Uncle review: way better than recent Mammootty flicks

Shutter written and directed by Joy Mathew was a thriller that took on the subject of pseudo morality very effectively. His latest script Uncle is also addressing the same issue. But the plot here is very diluted with political worshipping and zero subtlety. Directed by Girish Damodar, this movie is fine only when you compare it with other Mammootty movies in the recent past.

Krishna Kumar, a big businessman returning from Ootty to Kozhikode, happens to see his friend Sathyan's daughter Shruti. As there was an unprecedented strike happening he offered Shruti a lift to Calicut. Knowing the other side of this single man, Sathyan became a bit tensed about his daughter's safety and the movie here tells us about what happens in that journey.

When you try to make a character look cool by making him a person with humor sense and good music taste, you need to do the research properly. Joy Mathew's tools to achieve these two goals are Justin Bieber's Baby and a joke that Elephants can't read Malayalam. The movie considers itself as a thriller in the beginning but there is hardly any thrill when you get no hint that KK could be a bad guy. To make it worse, a character says she will call Vijayettan (Kerala CM) a scene I feel will even make the CM cringe.

Mammootty is yet again a glamour tool. He looks great and as he is old, he is eligible to be that cinematic charming uncle. Karthika Muraleedharan is surprisingly good. Muthumani grabbed her opportunity with both hands and Joy Mathew gets a good role in his home production.

Girish Damodar isn't adding anything to the peripherally explored script by Joy Mathew. A better director would have minimalized a lot that were way too descriptive in the script. Post interval the movie has no conflicts and the writer in Joy Mathew decides to push it to a different social demon of moral policing and he seems to be clueless on how to construct it. It just becomes a criticism series. Other technical aspects except for Music was dull and the song by Shreya Ghoshal falls in a no man's land.

Box office:  Uncle box office collection report

Uncle isn't a great film. It's better when compared to the movies Mammootty did after The Great Father. Joy Mathew can do acting, scripting, directing and producing. But he should invest time to make the content intriguing rather than assembling.