Movie Review: Kolamaavu Kokila (Tamil)

The idea of a lone woman struggling to support her family is nothing new. But in Kolamaavu Kokila, debut director Nelson subverts the cinematic tropes to offer a slice of melodrama-free black comedy that's hilarious... and troubling. While it's definitely laudable that the film is refreshingly judgement-free in its portrayal of a drug smuggler, that too a woman (at least to the extent Tamil cinema will allow, lest she is deemed amoral), to call it empowerment would be a bit of a stretch. The story, as old as the hills, is about dire familial circumstances pushing Kokila (Nayanthara, at times overdoing the wide-eyed, innocent act) into carting cocaine for money, while charting her evolving moral compass as she gets entangled in a life threatening crisis that's far more than what she bargained for. And it's nice too, for a change, to see women in charge of everything. But to brush off the consequences of drug peddling as something incidental is much more a cause for worry than the lapses in logic and singular lack of thrills. Reasonably entertaining, keep-your-brain-at-home stuff.