1. Plot

2. Review

3. Cast

4. Awards

5. References

6. External links

Irakal ({{lang-ml|ഇരകള്‍}}, {{lang-en|The Victims}}) is a 1985 Malayalam psychological thriller film written and directed by K. G. George and produced by the then prominent actor Sukumaran.^[1][2][3] The film is an in-depth exploration of the psychology of violence. Ganesh Kumar plays the film's protagonist.

The film met with critical acclaim upon release, though not commercially successful. It received several accolades including the state awards of that year.

Plot

A ruthless, Syrian Christian rubber baron, Mathews aka Mathukutty, disregards the prevailing moral standards, wielding money, religion, and violence as methods to sustain his empire, which includes marijuana. His sons Koshy, who is the second-in-commands in his business and illegal activities, is equally ruthless and violent. His second son Sunny is an alcoholic, but a normal guy struggling to get out of his father's stranglehold; he rebels once a while, but is afraid and lazy to go his own way. Mathukutty's only daughter, Annie, is a nymphomaniac, who keeps no emotions for her simpleton husband or daughter. Annie comes to live with her bigger family every month, in the pretense of some fight with her husband, so that she can sleep with Mathukutty's henchman and rubber employee, Unnunni. Mathukutty and Koshy encourages Annie's wayward lifestyle, and minces no words while insulting his son-in-law; Koshy even roughs him up, with his father's encouragement. Mathukkutty's youngest son, Baby, an engineering student, is inherently violent and shows early signs of neurosis or psychosis. Nevertheless, he keeps a strong but weird sense of justice. In the opening shots, he is shown as ragging a junior student, finally strangling him with an electric wire. The victim ends up in a critical state in a hospital, and Baby gets suspended from the college. Baby always keeps the electric wire in his bag. Baby observes Annie's affair with Unnunni, who is later found dead. Baby has violent dreams, constantly plays with his father's rifle, and imagines murdering Annie, multiple times, using his electric wire and the gun. He likes Nirmala, a village girl from a poor family. Nirmala, a voluptuous teenager, keeps him interested, and even makes love to him under the shade of coffee shrubs in broad daylight, but is blatantly fickle or strongly practical when it comes to marriage. She knows the meaning of being poor and powerless. Her marriage is planned with a local shop-owner, Balan. Baby silently watches her moves, and later kills Balan by strangling him with his preferred weapon, the electric wire. The murder went unsolved. Nirmala believes that Baby is behind Balan's death, and threatens Baby of reporting to the police. Baby tries to kill her as well, but Nirmala escapes. She gets engaged to Raghavan, a rubber tapper and Baby's local friend. Baby tries to strangle Raghavan, but fails in his attempt. Police is searching for Baby, who goes into hiding. While his family tries to find him, he suddenly appears with a revolver, and shoots at this father and brother. Mathukutty escapes, but Koshy is hit. In the end, Baby is shot dead by Mathukkutty, using his rifle.

Review

The one scene near Nirmala's house when the camera slowly zooms back from a close view of the house taking in more and more of the surroundings till it reveals the cold and menacing figure of Ganesh is the work of pure genius. The music, though loud at times, is suited to the mood of the film. But Malayalam film has got to a long way to go, if it has to provide a really good score for films such as these. In a situation where so many complex shots have to be joined up, editing can be a tough job. But it has been handed very professionally, with none of the amateurishness often seen in the 'parallel' cinema. The audiography too blends in with the general tone of the film. 'Irakal' can be analysed from the sociological, psychological and philosophical levels in addition to the surface level of pure cinema (Review published in Vaartha, 1986, the Press Club Trrivandrum's Diploma Newspaper, by late AP Prem Kumar).

Cast

• Ganesh Kumar as Baby Mathews
• Thilakan as Mathukutty
• P.C. George as Koshy Mathews
• Sukumaran as Sunny Mathews
• Srividya as Annie
• Nedumudi Venu as Andrews, Annie's husband
• Radha as Nirmala
• Venu Nagavally as Balan
• Ashokan as Raghavan
• Innocent as Aniyan Pilla
• Bharath Gopi as the Bishop
• Azeez as Ramakrishnan, the police inspector
• Chandran Nair
• Mohan Jose as Unnunni
• Kannur Sreelatha as Sunny's wife
• Shammi Thilakan as Baby's classmate

Awards

The film won two Kerala State Film Awards: for Second Best Film and Best Story (K. G. George).^[4] Thilakan narrowly missed the National Film Award that year.^[5] In 2016, George was awarded the Muttathu Varkey Award for writing the screenplay of the film. It was for the first time in the history of the prestigious award that a screenplay was chosen to be awarded.^[6]

References

External links

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