A breezy storyline, characters with some depth and warmth and a pitch-perfect cast - if Lal Jose is serious about breaking free from the lures of mainstream cinema, ‘Diamond Necklace’ is an attempt in the right direction.
Dr Arun (Fahad Fazil), the slaphappy hero of the film, is a soul lost in the blinding flamboyance of Dubai life.
Three women enter his roller-coaster life, and the film unspools his angst-ridden race without any sentimental overdose.
The blend of anguish and pleasure in the film is strikingly spontaneous and so is romance and drama - they are never forced into the plot.
Each element adds its own spice to the mix in a subtle and soft style.
The script by Iqbal Kuttipuram has oodles of genuine humour, a rarity in an industry saturated with slapstick buffoonery.
Though episodic and highly predictable in nature, the screenplay has a perfect flow.
But, after a point, the narrative starts losing the stream owing to the laidback pace and fall in tempo.
At times we wish the film was boiled down to a certain degree so that it stops being an eerie cross between a sassy new-age film and a family drama set in the 80s.
The film is also not without its share of cliches - Anusree’s over-thetop aunties, the good Samaritan expatriate and the widowed and neriyathu- clad mom in the Valluvanadan village.
Fahad has an easy going screen presence that perfectly fits the bill of a suave and flirtatious metrosexual and all t h e t h r e e lead ladies - Samvrutha Sunil, Gauthami Nair and Anusree - also come out with extremely natural performances.
Resisting normal mainstream norms, they are given equal importance and reel time.
Vidyasagar’s music is passable while Samir Tahir brilliantly frames Dubai without any overplay.
Ranjan Abraham’s editing could have been crispier, especially for the last 20 minutes.
Lal Jose’s ‘Diamond Necklace’ may be far from perfect or completely clichefree, but the film is definitely worth a watch.