Neelira TamilYogi Review: What is the initial thing you associate with a wedding house? – usually filled with turmeric-streaked laughter, ringing bangles and mad blessings – is the aching heart-beat of Neelira, and one glimpse of it leaves you privy to all that Someetharan has to say in his film. It does not have to act like a typical war movie because of its backdrop of the late 1980s animosity between the Indian Peace Keeping Forces and the LTTE. Instead, it renders celebration uncomfortable, letting silence, looks, narrow quarters to do the work. The final result is a movie that is intimate, dramatic and most human of all that, the bride and her family and the guests in the hall are trapped in what appears to be a party, which no longer feels like a wedding but it is a struggle to survive. Neelira makes no screams of pain, it burrows inside your skin.
Under the direction of Someetharan, Neelira is set in the late 1980s, the turbulent period of the relations between the Indian Peace Keeping Force and the LTTE. The first thing that immediately struck me was the fact that the film does not over-explain its political background. It does not stop to teach or inform context in a blatant way. Rather, it plunges the audience into a real world, with the conflict being a silent presence there. I thought this was a very effective method, as it does not assume that the viewer is stupid, and it lets the tension be generated naturally by situations and behaviour.
The narration relies upon silence as much as it relies upon words. The unease is not declared, it is felt. And that makes it all the more immersive.
The main character is a wedding at the heart of Neelira, a symbol of continuity and hope. However, despite the family meeting and the rites commencing, one feels that this celebration by itself is a courageous, or maybe a denial, act. That tenuous normality is broken as the armed troops come, next in line, and transform the house into a battleground.
This transition was especially effective to me. No intense change of tone, it occurs nearly silently, but the consequences are gigantic. The house ceases to be home and turns into a territory of uncertainty, where each look, each action is dangerous. This changing point is depicted in the film with remarkable tact.
The things that remained in my image were how the film did not focus on politics but on people. Building a traditional war story with ideological stage-setting would have been effortless, yet Neelira opts to follow a much more compelling path. The vulnerability of the bride, her parents, the guests, all of them are depicted with a silent vulnerability that is too real to be painful.
They are not composed in the form of metaphors and symbols. They are people, trapped in a situation which they cannot control and are not entirely aware of. It is humanisation in which the film is emotionally rooted. I could feel their fear, their confusion and their efforts to cling onto normalcy.
Neelira is very sharp in writing. Each scene seems to be leading to something, restraining a revelation. I kept on guessing what would happen next but the movie keeps on thwarting expectations. This uncertainty turns into one of its most captivating attributes.
The story is overlaid with scenes that have a silent shock. These are not noisy turns, but very dramatic changes that turn the emotional foundations under your feet. When the movie gets down to its last stretch, I was able to see the point in keeping any information about it a secret or the experience would be watered down.
One can appreciate the dialogues especially because of their subtle power. They are not made to astonish with pomp, rather, they are natural, almost as bits of actual dialogues. The topics of war, its meaning and its aftermath are discussed without the sense of being forced.
There is a point at which the question which underlies is inevitable, who desires war, and more to the point, who loses by it. These lines are not written dramaturgically. They are battered and burdened with the burden of reality.
One of the most mature aspects of Neelira is its refusal to take a simplistic stance. No obvious heroes or villains. The Indian soldiers are not turned into aggressors, the Tigers into one-dimensional rebels. Rather, the movie shows everybody humanity.
I loved this balance very much. It gives the story more depth and makes the movie much thought-provoking. Through not taking moral absolutes, Neelira encourages the viewer to explore the depth of conflict.
Acting throughout the movie is consistently good. Each character, starting with the main family, through to the tiniest of supporting characters add a sense of reality to the film. I especially liked the fact that even minor characters make an indelible impression.
The film has a naturalness of the performances. There is no sense of exaggeration or incongruence. Within minutes, I was fully plunged into their world and I believed in all the feelings that came across the screen.
Neelira is technically very precise. One of its best aspects is the sound design. There is subtle ambient sound, birds, faraway movement, the rustle of wind and this gives a documentary-like feel of reality.
Background score is applied sparingly, but successfully. It does not overpower the scenes, instead, it silently increases the tension. I found this restraint especially commendable, since it lets the natural soundscape to be in the spotlight.
The other thing that struck me was the manner in which the movie manages to squeeze the vastness of war into a tight space and time. It takes the psychological and emotional burden of a long-term conflict in a little less than 90 minutes.
It does not bother to describe the magnitude of war but only a slice of it. But a slice of it tells us all we have to know. The influence is broad, although the area is narrow.
Another way in which the loss of innocence that goes with conflict is brought out in the film is in a subtle manner. The fact that a wedding, which is a symbol of hope and new life, can be accompanied by violence is disturbing.
It compelled me to face a bitter truth and that life does not wait to go to war. It survives, but in a state of continual danger. That sense of normalcy and danger merge to become one of the most terrifying themes of the film.
When Neelira comes to its end, it leaves a deep silence. Not of perplexity, but of contemplation. I was even wondering about the price of war, but not in the sense of strategy or land but of lives.
So what does war really bring to those who are not involved in the decision making, but who are made to bear the impact? That was a question that remained after the movie.
I also had a chance to watch Leader, a film that included Legend Saravanan, in the same cinematic window, which tried to work with a larger commercial canvas. Although it was able to work in bits, it failed to achieve that emotional or narrative depth that Neelira is able to do so accurately.
Neelira, which translates to “long night,” fully embodies its title. It is as though a long expanse of darkness, on which light bits fight desperately to live. It is not intended to be soothing and it is intentionally disturbing. Rather it is a way of making you feel and think.
The film is a compelling drama even in the absence of an in-depth knowledge of its historical context. It is even more effective with context, as almost as witnessing pieces of history being played in real time.
It is not just a film to be seen but one to be absorbed and thought over. It deprives war of its spectacle and reveals its most heartrending realities, leaving a trace that is hard to clear.
Rating, 4/5
