Drishyam 2 Movie Review: Mohanlal and Jeethu Joseph’s sequel adds layers to the prequel

Movie Name: Drishyam 2

Cast:  Mohanlal, Meena, Ansiba Hassan and Esther Anil

Director: Jeethu Joseph

Rating: 4/5

Jeethu Joseph’s crime thriller, Drishyam, is back after 8 years. The moment the trailer was released, many of us were on the edge of the seat. What is George Kutty up to now? Is there another twist in the dark that we missed?

When we recently interviewed Mohanlal (George Kutty), he claimed that Drishyam 2 is one of the best scripts he has worked on. True to the megastar's words, Drishyam 2 is genuinely a ‘resumption.  

The story begins after a gap of six years from where the first film ended. The ordeal continues for George Kutty and family after the fateful night. Life has moved on. His two daughters have grown up. His financial status has improved. He now is an owner of a multiplex and an aspiring film-maker.

However, George Kutty is still stuck in a time-warp, replaying his every move and predicting what lies ahead. He was once hailed as a hero, a victim of police brutality. But jealous of his prosperity, the same society gossips about the family and is sure the murder was committed by them.  

He is cognizant of the fact that crime doesn’t pay; criminals do. It haunts them forever, even if they remain elusive from the clutches of law. In the case of George Kutty, his worst punishment is that his entire life is now being spent looking for shadows and preparing for the next move to save his family. Consequently, George Kutty has taken up to vice and become an occasional drinker. He has also been spending quite a share of his revenue on building his dream script with a well-known scriptwriter of yesteryears. His elder daughter Anju (Ansiba Hassan) has been suffering from PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder) and is recuperating from her spells of seizures triggered during tensed moments.

His wife Rani (Meena) feels years have changed George-kutty. He is adamant and refuses to discuss anything about the incident. His younger daughter, Anumol (Esther), is going through her teenage and related behavioural change. Apart from her minor rifts and arguments with her mother, she is in control of her reaction and visibly unshaken by the events. Apart from George Kutty, she is the only one who understands the real cost of a slip, especially since it was she who led the police to the first burial spot during her interrogation in the first film.
Things change when a moment of slip and a chance witness give police the opportunity to reopen the investigation once again. Jeethu Joseph and team ensures there is enough in the script for the audience to realise why Drishyam is regarded as one of the best crime-thrillers from Malayalam film industry.

ALSO READ: EXCLUSIVE: Mohanlal says he would love to watch some other actor playing his role as he opens up on remakes 

The story is well stitched and even follows the pace of the prequel. The first half makes the audience impatient and ponder over the relevance of parallel tracks and characters. It kicks-off the Sherlock in us, and we try to connect the dots. However, once the second half of the film begins, everything falls in place. The umbilical cord with the prequel is established, and the firm emerges as a true thriller sequence.

All actors, including those the audience might initially snub aside as ‘supporting cast’, don their hats with finesse. Each has a story, a reason, ethics and principles and grudges to settle. Yet none is wrong, and that’s the beauty of the film.

The actors and makers bring out the ‘basic instinct’ of the criminal mind of George Kutty, yet stand true to his iconic dialogue from the first film: When it comes to protecting my family, I will go to any extent, and in the course of it, for me everything is right, and nothing wrong.