Labels can be deceiving, especially in the times of misguided marketing. A film might arrive with the label of being a ‘youthful entertainer’, but would end up having the sensibilities of the youth from another distant era. It is thus a joy to savour when the rare film comes along exuding the tone and tenor of the then and now. In Premalu, there is no visible effort to place anything or anyone in the present; everything and everyone is just in place, as if they belong there.
One can easily draw more than one parallel line from Girish AD’s first two films, Thanneer Mathan Dinangal and Super Sharanya, to his latest film Premalu. For instance, there is the down and out, low on confidence protagonist. Sachin (Naslen) of Premalu will certainly find a kindred spirit in Jaison from Thanneer Mathan... or Sharanya. All three are yearning for love, but it all seems doomed right from the beginning. Even the antagonist whose serious antics are designed to draw laughs gets repeated here in the form of Aadhi (Shyam Mohan). Reenu (Mamitha Baiju), the feisty IT professional whom Sachin, the jobless engineer, is wooing is perhaps one of the few characters to not have a parallel.
