With an exemplary instance of society reducing a woman’s ‘honor’ to her body (thus questioning the same), Sony LIV’s Anel Meley Pani Thuli was released on November 18, 2022, with a runtime of 118 minutes. The drama film starring Andrea Jeremiah, Aadhav Kannadasan, Azhagam Perumal and Ilavarasu was directed by R. Kaiser Anand and is available on the OTT platform for premium subscribers in Tamil language with English subtitles.
Raising a brow at the exploitative actions of the police and the incidents a rape survivor has to deal with post-traumatic misfortune, only to unsettle them further in their skin, the film highlights the debilitating conditions of our society that target women’s safety and autonomy. With an overt announcement of a social message at the end, the storyline articulates the shortcomings of patriarchy but has some blemishes in its cinematic visualization as well.
Sony LIV describes the film as follows:
Mathi, an enthusiastic operations manager at a Chennai store, is in a village near Kodaikanal to attend a colleague’s wedding when she is kidnapped and gang raped. However, when the police arrest a couple of her male colleagues who seemingly have motives to harm her, Mathi stands firm and follows her instincts to ensure the actual culprits are brought to justice.
-Anel Meley Pani Thuli Review Does Not Contain Any Spoilers–
Mathi’s upbringing may have taught her otherwise, but she has strong convictions to stand tall against scenarios barring women from exercising their autonomy. A similar case is brought to her attention when one of her colleagues, Anitha, at Chennai’s Decathlon branch, is stalked by her ex. She helps her get back on track with her life despite the overwhelming situation, and soon Anitha finds the courage to get married to her fiance in Kodaikanal.
She invites Mathi to the auspicious occasion as her special guest, extending a gesture of gratitude, but things don’t turn out to be as fortunate for Mathi. On being kidnapped by three men after the ceremony, she’s gang-raped and suffers a great blow to her psychological balance. Yet, her determination for justice remains unwavering, and she approaches the local police for help, where more horrors await her.
There are some misdirections along the way – in the manner that some characters support the survivor and also how some of them are portrayed in the former half. On the one hand, it makes you wonder about the overall human psyche and its failing nature, particularly a case of police exploiting their power. Still, it also leaves some doubts related to the former case regarding dialogue writing.
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Andrea Jeremiah does a remarkable job of embodying the physical and mental toll the incident has on her character. It further pushes her down memory lane to revisit various moments through her life in a montage wherein people around her seek to put down young girls and women for wearing certain clothes or being too outspoken in a society that essentially counts on them bearing the brunt and onus of a family’s ‘honor’, thus reducing them to commodities. This particular visual montage is possibly the most inspiring moment in the movie, backed by a strong and complementary music track and score helmed by Santhosh Narayanan.
Anel Meley Pani Thuli: Worth the Watch?
The Sony LIV Tamil digital world premiere has much to say about the prevailing structure of a heteronormative patriarchal society. Since it primarily deals with the aftermath of surviving a sexual assault, some scenes tend to make the tension so palpable that some viewers may be unable to accept them. The movie comes with an ‘Adult’ rating, but it isn’t enough discretion to prepare the audience for the trigger warnings ahead.
It focuses on an extremely sensitive issue, ailing and inhibiting women’s freedom and agency. Therefore, the scenes wherein the survivor has to relive that experience in the form of verbal abuse at the hand of the perpetrators are almost cold-blooded, even though they display the dark reality of the disturbing situation.
Carrying an empowering and emotionally stirring message to the audience, the film is severely vocal in speaking of such issues and dealing with the survivor’s fractured yet determined psyche. However, it isn’t one of the perfect pieces of cinema due to its lacking screenplay. Moreover, due to the brutality, as mentioned earlier, it may not be a desirable watch for everyone. While the subject matter and the sensitivity it is dealt with is one of its major positives, the visual presentation of the same is not so much.
Anel Meley Pani Thuli is now streaming on Sony LIV.
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