Ishtam

Cast: Dileep, Navya Nair, Nedumudi Venu, Sreenivasan, Innocent, Balachandra Menon
Language: Malayalam
Director: Sibi Malayil
Producer: Siyad Koker
Story: Kalavoor Ravikumar
Screenplay: Kalavoor Ravikumar
Dialogue: Kalavoor Ravikumar
Music: Mohan Sithara
Distribution: Kokers Release
Year: 2001

Siby Malayil one of the better directors is back after the nightmarish Devadoothan, with the naughty – nutty antics of a father and son with his new film Ishtam. The screenplay is minty cool and unlike other family comedy films Ishtam is sharp, hip, mod, trendy and funny. If you liked Siby’s Summer In Bethleham, then Ishtam is hilarious.

Kuttikrishna Menon (Nedumudi Venu) is a rich widower with two sons Vipin (Sreenivasan) and Pavan (Dileep). Vipin stays with his family, while Pavan is still a bachelor. Pavan runs a successful department store and Menon helps him in the business. There is an unusual bond between the father and son. They are more like friends, sharing jokes and secrets and they understand each other very well. Menon’s best friend Narayanan (Innocent) is on the look out for a middle-aged lady, whom he can marry. They get into all sorts of funny situations including being nabbed by a team of women police for alleged eve teasing. In these situations it is always Pavan who bails them out. Pavan believes that Narayanan is spoiling his father!

One day Pavan gets an anonymous call of a girl Rose, who claims that they studied together in college. The girl drives him mad and finally she confesses that she is Anjana (Navya Nair), whom Pavan had ragged in college and had to leave studies to join her parents in US. She wanted to take revenge on Pavan and she wins Menon over. Anjana stays with Sreedevi (Jayasudha) who is a music teacher in a college.

Anjana comes closer to Pavan’s family and Menon starts adoring her. In one of the family weddings Menon sees Sreedevi and gets a shock. They had a soft corner for each other in their younger days but were unable to develop it into marriage. But later Menon married somebody and got settled in Singapore. But knowing that Sreedevi is still unmarried, Menon wants her back in his life. Pavan and Anjana try their best to bring them together, which also results in their falling in love. But Anjana’s father (Balachandra Menon) objects to is daughter’s father-in-law getting married. He asks Pavan to decide if he wants to marry Anjana or conduct his father’s wedding. But for Pavan, it is his father’s happiness that matters more than his own life. Will Pavan be able to pull it off?

Newcomer Kalavoor Ravikumar a journalist has written the script with inspired inputs by Siby. Of the cast Dileep is amazingly candid and can be crowned the comedy king. Nedumudi Venu, Innocent, Srinivasan are all, brilliant. Jayasudha still is as fine as mature red wine. But the film’s brilliant and bouncy surprise packet is Navya Nair as Anjana. She has a fine future.

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