The disastrous results of Mammootty’s Puthan Panam, Mohanlal’s 1971 Beyond Borders and Dileep starrer Georgettan’s Pooram proves that Malayalam film audiences are smart enough to reject bad films.
Malayalam film industry is facing one of the most shocking phases at the Kerala Box Office as three major Vishu releases, Puthan Panam, 1971 Beyond Borders and Georgettan’s Pooram turned out to be Box Office disasters. Interestingly, all these three films featured top three superstars of Malayalam cinema—Mammootty, Mohanlal and Dileep.
The first film that tasted failure was Dileep’s Georgettan’s Pooram. Directed by K Biju and jointly produced by Arun Gosh, Bijoy Chandran and Shivanee Suraj, the film was Janapriyanayakan’s first release after his second marriage to the popular Malayalam actress, Kavya Madhavan. Generally, films of Dileep do well despite getting negative reviews, but in the case of Georgettan’s Pooram, the poor reviews had affected the collections of the film. It has to be noted that Dileep’s previous three releases—Welcome To Central Jail, King Liar and Two Countries—were super hits at the Kerala Box Office.
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The second film that faced outright rejection at the Kerala Box Office was Mohanlal starrer 1971 Beyond Borders. The film had everything in its favour as 1971 Beyond Borders was Lalettan’s fourth Malayalam release after three straight blockbusters Oppam, Pulimurugan and Munthirivallikal Thalirkkumbol. The film also starred Mohanlal in dual roles and was one of the biggest releases of Malayalam cinema. However, the film, which opened to poor reviews, was a disaster from day two at the Kerala Box Office. 1971 Beyond Borders has been criticised heavily for the poor writing of director Major Ravi. A section of Mohanlal fans also showed their disappointment on social media by asking their favourite actor to stop working in Major Ravi films for the sake of friendship. The film also turned out to be the third disaster for actor-director duo after Kandahar and Karmayodha.
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The most shocking failure among the Vishu releases was the Mammootty starrer Puthan Panam. Though the reviews of the Mammootty film was better compared to Georgettan’s Pooram and 1971 Beyond Borders, the second Mammootty release in a span of two theatrical weeks has worked against the film. The film was also criticised for the Kasargode dialect used in the film as many film audiences found it difficult to understand. It has to be noted that Mammootty blockbuster The Great Father is still running to packed houses in a majority of the screens.
The total theatrical collections of all three films so far are in the range of Rs 7-8 crore, which is shocking considering the films starred the Malayalam superstars. The failures of all three films prove that Malayalam film audiences are smart enough to ignore the bad films. They need good films, not the superstar films!
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