Villain

<p>The plot begins with the murder of three men who are killed by at gunpoint. Mathew Manjooran is retiring after a ; on his last day at work, he is called by the to investigate the case. Mathew is initially reluctant to help the Police in investigating the case but realizing the pressure on the and knowing about his medical condition finally decides to takes over the case. He is aided by 2 officers, Harshitha Chopra and Iqbal. Harshitha tells that she saw a woman wearing a rushing into a restaurant on the night of the murder; she offered help, but the woman refused and ran away. 7 months ago, Mathew arrests Felix. D. Vincent, who escapes from custody. Mathew and his wife Neelima accompany their daughter to her new college in . While en route, he receives duty call and returns to work, leaving his family to continue their journey alone. Their car is hit by a lorry, leaving his daughter dead and Neelima comatose. Meanwhile, Three more men are murdered in the same fashion; the victims have a connection with Tharakan’s hospital. Mathew deduces the killer to be Shaktivel Palanisamy, a doctor who works at the hospital. Shaktivel dark past reveals that his father committed suicide, and witnessing his death causes Shaktivel ; he sees incidents of in the hospital, and after graduating, he starts killing the perpetrators, with his girlfriend Dr. Shreya as an accomplice (the woman in the burqa). Mathew requests to relieve him from the case as now the culprit is revealed and decides to leave the man hunt operation to state police machinery. Harshitha finds out that Mathew’s family was murdered by Felix. She informs Mathew, who already knows this and shows no interest. They receive a video message from Shreya, revealing Felix’s location. Mathew fights Felix and is about to kill him, but draws back, realizing that Shaktivel had targeted Felix, and instead arrests him. Mathew learns that it was Iqbal who helped Felix escape from Police custody. Mathew asks Iqbal to surrender to the Police. Mathew discovers that Shaktivel’s next target is the DGP, who threatened a patient named Khalid Musthafa in Tharakan’s hospital, who later died in an unknown accident. Mathew is , and Shreya takes him to Shaktivel, who plans to kill the DGP in front of him. DGP convinces Mathew that he had threatened Musthafa fearing a great financial loss but has no role in his death. Mathew tries to dissuade Shaktivel, who believes that the is corrupt and that what he does is alternative justice. He reveals that Mathew Neelima. They argue and engage in ; Mathew defeats Shaktivel, but spares him because he believes that Shaktivel could still become a good doctor after treating his mental illness. Mathew is then seen building a school completing Neelima’s last wish. Following the release of (2014) starring , announced in May 2014 that his next film will also have Mohanlal in the lead role. Unnikrishnan’s initial plan was to make a sequel to his 2012 film starring Mohanlal, but this was cancelled due to difficulty in obtaining rights from ; its parent had ordered the closure of its Indian productions. In 2016, he planned a project with Mohanlal and , which did not materialise. Unnikrishnan abandoned five projects before choosing his self-written project . In July 2016, he said the film would be a thriller with an and that filming would commence in three months. In September 2016, Unnikrishnan said the project was experiencing some technical problems. During the initial discussions, the film was set against the backdrop of a village, which was later tweaked. He completed the screenplay in two-and-a-half years and estimated a high production cost. In early December 2016, he announced the project was scheduled to begin filming on 20 January 2017 for a release that May; the film would be distributed by . Initially, and HG Entertainment were signed to jointly produce the film; they conducted a preliminary function on 14 December and a few scenes were filmed. Regular filming was scheduled to begin in January as planned. Filming was later rescheduled to commence in March for a July release. work was still underway in January 2017. The same month, it was announced that would produce the film under the Rockline Entertainments company, marking their maiden production in Malayalam. Mohanlal announced the film’s title on 7 March 2017. According to Unnikrishnan, it is an “investigative thriller”. The film’s function was held at the in , Kerala, on 2 March 2017. commenced the following day in Kuravankonam, Thiruvananthapuram, beginning with shots featuring Khanna. Filming took place at and around marketplace. An investigation office set was created at Merryland Studio. The film’s art director was Gokuldas. Mohanlal joined on 5 March. Filming underwent at various places in and around Thiruvananthapuram during early March 2017. The schedule was expected to conclude by 20 March, after which the location would be shifted to . First schedule concluded on 19 March and second schedule began in on 24 March. Srikanth joined towards the end of this month. During the filming in the first week of April, Mohanlal was spotted with a different look. It was reported to be for some scenes. Warrier joined the filming on 14 April. The second schedule was concluded in on 18 April 2017. Post-production began before the final schedule commenced. After a month-long break, the final schedule began in June 2017 in Ernakulam. Vishal and Motwani joined in the first week. Some hospital scenes featuring Vishal were filmed in . For the filming of a song sequence including Vishal and Motwani, a set was constructed in Ernakulam. Vishal spent 20 days filming for the project. On 10 June, the team returned to Vagamon to film portions of the climax; Mohanlal joined for a 10-day schedule. Filming concluded on 19 June 2017 in Vagamon. The complete filming process was initially planned to take 50 – 55 shooting days. The film’s editor was Shameer Mohammed, who used a technique known as spot editing (editing on location). is the first Malayalam film to have done live on location during the filming process. (VFX) were used in 47 minutes of footage, which according to Unnikrishnan is unrecognisable because it was used in the background of some natural scenes. A Poland-based company was in charge with the film’s visual effects department. Stunt coordinators were , Ram Laxman and Action G. and were the cinematographers. is the first Indian film to be filmed entirely in ; ‘s Weapon Helium 8K S35 camera was used in the film. As of 2017 , no theatres in Kerala are equipped with 8K projection, and only a few even have 4K. Unnikrishnan said most Indian films are filmed in 1.8K resolution and are upscaled to 2K or 4K for theatre screening, which results in a loss of quality. Unnikrishnan chose to use a Zeiss Otus lens that was designed for use in . Before filming began, he and cinematographer Manoj Paramahamsa conducted test shoots; his inference was that Otus lenses, having high sensitivity and sharpness, will multiply the workload of a but will compensate with a greater output. Low lighting was extensively used in the film, which has no static shots. According to Unnikrishnan in , is “a compelling story of crime and detection” that “has predominant elements of politics and philosophy woven into it” and “is more intense than all my previous [films]”. The tagline “Good is Bad” was revealed in a poster featuring a black-and-white image of Mohanlal’s character. The film’s score was composed by , and the original soundtrack consists of five tracks composed by the music group (Jim Jacob, Biby Matthew, Eldhose Alias, and Justin James). All of the songs—except “Angakale Chengathiraniye”, which was written by Engandiyur Chandrasekharan—were written by B. K. Harinarayanan. The music rights of were bought by the label for a Malayalam-film-record amount of 50 . Dubbing rights to the songs were sold for 1 crore. The soundtrack album was released digitally and on DVD on 13 September 2017; a music launch function was held at Kochi for the occasion. Besides acting, Khanna made her Malayalam singing debut when recording the film’s title track in April 2017. The was released online on 27 April 2017; it set a record for a Malayalam film by accruing a million views in three hours. overseas distribution, Hindi dubbing and satellite rights were sold to RKD Studios for 2.5 crore, 3 crore, and 7 crore respectively—a record amount for a Malayalam film. The release date was announced after the film was censored by the on 6 October 2017. Advance booking in theatres in began from 22 October 2017. was released in India on 27 October 2017 in a Malayalam-film-record number of 273 screens in Kerala. It had more than 1,100 shows on its opening day, beginning with early screenings for fans. The premiere fan show was at HMT Theatre in at 07:00 and fan shows in Kerala were scheduled to begin at 08:00. The film had 156 fan shows in Kerala, the highest for any film in the state. was released internationally from 2 November 2017, debuting in the . The film was dubbed and released in as by RKD Studios in 2018, in as in 2019, and twice in : in 2019 and in 2022. On its opening day, grossed 4.91 crore ( 49.1 million) at the Kerala box office, setting a record for the highest statewide first-day gross for a Malayalam film. The film collected 12 crore ( 120 million) in its opening three-day weekend. It grossed a total of 20 crore from Kerala box office. grossed $441,977 from 49 screens in the in the opening weekend (2 – 5 November)—second best opener of that weekend (behind ) and $531,508 in three weeks. It grossed US$36,583 in the United States and US$5,214 in Canada in three weeks, A$2,355 in Australia in two weeks, £26,867 in the United Kingdom in three weeks and NZ$6,255 in New Zealand in two weeks. received generally mixed reviews from critics. Rating it 3 stars out of 5, Sanjith Sidhardhan of said: “Mohanlal as the veteran cop, who has endured pain but masks it, showcases his finesse as an actor. One of the strengths of the film is that it doesn’t bank on his superstar image and rather focuses on the narrative, which at times is choppy at best … BGM [film score] by Sushin Shyam adds to the tense scenes and the action sequences too are choreographed well”. Prem Udayabhanu from rated 3 stars out of 5, writing, “Only Mohanlal can enact the lingering pain of a personal tragedy with such subdued finesse … the cop doesn’t falter in his clinical observations to join the dots, but that is not the case with the narrative of . Perhaps the emphasis of the filmmakers was on its treatment, and on that count, it is a justified attempt.” Awarding 3 on a scale of 5, Meera Suresh from wrote: “Many might criticise for its slow pace, which is disappointing for a cop story. But, then, when a movie deals with ‘grey areas’ of life, it is not easy to be taut and steady … Mohanlal’s latest may not be a thrilling edge-of-the-seat outing, but it takes a different route, one that is enjoyable.” Calling Mohanlal’s performance “brilliant”, she added that his “subdued performance lifts the character to another level”. of Film Companion South called it “Yet another thriller that mistakes surface coolth for depth” critic awarded 3 out of 5 stars and commented: ” works fine as long as it doesn’t begin to lean on Hollywood prototypes. The indigenous strain is well woven into the thriller … the director never lets his characters lose track of their place in the jigsaw”. The review also said the film is “very handsomely mounted and shot” and “builds on Mohanlal’s power to express rage and grief without letting go”, and praised Vishal’s performance. Manoj Kumar R. of rated it 2.5 stars out of 5 and commented that the film “has some well written and well-shot scenes that establish the mood of the character. Mohanlal is convincing as a dejected copy, who is stuck in the past and looking for a reason to continue living … the screenplay is intriguing and sets in an element of suspense”. He also praised Vishal’s performance. Directors , , , and were all positive about the film, particularly praising the actors’ performances and its making. S. R. Praveen wrote in : “B. Unnikrishnan’s attempt here was not to deliver a straight, taut thriller, but to build a slow-burner, with an emotional family drama and the unravelling of a psycho killer all weaved together. But it is too much load to carry for a script that is short on imagination”. Rating the film 2 stars out of 5, Priyanka Sundar of said the film’s “slow pace, heavy dialogues and disconnected character arc take the thrill out of this investigative thriller”, and also criticised the script.</p>