A film that evokes a strong sentiment of patriotism happens once in a blue moon, especially in Mollywood. Other than ‘Pazhassi Raja’, the historical war drama released in 2009, there has been none in recent times and P T Kunju Mohammed’s upcoming ‘Veeraputhran’ is an ace exploration of the genre. The film, a biopic on freedom fighter Mohammed Abdul Rehman, chronicles his tumultuous political and personal life. “New generation Keralites are absolutely unaware of their roots. We have a tendency to blackball our legacy and history when it comes to cinema. ‘Veeraputhran’ is a slice of past unwinding a period of indigenous uprising which makes a glorious chapter in Kerala’s history” says director P T Kunju Mohammed about his first period drama.
Kunju Mohammed says the film is an attempt to break free from the colonial perception of history and war. “In many of us there is a deep rooted subservience to everything English, an aftermath of the not so distant colonial past. We lack self esteem and are engaged in a constant exercise to neutralize everything native,” he says. The filmmaker who has called the shots for critically acclaimed films like ‘Magrib’, ‘Garshome’ and ‘Paradeshi’ says many films today fall into the category of westernised Indian cinema. ‘Veeraputhran’, the director says, will be leagues apart from the present-day potboilers aimed at earning a quick buck. At the same time the film is no offbeat designer product devoid of all the entertainment quotient. “I want all sections of audience to watch my film. It has songs, emotional moments and action sequences but nothing has been added or chopped off for making the film fit into a special category.”
Though an unfamiliar name to the new generation, Mohammed Abdul Rehman is part of folklore in Malabar. An influential presence in the politically charged 1930s, he was jailed and brutally tortured by the British. “There is a song and story galore about the man in Malabar. He was a man who lived beyond the barriers of religion. He fought the Britishers with an unrelenting spirit and was paraded in shackles in front of his countrymen. There are many who believe that he was murdered,” says Kunju Mohammed.
Almost all the poets in Malayalam have paid tribute to the matchless patriot through their verse. “Vallathol, Vailoppilly, Akkitham, Edassery, Kunjiraman Nair, Sachidanandan, Prabha Varma, P Bhaskaran, G Kumarapillai - they have all written about him. There are two documentaries on him , seven biographies, a novel and two Phd documentations on him. Moreover he is mentioned in all the biographies on freedom fighters,” he says. The songs in the films are all poems written on him sung by Shankar Mahadevan, Shreya Ghoshal, Yesudas, M G Sreekumar and Manjari. “Veeraputhran is a title attributed to him by the poets and I decided to retain that for the film too. Even a book on him is titled ‘Keralathine Veeraputhran’. There are thousands of people who are named after him,” he adds.
His personal life was equally turbulent as Abdul Rehman became a widower after hardly two years of marital life. He travelled from jail to jail carrying the memoirs of his dead wife Kunji Beevathu. “There were many women who wanted to marry him , but he was completely devoted to his dead wife,” says the director.
The film has an enormous canvas and all other paraphernalia a period film demands. There are 10,000 junior artists and 162 characters among which 90 percent are historical figures. The film has only one fictional character based on N P Muhammed’s A K Odayathil. Vaikom Muhammed Basheer’s son has played the role of his father in the film. “All the prominent figures in Kerala’s history make their entry at some point in the film. The film sketches the socio-political scene of Malabar from 1921 to 1945. The film revisits history and recreates the incidents and moments that are sen percent factual,” says Kunju Mohammed.
