Whirling dervishes, a protagonist named ‘sufi’, background music with the word ‘roohi’ thrown in at regular intervals every time the sufi’s lady love appears on screen, a clarinet-playing old Sufi saint in a Jinn mosque — all the elements that one could associate with a mystical romance are in place in Naranipuzha Shanavas’s Sufiyum Sujatayum, streaming in Amazon Prime now. But, all the visual elements being there would still not make up for the absence of a film’s ‘rooh’ (soul), a script with well-etched characters.
Ironically, much of the work in burnishing the movie’s Sufi credentials remains limited to the surface, in its visuals and music, which it gets right. In that respect, it is a stark contrast to Shanavas’s debut film Kari, a bare-to-the-bone independent work that was noted for its strong critique of casteism.
Sufiyum Sujatayum begins with the nomadic Sufi (Dev Mohan) returning to the Jinn mosque after years. A soulful ‘Azaan’ call later, he collapses and dies. A message informing the death reaches Rajeevan (Jayasurya), the husband of Sufi’s former lover Sujata (Aditi Rao Hydari), who decides to take his wife to see his face for one last time, hoping that it would save their unhappy marriage.
Loose threads
Much of the first half of the film is then set in the flashback, of the Sufi arriving in the village, somewhere on the Kerala-Karnataka border, meeting the aurally challenged Sujata during her visits to the clarinet-playing saint at the mosque and them falling in love. But, this love remains under-explored, so is the character of Sufi. If the intention was to maintain the element of mystery on a mystic, it does not cut it in a film where we would be keen to know what made him what he is or what makes them fall for each other.
Inevitably, the film also addresses the fake propaganda of ‘Love Jihad’, which sees Hindu women as helpless victims being lured by evil Muslim men. Here, the initiative comes equally, or even more, on the part of Sujata.
But the script sticks to just a mere mention of ‘Love Jihad’, staying safely away from the other complicated societal issues behind it. But at a time when symbols of Muslim-ness become targets of hate, the film celebrates them unapologetically.
Yet, the treatment of the film harks back to a past era, despite all the pleasing visuals conjured up by cinematographer Anu Moothedath. We are also left confused as to the timeline of the story.
The love and Sufism in Sufiyum Sujatayum disappointingly remains skin-deep, which is a tragedy considering the promise it held.
S.R. Praveen
