Since the release of Athiran back in 2019, I've been wondering why malayalam cinema shies away from exploring the psychological-thriller genre in a different way. Even after copying most of its setting from shutter island and having a mediocre story Athiran still did well at the box office. In fact , there are numerous examples of major commercial hits from this particular genre (like manichithrathazhu). But it took a pandemic induced OTT boom for the industry to try out something more audacious like LOVE. Well, better late than never. Right?
But if you finished watching this Khalid Rahman directorial, chances are you probably got stumped by the mysterious turn of events that took place. THUS, in order top bring peace into to this chaotic world, I took the time to re-watch the whole movie, and here is my [SPOILER FILLED] explanation of WTF just happened.
[MAJOR SPOILER ALERT] Read this after watching the full movie
The Timeline of events: Story begins with Rajisha's character(Deepthi) , finding out that she is 2 months pregnant, and as she arrives at her apartment , an argument with her husband(played by Shine) ends up in her getting killed. Then we are introduced to several characters like Deepthi's father and Shine's secret lover. But the most intriguing of them are the two men, who at first glance looks like Shine's close friends. One of them (Gokulan) is a failed business man who has trust issues with his partner, and thinks that his wife is cheating on him. The second one (Sudhi Koppa) is a cheating husband who has an affair with another women and tries to keep it a secret from his wife. Later on, it becomes clear to Shine that these men are two different versions of his own psyche, and that the death of his wife was a trial run by his mind , trying to predict the possible outcomes. When Rajisha's character finally arrives home and reveals that she is pregnant, he tries to avoid an argument with her. By this time we know that the text message he recieved saying " I'm Pregnant " at the beginning was from Haritha - Shine's other LOVE.
The Interconnections: When we hear Sunny Wayne's voice at the other end as Haritha cooks up excuses for her fooling around, we know that it is the same Shelby that Gokulan's character is suspicious of. In short, Shine is having an affair with Shelby's wife, and simultaneously thinks that his own wife is cheating him with Shelby . This inner conflict of guilt, failure , fear and suspicion is what drives him to the mental stage that he is currently in.
The Twist: And, when all these emotions start warring inside him, Shine finally opts to hit Rajisha with an Iron box. Unfortunately for him, she is more than alive after getting hit in her head, and kills Shine.
Now, I am not quite sure if this is exactly what the makers intended with the climax, but several online discussions have also came at the same conclusion that I did. This would explain the blood on her head as she surrenders to the police. So to sum up , Shine is contemplating Rajisha's murder for the entire lenght of the movie, but in the end, he gets killed by Rajisha.
(There was no other option for ending Shine's character arc as it would be morally wrong for the violent&adultering anti-hero o survive)
What are your thoughts on this ending? Feel free to share your opinions here
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