Chintamani Review

If you are looking for a specific kind of film to watch, well, Chintamani isn't the one. This is one of those that don't fit into any genre. It belongs to that particular category of innovative films whose makers start off trying to create a new kind of cinema, lose heart/confidence/patience in between after belatedly realizing that there's such a thing as economics, and throw in a lot of soft porn as a value-added benefit for the viewer, so as to insure themselves against disastrous collections and irate producers.

The movie is set in an odd little hamlet - odd because the total inhabitants don't number more than a dozen. Chintamani is the bombshell of the village, and serves as the only source of sexual excitement for the village folk who are starved pervs. Despite its name, calling Chintamani the main character of the film somehow wouldn't be right. This film doesn't have any main characters. It just portrays the day-to-day experiences of many characters with no relation to each other except that they live in close proximity to each other.

Benny Thomas confuses you about the character of Chintamani by depicting her variously as an exhibitionist, a pervert, a lady with her own sorrows and a preacher of women's rights who incites women to seduce men and get what they want - the message is obviously that the means justify the ends.

Right from her servants to her husband to the other village folk who display their perversion on her, nobody seems to contribute in anyway to make this a story of any sort. And then there is Radhika, another bombshell just arrived in the village, who has no connection with Chintamani. It's just that she too makes heads turn in the village. What's the movie about, you're wondering? Now, didn't I tell you it was innovative?