‘Abhayam Thedi Veendum:' Powerful frames dominate this Santhosh Sivan film, which falls short in narrative | 'Manorathangal' Series Review

‘Abhayam Thedi Veendum’, directed by Santhosh Sivan, just like the title, opens with a man who arrives at a village hoping to find a place to stay. The opening shots reveal he is familiar with the place, though the villagers see him only as a stranger. Despite their apprehensions, he finds a space in a landlord’s home, whose temperament is as unpredictable as the weather.
There is an air of mystery throughout the series, even as Siddique, who has been introduced as The Man, tries to find answers there. Santhosh Sivan, who has cranked the camera for the segment, also employs various hues and lighting at times as if in a quest to capture the mood of the story. The film starts off by creating a sense on intrigue. The man’s arrival at the village creates a lot of flutter. He seeks refuge at an old, ill-maintained home, reminding you of Vaikom Mohammed Basheer’s ‘Bhargavi Nilayam’. However, unlike Bhargavi Nilayam, in 'Abhayam Thedi Veendum,' it is the protagonist's mind and not the house that is haunted.

MT's work was made into another film in 1986, which was titled ‘Abhayam Thedi’, where a young girl seeks solace at her ancestral home after her parents’ death. In ‘Abhayam Thedi Veendum’, the man is seemingly haunted by a woman’s memory, though we are not given any details about her, except that she is a beautiful woman who often wore red bangles as she flirted with the man.
Santhosh Sivan and M T Vasudevan Nair are collaborating for the first time as director-writer. While Santhosh Sivan has proved his excellence as a director in the past, in ‘Abhayam Thedi Veendum’, too many frames dominate each scene, creating a confusion in the narrative. M T’s work is poetic and Santhosh Sivan tries to capture it with fervency, but at the end you only get an illusion of what it could have been. Siddique excels in his role as the unnamed character. The haunting music by Jakes Bejoy also works for the film.