When hope dies!

The exploration of 90s Malayalam movies has led me to another Mohanlal gem. A dark, heartbreak story about hope, losing hope, and then coming to terms with the inevitable. A gut-wrenching tale that’s too tough for a rewatch. A story that reminds us how some people are more privileged than others right from birth. A story that reminds us how tough it is for people to change their fates, to escape the tags stamped on them from birth. A story that reminds us how the weak are always at the mercy of the powerful.

Sathaynandan was stamped as an outclass right from his birth. The son of whore, who couldn’t point to his father, his fate is sealed by his mere birth. So was Jaya, a girl abandoned by her parents to live with relatives engaged in the flesh trade. Both of them tried hard to escape their fates, to become acceptable in society, and to live a life they were proud of. In the end, they were betrayed by people considered more acceptable in this same society.

What do you do when you lose all hope, when you see the love of your life leave, when you see her lose everything, when you see her sell her flesh and engage in the trade you despised all your life? What do you do when you see the kids you loved so much also going down the same path? What do you do when you realize there’s no hope for change? What do you do when you feel everything is already scripted? What do you do when you feel you are just a puppet unable to make any meaningful change? You try to take control the only way you feel it’s possible, you try to stop the wheel. And sometimes the only way to stop the wheel is to break it.

This MT classic is rightly called Sadayam (mercifully).