Thenali (2000)

I tried really hard to like this movie because Jayaram was hilarious, and so were many of the scenes, but every single time I looked at Kamal and Jyothika together, all I could see was the age gap of 23 years between them. Jyo was literally 23 when this movie I came out, and now my head hurts.

Anyway, the icky lead pairing wasn't the only thing that turned me off- I found the film way too long to successfully maintain its comedy throughout, and I'm sorry to say but the PTSD aspect was very shoddily handled. That was my main reason for watching Thenali anyway, so you can see why I'm not very fond of this movie. It feels extremely dated, to say the least. Plus, Jyothika has been under-utilised here and it pains me to see her like that, ugh. 

In conclusion, this definitely feels like it was made 20 years ago. Thank god there seems to be some progress regarding the depiction of mental illness in Indian cinema now (keyword being 'some', of course). 

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