Minmini

Minmini Movie Synopsis: Praveena and Sabari used to be classmates. Cut to the present: both are riding to the Himalayas in a Royal Enfield. What happens when they again cross paths?

Minmini Movie Review: How much guilt is too much guilt, asks Halitha Shameem in her newest film, Minmini. How one deals with guilt and remorse varies from person to person; Minmini takes us through the lives of Praveena (Esther Anil) and Sabari (Pravin Kishore), who have a contrasting approach to dealing with sorrow.

Praveena and Sabari meet as adults while riding to the Himalayas in their Royal Enfield. While Praveena soaks in each moment of the trip and pauses to marvel at what she sees, Sabari keeps riding and focuses on reaching the destination. In contrast to Praveena, he values the destination more than the journey.

Quite early in the film, while Sabari is in school, a teacher asks the class what they want to be. The answers range from fashion designer to singer but the only two answers that cannot be limited to just naming one profession were Sabari’s and Pari’s. Pari is the popular boy at school, whereas Sabari is the studious one. Both of them do not instantly get along due to them being so different from one another and their interests being different. But, along the way, Halitha takes us through the mind frame of two teenagers.

Minmini is one of those films that has a first and second half that are so tonally different from each other. It is already well known that the schooltime portions of the film were taken in 2015, while the portions where the characters have grown up have been shot more recently. So, it benefits the flow of the film that the story is told in a linear format rather than cutting between the past and the present.

Will the film have the same impact if the same actors hadn’t played their grownup versions? Maybe yes. But the tonal change in the second half would have been more evident if other actors had been cast for those parts. But Halitha doesn't rub it in our faces that she has shot with the same actors over a period of years. Rather, the story naturally unfolds along the way in an understated way.

While the school portions are more out there and animated, the grownup portions are soothing. Also soothing is Khatija Rahman’s understated music, which goes well with the tranquil nature of the film. All in all, Minmini is a refreshing film in the current Tamil cinema setup. It's both emotional and humane and except for a few forced humour scenes consisting of the character of a Malayali teacher, Minmini has a novelty that we hardly see in films nowadays.

The film explores an otherwise unexplored topic like survivor guilt and calls for pursuing our passion and being ourselves. But it does so without seeming preachy or draining. The film comes into its own in the second half when the seeds planted in the first half are delved into. Just like Praveena and Sabari, we, the audience, also feel like we have been through a journey by the end of the film, as we travel from a secluded boarding school to the soaring heights of the Himalayas.

Esther Anil, Pravin Kishore and Gaurav Kalai make us care for their characters. The former two actors’ fun banter is amplified by the natural chemistry that they share with each other.