi gets a temporary shelter. The next day, Krishnan takes them to his shooting spot, where his film crew are busy with a shoot. The shooting location is in a lukewarm mood due to the stereotypical choreography of dance master Vikram, and the director and cameraman are becoming uncomfortable with him.

Krishnan introduces Chanthu before the director, who allows Chanthu to unfurl his new script in spite of being known that he always gave away sloppy plots. Chanthu opens his own tale to the director and adds that Vasumathi comes out of the home believing those letters. But the director doesn't accept it, saying that no girl would trust such letters and flee from home stupidly like he said. Seeing the dilemma that Chanthu is facing, Vasumathi hinders him and reveals her own origins: she was born in a rich family and was the lone heir of the massive wealth passed down by her mother and grandparents. However, tragedy struck when Vasumathi's mother died falling into a well and Vasumathi's grandmother died in her sleep, and the fingers point out to Vasumathi as she was present during the incidents. That, along with her refusal to marry her greedy brother-in-law Aravindan, is what led Vasumathi to be tortured by a Hindu priest who practices false wizardry. The tortures inflicted on Vasumathi, along with her supposed guilt over her mother and grandmother's deaths, is what almost drove her to commit suicide until she received the letters from Chanthu. Unknown to Vasumathi and the others, it turns out that her relatives (including Aravindan) from her father's family, led by her evil uncle, were jealous of her inheriting the wealth and plotted to have her murdered to take the wealth for themselves. It also turns out that the uncle was the one who murdered Vasumathi's mother and grandmother and framed Vasumathi for them, and that he and the relatives hired the priest to torture Vasumathi into committing suicide in exchange for a portion of the fortune. Vasumathi's grandfather is the only person in the family who sympathizes with Vasumathi's plight, but just like her, he too is unaware of the true circumstances as the uncle and the relatives easily manipulated him into believing that Vasumathi is being possessed by demons and that the tortures are justifiable.

When Vasumathi finishes her story, Krishnan tells the director that it was her own life story and they decide to make them join together. The entire crew of the shooting place come together and enjoy that day with music and dance. Chanthu commences to nurture a stardust towards Vasumathi, who truly believes that Chanthu soon realize the veracity and they join together. When Vasumathi brings in herself to show the letters to him, Indira arrives at the palace, having been informed by Pappan about what Thampuran did. But Chanthu holds his nerves and introduces Vasumathi as his lover. When Indira delves into Vasumathi, she denies it. A couple of days later, Aravindan reaches the cottage in search of Vasumathi to lure her back to Thottakkattukara (per the directions of her uncle). In the absence of Krishnan, Vasumathi is compelled to go with Aravindan. When Krishnan returns home, he reveals the truth to Chanthu by showing him and Indira the letters which were left by Vasumathi, and that the film crew were arrested by the police regarding to Vasumathi's disappearance. Realizing that he was duped to leave Vasumathi at the hands of her merciless uncle and relatives, Chanthu tries to save her, but Aravindan manhandles and sends him back to Madras in disgrace. Around the same time, the film crew returned after enduring the torture from the police and blamed Chanthu for what happened.

Deciding to rectify his mistakes, Chanthu rewrites the script in order to save Vasumathi. As such, he and the film crew reach the home where her uncle and relatives reside and begin the play using artificially-created horrific visual effects. They eventually locate the palace where Vasumathi is held captive. Upon reaching the palace and tending to Vasumathi, the crew plot a lively mechanized drama of ghastliness and trepidation using cinematic ghost characters and audio-visual sequence of events, turning the palace completely into a haunted house. Vasumathi, Chanthu and the film crew scared the arriving uncle and relatives, who called in the same priest to torture Vasumathi again. However, Vasumathi burns the priest's beard and lures him into the palace, where she, Chanthu and the film crew terrify him with their antics. Being scared out of his wits, the humiliated priest apologizes for his actions against Vasumathi, and leaves after calling off the deal with the uncle. Around the same time, a remorseful Thampuran arrives to the palace to make amends with Chanthu and Indira, but is surprised to see that Vasumathi actually exists.

Eventually, Vasumathi's uncle and the relatives soon learn that the entire event was just an artificially carried-out scene to stop them from murdering Vasumathi for the family fortune. Realizing this, the uncle orders the relatives and their thugs to murder Chanthu and the film crew while he confronts Vasumathi near the well where her mother died. While Chanthu and the film crew were able to fight back against the relatives and the thugs, the uncle admitted to having murdered Vasumathi's mother and grandmother just as he intends to murder Vasumathi with a sword. However, Vasumathi's grandfather came to the rescue by stabbing the uncle in the chest with another sword, having overheard everything and being outraged of what the uncle did. Vasumathi reconciles with her grandfather as they scornfully let the uncle succumb to his death, thus avenging the deaths of Vasumathi's mother and grandmother.

With the plot to murder Vasumathi and her family finally exposed, the relatives and their thugs are arrested for their crimes, but Vasumathi's grandfather too ends up being arrested for killing the uncle. However, the grandfather gratefully entrusts Chanthu and the film crew to take care of Vasumathi before he surrenders himself into custody. When Thampuran decides to return home with Indira, Vasumathi counsels Chanthu to go back to Indira if he chooses to. The film crew later made a movie based on the events, and it is revealed that Chanthu (now a successful script writer) entered into a relationship with Vasumathi while Indira entered into a relationship with Krishnan, thus ending the story on a happy note.

Cast

Soundtrack

The film's soundtrack is composed by Alex Paul. Lyrics are penned by Gireesh Puthenchery and Santhosh Varma.

No.TitleArtist(s)Length
1."Hossaina Hossaina"Afsal, Sujatha Mohan4:25
2."Kakothi Kavile"M. G. Sreekumar, Vidhu Prathap4:41
3."Love Letter"Balu3:55
4."Love Letter"Jyotsna3:59
5."Mazhameettum"Jyotsna, Balu5:25
6."Minnaminunge"Dr. Fahad3:41
7."Minnaminunge"Rimi Tomy3:48

Box office

The movie was a commercial success at the box office.[1][2][3][4]

gollark: And that's probably from Civ.
gollark: The only other one I can remember is some hanging gardens of Babylon thing.
gollark: Can you name all those and explain their history?
gollark: Everyone knows that aliens built the pyramids anyway...
gollark: Though the pyramids thing is probably just people not caring.

References
  1. "Malayalam cinema- Analysis 2004!". Sify. 1 January 2005.
  2. "Famous Movies rejected by Malayalam superstar". The Times of India. 24 April 2014.
  3. "Rafi-Mecartin reunite with a family entertainer". The Times of India. 24 April 2014.
  4. "Dileep and Lal are friends!". Sify. 2 March 2005.
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