Saturday, October 11, 2014

Ustad Hotel - ordering a biriyani now!

Movies on food are not new. But Malayalam cinema making movies on food is like finally going to confession a day before Easter admitting that we have serious gastronomic fetishes. After Salt and Pepper,its Ustad Hotel which is tickling the food hormones and almost making one reach Zomato pages.

Before we talk about the current foodirectors (see what I did there? ;) ) ,lets not forget probably the first movie which celebrated eating pleasures guilt free Mr.Butler. Remember a young, thin I-dont-have-an-upper-lip Dileep with his Japanese cooker-cum-utensil to attract his heroine in the lift. I rememebr that scene coz that vegetable pulao made my mouth water!  For many days after that,I've had dreams of being stuck in the lift with a hot pulao-and not a hot guy.

  
                                           Dileep doing a demo of ccoking to the auntys of the flat. Humming the Gopalakrishan song are you ? :)



So we are serious about food? yes! and we are serious about films on food? oh yea! And with the not-so-serious youthful dapperness of Dulquer,the deer eyes of not-so-shy Nithya and ofcourse we need the patronage of someone -Thilakan (for mallu parents), we have Ustad Hotel. A movie about the journey of 3 people - Faizi ( Dulquer), Shahana (Nithya) and Thialakan - where they find themselves through relationships, food and through each other.



The movie has a very Bohemian approach to it. If you take a bunch of Malayalam movies, most is about relationships, the seriousness surrounding duty and the bipolar world of good vs bad. UH takes a detour but only slightly. No its not a rebel so you dont shrug it off as a 'youth' movie nor does it goes on a preaching class to brand it as art movie. It is as real as you take it. The reality of fleldging,small but reputed restaurants that we have seen in our sleepy naadan towns during our annual vacations to hometowns is a reality but to restore them is probably not so easy. UH takes up that real to reel.

I'm sure I dont need to review it coz every Mallu worth his biriyani would have seen it. I resaw (really Treez,is that a word?) it yday and thought if I love it I should share/post/publish/show off it before the next foovie ( I'm a genious!) comes out :)

I'm still very curious about what goes in the sulaimani tea.


Good job Anwar Rasheed - Director

I've decided to credit directors from now on coz woh nahi to taare zamin par. :) #geddit