Thirty-six years later, I can't tell you how many times I have watched 'Thoovanathumbikal', which was released on the 31st of July. In any case, I have beaten Rameshan, the eldest son of Janardhanan Chettan of Vadakkeveli, who has seen 'Madanotsavam' 15 times, on this score. I also have many friends, whom I know, still feel 'Thoovanathumbikal’ as an intoxicant in their veins.
Not only our generation but even the younger ones, too, fervently keep this cult cinema close to their hearts. Having lived among the students of a college for 19 years, I have truly understood their hero worship towards Mannarathodi Jayakrishnan Menon (the lead character played by Mohanlal). Even yesterday too, I saw and experienced many scenes in the film showcasing a magic that keeps changing every time I watch the movie.
I was a first-year degree student when 'Thoovanathumbikal', which did not enjoy much success in the neighbouring districts, was screened in front of a packed audience at Pankaj Theatre in Alappuzha. I wasn't quite impressed by Clara (the character played by Sumalatha) in the film because of some women in my countryside who were destined to be ‘Claras’ with no means to buy rations and kerosene. Their rare personality lay hidden. Over time, there was a change in my attitude towards Clara. This was because of the Claras whom I met in city life.
Still, the doubts raised in my mind, watching 'Thoovanathumbal' again and again, remained as such. Couldn't Clara have reigned like a queen in Mannarathodi by marrying a rich Jayakrishnan? Why did she let go of the opportunity? However, these two questions no longer linger in my mind. Today I understand the great sacrifice that Clara made to immortalize love, which the poets described as a four-day infatuation. May I bow before the purity, dedication, and courage of her heart that hastened to hold close love and freedom, which generally do not go together.
The sense of independence expressed by Mannarathodi Jayakrishnan stems from social and economic security. But Clara, who lives in the midst of a drunken father and an unyielding stepmother, does not enjoy such privileges. Clara's independent thoughts are natural. She decides and executes. Only once had Clara accepted an intermediary called ‘Thangal’ (a character played by Babu Namboothiri). She made the rest of the journeys alone. How did she find the courage? The answer lies in one line – because of the intense love for Jayakrishnan. Not even the one who had left a deep impression on Clara's heart in just one night, realized the secret at first -- that she would always be close, no matter how far apart they were physically.
And when Jayakrishnan saw Clara as a woman who shared her body for the first time in her life, for Clara, he was not only the first but also the last man she fell in love with. While Jayakrishnan regarded her as a mere source to satiate lust, Clara discovered in Jayakrishnan the evergreen love that remains unaltered in any life situation. She presented herself to him with the utmost joy so that she no longer needed another person.
'Thoovanathumbikal' is a film that can only be enjoyed by knowing the differences in the approach of a man and a woman towards love. One interpretation goes that once in love, it is their breath itself for women and food for men. For one, love is fundamental to existence. The other thinks about it only when he needs it. In the midst of this, Clara displays a mature personality that can strike the right balance. Wisdom, rather than emotion, leads her way. She wished that love should not wither away as a dream she had seen yesterday and should be with her forever as a reality. So, the well-known verse that interprets the Gandharva is well-suited to Clara as well. It doesn't take her a single moment to become Jayakrishnan's Clara, even as she travels from town to town and from room to room.
Far from all this, a vast majority of the male audiences enjoy 'Thoovanathumbikal' as a story of the heroic adventures of Jayakrishnan Menon. The influence of Jayakrishnan, who turns every moment into a celebration of life, on the male community is so profound. While some, who were inspired by him, wanted to be Jayakrishnans, another lot began to recognize the Jayakrishnan within. In fact, apart from being an adventurer, there is a hidden curve of a lover in Jayakrishnan. A man who is spread out like a lotus flower on the surface of the water without getting bogged down in the mud of lust. He wants the love of a girl. The mysterious wait for such a girl ended in Clara.
Many viewers take the rain that comes and goes like a character throughout 'Thoovanathumbikal' in distinct ways. I'd like to see it as the love that rains in Jayakrishnan. When he sat to write a fake letter in the name of Mother Superior, he felt the warmth of the first love in the raindrops that splashed through the open window. Jayakrishnan, who to date did not know what love is, identifies love as the fragrance of a thousand lilies in the presence of Clara. Here, there is an extraordinary harmony between Rishyashringa of 'Mahabharata' and Jayakrishnan of Mannarathodi. It required a girl's generosity to soak his dry male heart in the rain of love. Clara accomplishes her mission successfully. Thangal and her stepmother just provided the right background for it.
The very theme of ‘Thoovanathumbikal’ is the extraordinary love between a call girl hailing from a poor family and a youth, born and brought up in a traditional aristocratic setup. The ancient way of storytelling, which weaves together myths, works for any era. We can easily include the emotional bond between the hero and the heroine in the Platonic category, given the dedication and sacrificing mentality of the lovers for one another. The love that blossoms and exists for the sole purpose of love itself can’t be withered away by adverse situations. As the story ends, both Jayakrishnan and Clara get separated and return to two families. But even then, I can make out that evergreen love sparkling like a diamond in the eyes of Clara while she smiles and waves her hand at Jayakrishnan as the train chugs forward slowly. And Jayakrishnan’s body language further reveals the depth of their relationship, for their love is not one that blossomed to vanquish in one fine morning at the Ottapalam railway station. The movie ‘Thoovanathumbikal’ asseverate the truth that love, once blossomed, can’t be ruined in any manner and that the profound feeling will be permanently etched in the hearts of the lover even without their realizing it.
There are those who believe that love is the product of circumstances and that it happens when the friendship between a male and a female gets updated. But the emotional bondage between Jayakrishnan and Clara has nothing to do with circumstances or friendship. The remorse over being a small factor in ruining the life of a girl won’t be a sufficient reason for Jayakrishnan to love Clara for his entire life. Maybe he would marry her out of that obstinate feeling. But that’s not the truth, however. Jayakrishnan’s love for Clara started blossoming at the very moment he met her for the first time. And when he says, “She is not a girl who could be figured out easily,” he had actually fully understood her. Still, by posing the simple question, ‘Shall I marry you Clara’, Jayakrishnan is unsuccessfully attempting to protect that inner male chauvinism. Even the marriage promise that he makes out of the guilt feeling for sharing her body points out the male superiority feeling to clinch back victory. And Clara takes no time to spot his egoist desire to be her savior and authority. But she gave him an opportunity to free himself of that and to realize his true state of mind for her. Her fleeing from him was aimed at that. Her absence brought out the hidden lover in Jayakrishnan with much intensity.
Though Clara happens to appear before Jayakrishnan as part of a script laid down by Thangal and her stepmother, she had the astuteness to unravel his illusions and fantasies from the very start. Her expressions and body statements reveal no such struggles as to suggest she was losing something that is valued the most as far as a girl is concerned. Even I, too, wanted an answer to the query as to how an illiterate girl, who lacked real-world experience and grew up in traditional values, managed to face this with such easiness. In reality, what she had devoted to him was not her mere body, but her love as well. She was not pretending the immense joy she experienced in each second that she spent with Jayakrishnan. Only a girl who is immersed in such profound love could establish such a deep bond with the man whom she meets for the first time. Clara, who had a clear-cut idea of the qualities that her lover should possess, would have certainly found the same in Jayakrishnan. She returns him unconditionally, what he offers her with a condition.
Men, who are always eager to possess what’s new, see love as a means of asserting dominance over women. Women don't want to get out of love once they've made up their minds about it. They want their favourite man to be under their watchful eyes all the time and want to mingle with him. But for any man, love becomes an obligation after a point. He begins to see love as a barrier to his freedom. Not all women may be able to cope with this male mentality easily. The love that filled them with joy may ultimately make them suffer mentally and leave them in solitude. On the contrary, the love that Jayakrishnan and Clara introduce is unconditional and unselfish. Their heart-to-heart relationship helps to compare the two periods, old and new. Those involved in the new-age love dramas that make every day miserable and unbearable by suspecting, suffocating, fighting, threatening, disturbing, blaming each other, and invading privacy should be willing to take a look at 'Thoovanathumbikal' once again. 'Thoovanathumbikal' will be certainly useful in realizing how ridiculous the urges to tie the man as a slave of romance is, and to understand that woman too has the freedom to think independently and intervene in society, and to acquire the sacred lessons of the art of love that integrates contradictions.
For a long time, society has been singing the misery-filled stories of ‘Devadasas’ who have been rejected by women. But the life story of a woman melting away in the agony of being thrown away is not much documented. Nor society allows women so much freedom to give up what is not good for them. Society is also unable to educate those who are out to take revenge with guns, daggers, petrol, and acid. Parallelly, models that support attitudes of male dominance are also celebrated in literature and other arts as well. Here, for a man, love is lust masqueraded, a kind of genetic instinct. Examples to the contrary are available as well. I, too, have seen the ease of changing bedsheets. The reason Clara is different from them is because of the value she attaches to love. She has enough skill and control of her mind to take love and freedom together.
Right from the start of my teaching career, I used to follow a system to make the subjects that I teach in classes interesting. As part of this, Clara and Jayakrishnan have appeared and gone many times in my classes. On such occasions, I used to repeat one line in a lighter vein -- “I’m against love.” The girl students, as they hear this, will become restless. A major share of the audience would have already been in love. So, they will tend to question the same. Even the other day, a student asked, “What’s the problem with love, sir?” I’ve already readied the answer in advance by co-relating with the happenings around. “In love, a girl often finds herself having no freedom. The first thing that a man does after falling in love with a girl is to restrict her freedom.” Though she didn’t understand it, I mixed certain maxims that form part of the syllabus. Even Clara was not used to such statements. Still, she satiated the desire for freedom, highlighted in women-centric studies, in her life. She proved that one could attain love without sacrificing freedom. Clara has also manifested that if the love is true, unselfish, and seeks pure happiness, then it will overcome any living conditions, period, and hindrances. Let me add a small story to further make the point clear;-
Once Osho said during a discourse: “Love is poisonous. It will result in death.” Then a foreign youth sitting among the audience raised his hand and asked, “If that is the case, Guruji, why are the people still indulging in love?” Osho replied with a smile, “Dear, your death has already happened. Now wait with patience for your rebirth.”
A big secret lay hidden in the statements of Osho – Love, which is the cause of death, also paves the way for rebirth. But what Clara desires is entirely a different thing. She doesn’t want to die. She wants to continue living in this birth titled Mannarathodi Jayakrishnan Menon. After all, it is the same sentiments she reveals by longing to be the non-healing wound in the legs of a mentally ill person lying chained on the hillside and clinging to the single link of the chain all the time.
(Note: The author is a music composer and also a professor at Ernakulam Maharajas College)
