‘Kurai Ondrum Illai’ appeals with its honesty and simplicity

Karthik Ravi’s debut film, ‘Kurai Ondrum Illai,’ (translated as ‘There are no flaws’) makes no tall pretensions.

This love story is told in a simple manner and in the process the director also put across the message of including our villagers, especially farmers, in our technological march.
Krishna (Geethan Britto) is a sales executive of large private company. When he suggests to his seniors that the company should extend their sales network to the villagers and include farmers too, his immediate boss brushes away the idea. But the company’s Vice-President likes it and gives Krishna a chance to try it out. Krishna arrives in his village where his grandmother lives. There he meets a young doctor, Sangeetha (Haritha Parokod) who has been posted in the village. Love blossoms between the two. The director has captured these moments in a realistic way and that is what makes the story convincing. Sangeetha is the more responsible kind, having grown up without her parents and brought up her little sister by herself. Krishna is the typical young guy, who does not bother about keeping his room clean, is late for a meeting, be at work or with his beloved and his motor-bike tank always runs short of gas. But he has his values intact.
Director Ravi has developed his characters well and his actors, despite being first timers, don’t let him down. Not just the lead players, the entire cast, especially the actor playing Krishna’s immediate boss. He comes across as a real prick.
A very poignant scene is the one where Sangeetha breaks down while sharing her feelings for Krishna with her younger sister. Sangeetha is in UK on training and has had a tiff with him. Feeling utterly lonely, she tells her sister, ‘I just feel like lying on amma’s lap now.’ That was a good performance by Haritha.
The same sentiment is later echoed by Krishna when his plans at work go awry. Disappointed and feeling lost, he calls up his mom when she least expects it from him.  Beautiful moments captured by Ravi, who has written the script.
The ‘kurai’ (flaw) with ‘Kurai Ondrum Illai,’ lies in the slow pace of the narration. And it t could have done with tighter editing.
Yet Ravi’s work is laudable for making a film that is shorn of exotic locales, cinematic romantic scenes, gory action scenes and loud music.
Incidentally this film was crowd funded the first in Tamil cinema.