Guru Somasundaram, Sanchana Natarajan, and John Vijay give fantastic performances in this sobering story about how difficult it is to give up a habit. The rest of this review contains spoilers.
One of the pleasures of cinema-watching is seeing that genuinely good actors like Guru Somasundaram have come into their own, to the extent of having films built around them. Bottle Radha is not a movie that would have worked with just a star, or the kind of “known face” who is usually cast because they have poster value. This is a difficult film about an alcoholic, and it needs an actor. It needs someone like Guru Somasundaram, who is also something of a star, thanks to Minnal Murali. (I guess that’s another reason to thank Malayalam cinema.) In Bottle Radha, the actor plays a man skilled in construction work. He is an A-grade tile-layer. He is also an A-grade alcoholic, who gets sacked from a job in the film’s opening sequence, a static single-take stretch where cinematographer Roopesh Shaji establishes the camera aesthetic. The frames are slightly wobbly, almost as if the camera was also drunk and swaying.
In the 1980s, we had the television series adapted from Sivasankari’s novel Oru Manidhanin Kadhai, where Raghuvaran played an alcoholic. (This was eventually made into a movie, also starring Raghuvaran, named Thyagu.) In that story and series, the protagonist took refuge in alcohol because he could not get the love he wanted from his father, and later, his wife, and because his mother died early. Bottle Radha does not give us a “why” for the character’s alcoholism. Radha – that’s the Guru Somasundaram character – is already an alcoholic when the film opens. Would it have helped to know the reason he began to drink, or at what point in his life he began to drink? Not really – because the story is about rehabilitation. All the men with Radha at the rehabilitation centre must have their own reasons for becoming alcoholics. The point is whether they can stop being one.
The first hour is fantastic. It is structured like a surreal prison-break movie. The Shawshank Redemption becomes a reference point. We even get a violent warden and character named Red, like in that movie. And the surreal feel comes from the suddenness with which Radha is pushed into this rehabilitation centre. One minute, he is with his wife and two children. The next minute, he is “jailed”, surrounded by eccentric fellow-”prisoners”. Bottle Radha is the rare message movie where the messages are shown rather than conveyed through dialogue. And even when there is speech, it is always in context. For instance, a volunteer at the rehabilitation centre talks about the effects of alcoholism on the liver. Or we get reformed alcoholics who do “sharing”, which is the term for talking about their experiences once they leave this place. There are lines that sting, like when Radha says the government has opened TASMAC shops all over the place, and yet, it’s the people who get blamed for drinking. Director Dhinakaran Sivalingam has a firm hand on the proceedings, and the mood and feel of these portions is terrific.
Toward interval point, things become more cinematic. Because of the need to break the film on a high, there is a change in tone that feels a little off. And the second half gets a little monotonous. You understand why. The life of a recovering alcoholic is a cycle. You want to stop drinking. You get out of rehab. But you start again. You get back into rehab. You feel better. You feel you can do it this time. You get out. And you start drinking again. This is the monotony the film attempts to capture, but at two-and-half-hours, things do begin to feel repetitive. And yet, you wonder if a shorter running time would have convinced us that it takes a long, long time for someone to truly break the habit. The director doesn’t just make us watch the life cycle of an alcoholic. He makes us feel it. He makes us feel like Radha’s wife Anjalam, played by a brilliant Sanchana Natarajan.
Guru Somasundaram’s success is in playing an alcoholic without the exaggerated body movements and slurred speech. Radha feels like a man who is not in control of his words or actions, but wants to be in control – and the actor shows us that effort. But Sanchana’s performance registers even better because this is a part we never see in Tamil cinema. Anjalam is no silent sufferer. Yes, the wretched look on her face after Radha has sex with her shows us that she is in a hellhole. But if Radha is determined to escape his prison (the rehab centre), Anjalam, too, is determined to escape her prison, which is this life, this endless cycle of mental abuse. She is the one who pushes Radha into rehab. She is the one who moves out with her children when Radha comes out of rehab and begins to drink again. Best of all, having wasted ten years of her life on this loser, she starts seeing a kind man. I wish this man’s role had been developed more, but just the mere sight of a married woman trying to find love again is fantastic. Sanchana owns this role like a boss, and there isn’t a single misstep. And through her, we also see the need for the film’s long run time – because it takes a long time for Anjalam to trust Radha again.
The third great performance in Bottle Radha comes from John Vijay, who plays Ashokan, the person who runs the rehab centre. On a side note, his character is a Christian. The owner of the house Anjalam moves into is a Muslim. And as we have come to expect in Pa Ranjith’s films, there are Buddhist references throughout. This intermingling of faiths gives the story a realistic feel, and also tells us that people are people, whatever their faith is. Ashokan has a past, too, and John Vijay is beautifully understated in the scene where he talks about it. He tells Radha that being sober in the rehab centre is easy, but the real challenge is staying sober in the world outside. Ashokan knows what it’s like to stay sane in the outside world, because he is battling his own demons. My favourite moment in the movie is when Ashokan has to face what Radha and two others have done just before interval point. There is no anger on his face, only resignation. He knows this is par for the course, and the only thing to do is think about the next step.
Every time you wonder why something is needed – like a song in a booze shop – we get an answer. After the celebration, we get a tragedy. There are some clumsy moments, like Radha’s daughter telling her father to give up drinking. This is too sentimental a scene, too eager to give the audience an emotion. But despite its flaws, Bottle Radha has a lot going for it. There is a fantastic scene when it rains, and Anjalam takes shelter with her kids while Radha is outside, getting drenched. You expect her to call him in, to be with them, but she has been through too many empty promises and she knows that feeling sorry for someone is different from taking them back into your life. The film ends with a big speech from Anjalam, and the emotion in it is totally earned. We have lived through the frustrating ups and downs of Radha’s life, and we know what Anjalam is talking about. I don’t know if Bottle Radha is going to reform alcoholics, but it takes us through the experience of being one and being with one. That is a major achievement.
