Movies | Mahdi Ahmed

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DHEVI: A HAUNTING LEAP FORWARD FOR DHIVEHI CINEMA

I had the privilege of attending a private screening of the much-anticipated Dhivehi film Dhevi, ahead of its official release on 26 September.

After watching it, I could not simply wait for the release, write a conventional review and move on.

Because this is more than a review.

This is what I felt while watching it.

To begin with, Dhevi has one of the tensest openings I have seen in a Dhivehi film—and, strangely enough, it is introduced by a hen and her chicks.

I will not reveal what happens.

Let us just say that filmmakers have spent years using dark corridors, abandoned houses and creaking doors to frighten audiences. Dhevi begins by proving that even a perfectly innocent hen can carry us towards dread.

The opening hooked me from left, right and centre.

Anatomically impossible, perhaps—but that is how firmly it held me.

From that moment, the film makes its intentions clear. It is not here merely to make us jump. It wants to build a world, place us inside it and slowly remove every feeling of safety.

At its heart, Dhevi tells the story of twin sisters whose lives are overtaken by something far more sinister than one can imagine.

What begins with unease gradually tightens into a chain of terrifying events, each one drawing the sisters deeper into something they cannot easily escape. The horror continues to rise until the story arrives at a rousing and emotionally charged conclusion.

That is all I will say about the plot.

This is a film best experienced without someone walking ahead of you with a torch and warning you about what may be waiting in the darkness.

Superstar Mariyam Azza plays the twin sisters, Maahi and Maashi, while also serving as a producer for the first time.

Either responsibility would have been demanding enough. Azza chose both—apparently because sleeping peacefully is overrated.

I could not take my eyes off her.

That was true not only because of the physical demands of playing two roles, but because of the complete command she has over both characters. Through her body language, expressions, voice, movement and emotional rhythm, she creates two distinctly different women.

She does not merely change her clothes or appearance and expect the audience to complete the illusion. She changes her entire presence.

Even when the sisters occupy the same frame, we never feel as though we are watching an actress performing opposite herself. We believe that two separate individuals are sharing that space.

Physically, Azza is astonishing. Every movement appears carefully designed for the character she is playing. As an actress, she is equally remarkable. Her eyes carry fear, confusion, pain and strength—sometimes before a single word is spoken.

I watched her in awe.

These performances are miles apart from those in her recent blockbusters. There is no attempt to repeat what has worked for her before. She enters a darker and emotionally heavier space, then gives us two extraordinary performances in the same film.

As a first-time producer, Azza has also chosen an unusually ambitious project. Dhevi does not feel like a safe production created merely to carry her name. It feels like the work of someone prepared to challenge herself, her team and even the technical boundaries of Dhivehi cinema.

Mariyam Azza is not merely impressive in Dhevi.

She is extraordinary.

The supporting cast gives the film the strength it needs.

Sharaf Abdulla, Ismail Rasheed, Mohamed Manik, Ahmed Saeed and Rishmy Rameez deliver convincing performances, grounding the supernatural events in recognisable human emotions. Newcomer Hamdhaan also makes a confident impression, holding his own among experienced actors.

Then there is the late Ahmed Nimal.

He appears in a cameo in what would become his final film role.

Seeing him on the screen was bittersweet. There was happiness in witnessing him perform once more, but also sadness in knowing that this would be the last time a new performance of his would greet us from the screen.

For a moment, the horror gives way to remembrance.

Written by upcoming writer Shahudha Mahmood and director Sandy, the screenplay carefully establishes its atmosphere before allowing the horror to take control.

The writing understands that suspense comes from waiting—from sensing that something is approaching without knowing when, how or from where it will arrive.

Rather than treating the unfolding events as a convenient machine for producing frightening scenes, the writers build a human story around the people trapped inside it. That emotional foundation gives the horror its weight.

The screenplay steadily raises the tension and carries the story towards its powerful conclusion without revealing its hand too early.

Abdulla Muaz (Bhaai) and Rishmy Rameez’s crisp editing gives the narrative a well-balanced pace. The film knows when to let a moment breathe and when to tighten its grip. Horror can become exhausting when every scene screams for attention. Bhaai and Rishmy allow the quieter moments enough space, making the frightening ones strike even harder.

The workmanship applied throughout the film is outstanding. Combined with Samaah Ibrahim’s cinematography, the spaces become part of the horror. Light, shadow, colour and composition work together to make ordinary surroundings feel uncertain. Even silence begins to look suspicious.

Amid the mounting dread, I enjoyed the welcome breather offered by a modern rendition of legendary singer Naifaru Dhohokko’s Funhaa Loabi, performed by Anji with infectious energy and effortless moves.

It is difficult to believe that Dhevi is Sandy’s first film as a director. He directs it as though he has been calling the shots for years.

His confidence lies in his control. Performances, production design, cinematography, editing and visual effects all belong to the same cinematic world.

Of course, no director creates such an ambitious film alone. Sandy received wholehearted support from his team—particularly Bhaai and the visual-effects artists, whose technical brilliance helped him attempt things rarely seen in Maldivian cinema.

And now we come to the technical highlight of Dhevi: its visual effects.

Created by Bhaai, Vishal Zaky and Shamwyl Shareef, the visual effects contain moments that will genuinely leave audiences wondering how they were achieved.

The seamless presentation of Azza’s dual role is something I cannot recall seeing attempted with this level of complexity and polish in Maldivian cinema.

The sisters do not merely stand on opposite sides of a conveniently divided frame. They exist within the same physical world. They move through shared spaces, react to each other and interact with such precision that the technical construction becomes invisible.

And that invisibility is the achievement.

Creating a convincing dual performance requires far more than placing two images together. The eye-lines must match. The timing must be exact. Lighting, perspective, movement, shadows and physical distance must remain believable. Above all, the emotional performance on one side must feel alive to the performance on the other.

If even one element fails, we see the trick.

In Dhevi, we see the sisters.

Some effects proudly announce themselves, giving the film moments of visual scale and spectacle. Others work quietly beneath the surface, supporting scenes without asking the audience to admire the machinery behind them. Both kinds are handled with remarkable confidence.

The effects are not included merely to show us what the team can do. They serve the story, strengthen the horror and make Azza’s two performances possible.

That distinction matters.

Visual effects are most powerful when they stop feeling like visual effects. At several points, I found myself forgetting that the woman standing opposite Azza was also Azza.

My mind knew it.

My eyes refused to believe it.

The greatest compliment I can give the visual-effects team is that, after a while, I stopped searching for the trick.

I simply watched the sisters.

And one has to see this film to believe what this team has achieved.

Dhevi is not merely a successful horror film. It is evidence of what Dhivehi cinema can accomplish when ambition is supported by skill, patience and people willing to move beyond familiar limits.

It gives Mariyam Azza two extraordinary performances in one film. It announces Sandy as a director who already appears fully in command of his craft. It gives Shahudha Mahmood another strong step forward as a writer. It also gives us one final glimpse of the late Ahmed Nimal—an unexpected and bittersweet gift.

I walked into that private screening expecting to watch a much-anticipated Dhivehi horror film.

I walked out feeling immensely proud of the entire team behind Dhevi for bringing our cinema to a level of technical brilliance that genuinely surprised me.

Every department has contributed to that achievement. But the brilliance of Bhaai and his visual-effects team deserves to be celebrated. They have not merely created impressive images. They have helped turn an ambitious idea into something believable, seamless and technically remarkable.

Their work allows the film to dream beyond the limitations normally associated with our industry—and then places that dream convincingly on the screen.

For me, that may be Dhevi’s greatest achievement.

It does not ask us to admire it simply because it is a Maldivian film.

It gives us every reason to admire it because it is a technically brilliant film.

And that made me very proud.

TWO YEARS TO FADE OUT

Two years ago, I began writing a screenplay.

For now, let us simply call it Untitled.

I had the central idea. I knew what I wanted the screenplay to say, and I thought I knew the road it would take to get there.

Then my producer called.

He had recently watched a local film and felt that parts of my story had some similarities to it.

That call took the wind out of me.

I told him I needed time. I would return to the outline, take the story apart and rebuild it—while preserving the heart of what I had originally set out to write.

That sounded very professional.

What followed was anything but.

There were days when I sat in front of my laptop and stared at the screen, unable to write a single word. A week might pass before I managed one line. Sometimes two. On particularly productive days, I may even have moved a comma.

And that was how it continued for more than a year.

I outlined. I abandoned the outline. I tried another direction. I questioned it. I returned to the beginning. Some ideas survived every version. Others disappeared after weeks of work because they belonged to a different screenplay—not this one.

There was procrastination too. I would love to blame the laptop, the weather or some mysterious failure of artistic alignment. But the laptop was innocent.

At other times, I tried to squeeze every last drop from whatever creative juice remained in me. Unfortunately, creativity is not toothpaste. The harder you squeeze, the less cooperative it becomes.

Through all this, my producer never pressured me.

He assured me that I did not need to rush. He was not waiting for something quick. He was waiting for something good.

That patience gave the screenplay room to breathe. More importantly, it gave me room to fail, reconsider and begin again.

Then, at the beginning of this year, something changed.

The story began to flow.

Not all at once. Not like some divine waterfall pouring perfectly formatted scenes onto the page. But the characters started moving again. Images began connecting. Moments that had remained separate for months suddenly found their place beside one another.

I kept outlining and re-outlining.

I moved scenes. Removed them. Brought some back. I stripped away dialogue whenever an image could carry the emotion. I searched for silence where words felt too easy. I planted small visual details early so they could return later with greater meaning.

Gradually, the screenplay found its rhythm.

It became a story told as much through faces, spaces, objects and quiet gestures as through dialogue. It demanded patience from me. It also demanded precision. Every scene had to earn its place. Every spoken line had to justify breaking the silence.

Perhaps that is why this screenplay took so long.

Some stories allow themselves to be written.

Others make the writer prove that he deserves them.

This one made me work for every page.

Now, after countless outlines, discarded scenes, rewritten moments and long stretches of doubt, I have finally reached the end.

And strangely, looking back, I do not resent the difficult days. The screenplay needed those false starts. It needed the silence. It may even have needed those weeks when all I could write was a single line.

Because the screenplay I have completed is not the one I began two years ago.

I believe it is better.

It is one of the most visually driven screenplays I have written and, without revealing anything about its story, also one of the most emotionally demanding. More importantly, it has become one of the most satisfying screenplays I have written so far.

A huge thank-you to my producer for giving me something increasingly rare in this business:

Time.

Time to rethink.

Time to doubt.

Time to discover.

Time to write the screenplay this story deserved.

Two years ago, I thought I knew exactly where it was going.

I was wrong.

Thankfully.

BHAGAVANTH KESARI (2023): I DON’T CARE WHY I ENJOY NBK FILMS

I have not even the slightest clue why I enjoy Nandamuri Balakrishna films.

Perhaps the question itself is unnecessary. Asking why one enjoys a Balakrishna film is like asking why people stand close to the sea during a storm. You know something unreasonable is about to happen. You know the laws of nature may be temporarily suspended. Yet you remain exactly where you are—waiting for the wave to hit.

And Bhagavanth Kesari is no exception.

Balakrishna plays Nelakonda Bhagavanth Kesari, a man who takes responsibility for Vijji, the daughter of his deceased friend. His dream is to make her strong enough to face the world without him. Vijji, naturally, has other plans. She wants an ordinary life. Kesari wants her to join the army.

His method of parenting occasionally looks less like encouragement and more like military training conducted by an emotionally unavailable bulldozer. But beneath all the shouting, intimidation and impossible action sequences, there is genuine affection.

That is what surprised me about the film.

Director Anil Ravipudi understands that a Balakrishna film needs its expected ingredients. There must be powerful entrances. There must be punch dialogues. Villains must make the unfortunate mistake of standing within Balakrishna’s physical reach. And once the fighting begins, human anatomy becomes more of a suggestion than a medical fact.

The villains do not simply fall. They travel.

Yet Bhagavanth Kesari tries to do something more meaningful within that familiar formula. At its heart, this is not merely the story of a man protecting a young woman. It is about a man teaching her to protect herself.

That difference matters.

Kesari could easily have been written as another invincible hero who spends the entire film rescuing a helpless girl. Instead, he wants Vijji to overcome her fears and become stronger than the circumstances surrounding her. He knows he may not always be there. His responsibility, therefore, is not to stand between her and the world forever. It is to prepare her to face that world alone.

The film’s message about empowering girls is hardly subtle. In fact, subtlety enters the room, sees Balakrishna and quietly leaves. But the message works because the emotional relationship between Kesari and Vijji gives it weight.

Sreeleela is effective as Vijji, particularly when the character’s fear begins to transform into courage. Kajal Aggarwal brings warmth and some welcome lightness, although her character is not given as much importance as the central relationship deserves. Arjun Rampal makes a suitably arrogant villain. He does what villains in such films are required to do: accumulate power, underestimate the hero and patiently wait for his bones to be rearranged.

But this is Balakrishna’s film.

He carries the larger-than-life moments with his usual authority, yet he is equally convincing in the quieter scenes. There is a surprising tenderness in his performance. His bond with Vijji never needs to become conventionally sentimental for us to understand how deeply he cares for her.

Of course, the film has its weaknesses. It is loud. Some scenes are stretched. The villain belongs to a much more predictable film. The action is excessive, and logic occasionally takes a tea break without informing anyone.

Still, I enjoyed it.

Perhaps I enjoyed it because Balakrishna never performs with embarrassment. He commits completely. When he delivers a line, he believes it. When he walks into a confrontation, he behaves as though the background score was composed before he was born. That sincerity makes even the most outrageous moments strangely entertaining.

And somewhere inside all that noise is a sincere film about fear, responsibility and raising a girl to believe she is not weak.

Bhagavanth Kesari was later honoured as the Best Telugu Feature Film at the 71st National Film Awards—a recognition that makes sense when one considers the social message wrapped inside its commercial cinema machinery. The award went to producer Shine Screens and director Anil Ravipudi.

Is it a perfect film?

No.

Is it always believable?

Certainly not.

Did I enjoy watching Balakrishna walk through men as though they were badly arranged furniture?

Absolutely.

I still have no clue why I enjoy Nandamuri Balakrishna films.

And, borrowing Bhagavanth Kesari’s own philosophy, perhaps I don’t care.

MAA INTI BANGAARAM (2026): WHEN THE WOMAN OF THE HOUSE BECOMES THE MASS HERO

There is a moment in Maa Inti Bangaaram when the film quietly puts away its family-drama clothes, rolls up its sleeves and reveals that it has been carrying a weapon all along.

And what a delightful reveal it is.

Directed by B. V. Nandini Reddy, Maa Inti Bangaaram stars Samantha Ruth Prabhu as Swarna, a woman entering her husband’s traditional family home while hiding a violent past. Diganth plays her husband, Anirudh, while Gulshan Devaiah appears as the dangerous shadow following her from the life she thought she had escaped. The film was created by Raj Nidimoru and blends action, comedy and family drama with surprising confidence.

On paper, these ingredients should not mix.

We have a daughter-in-law trying to win over her husband’s family. There are domestic rivalries, family politics, comic misunderstandings and the usual pressure to become the “ideal woman.” Then there are guns, gangsters, buried identities and enough flying bodies to make the family furniture reconsider its career choices.

Yet somehow, it works.

The film understands something many action movies forget: action becomes more exciting when we care about the person throwing the punch.

Swarna does not enter the story as a conventional mass hero. She enters cautiously, almost apologetically, hoping to be accepted into a family that already seems to have a perfect daughter-in-law in Anasuya. Sreemukhi plays Anasuya with terrific comic timing. Her competition with Swarna produces some of the film’s funniest moments because the conflict is rooted in something wonderfully ordinary—the politics of being appreciated inside a large family.

In a South Asian household, wars are not always fought over land or power. Sometimes they begin because somebody made a better curry.

The first half allows us to enjoy this family world. It is colourful, chaotic and affectionate without becoming excessively sugary. Beneath Swarna’s nervous smile, however, we sense that she is performing. She is not merely trying to impress her in-laws. She is trying to protect the peaceful life she has built.

Then her past comes looking for her.

This is where Maa Inti Bangaaram transforms. The change in tone could easily have broken the film into two unrelated halves. Instead, the comedy and family drama become the emotional foundation for the action. Swarna is not fighting because the screenplay suddenly remembered that it had promised us a mass movie. She fights because the home she struggled to enter has finally become her home.

That makes all the difference.

Samantha is the gold at the centre of the film.

She is funny without forcing the humour, vulnerable without appearing weak and fierce without losing Swarna’s humanity. When the film finally allows her to unleash the woman she has been hiding, Samantha owns the screen. She does not imitate the body language of a male action star. She creates her own mass presence.

And yes, she can throw a punch.

More importantly, she can make us feel why that punch must be thrown.

Gulshan Devaiah brings menace to Karuna without turning him into a noisy cartoon. His connection to Swarna’s former life gives the conflict a personal edge. He is not simply an enemy waiting at the climax. He represents the identity she abandoned and the belief that domestic life has made her smaller.

The film’s answer is simple: family has not weakened her. It has given her something worth becoming strong for.

That, for me, is the heart of Maa Inti Bangaaram.

The movie celebrates family without asking its heroine to surrender herself to it. Swarna does not earn acceptance by remaining obedient, silent and endlessly sacrificial. She earns it when the family finally sees her completely—her tenderness, her fear, her mistakes and the dangerous woman hiding beneath the saree.

Nandini Reddy handles this balance beautifully. She understands that a strong female character does not need to be emotionally bulletproof. Swarna can be frightened. She can long for acceptance. She can make questionable decisions. None of that diminishes her strength.

Her vulnerability is not the opposite of courage. It is what makes courage necessary.

The film is not flawless. Some portions stretch longer than needed, and a few developments rely on familiar commercial-cinema conveniences. Logic occasionally steps outside for fresh air while the action takes over the house. But by then, I was having too much fun to complain.

And fun is something Maa Inti Bangaaram delivers generously.

It made me laugh. It made me care about the family. Then it turned the same family home into an action arena without losing the emotional meaning of that space. That is not an easy tonal trick.

What I loved most is that the action does not crush the family sensibilities, and the family emotions do not dilute the action. One strengthens the other. The humour makes the characters lovable. The relationships give the danger weight. And when Swarna finally fights back, it feels both spectacular and deeply personal.

Maa Inti Bangaaram is an unapologetic commercial entertainer with a woman standing proudly at its centre. It has laughter, emotion, family chaos, concealed trauma and gloriously satisfying action.

In other words, it serves a full family meal.

Only here, the woman serving it might also use the dining table to knock out a gangster.

And I thoroughly enjoyed every bit of it.

THE ODYSSEY (2026): WHEN THE HERO IS ALSO THE PROBLEM

Long after the end credits of The Odyssey rolled, I kept asking myself two questions.

Is Odysseus really the hero of this story?

Or is he simply the antagonist who has been given more screen time?

That may sound harsh. But Christopher Nolan’s Odysseus is easily one of the most flawed protagonists I have seen in a movie in recent times. He is intelligent, courageous and determined. He is also arrogant, manipulative, reckless and, at times, unbelievably selfish.

In other words, he is a walking human disaster with excellent leadership skills.

We are used to protagonists who make mistakes. Usually, they make one terrible decision in the second act, regret it during a rain-soaked montage and return as better people before the climax.

Odysseus is different.

His flaws are not temporary obstacles on his journey.

His flaws are the journey.

He lies. He manipulates. He makes decisions that place everyone around him in danger. Men suffer because of him. Men die because of him. Yet he continues moving forward, driven by the belief that reaching home somehow justifies everything that happens along the way.

And somehow, despite all this, I wanted him to reach home.

That is where Nolan’s writing becomes fascinating.

The film does not ask us to blindly admire Odysseus. It asks us to understand him. There is a major difference between the two. You may not always like him. You may occasionally want one of his crew members to gently throw him overboard. But you understand his desperation, his guilt, his pride and his refusal to accept defeat.

It raises an uncomfortable question.

What makes someone a protagonist?

Is it goodness?

Is it morality?

Or is it simply the fact that the story follows them?

Odysseus may be the central character, but he is also responsible for much of the pain surrounding him. In another version of the same story, told from the perspective of one of his exhausted crew members, he could easily be the villain.

Imagine surviving a war, boarding a ship for home and then realising your captain has enough pride to turn a straightforward journey into a ten-year nightmare.

I would have resigned.

Of course, there was probably no resignation form available in ancient Greece.

Nolan does not provide a simple answer to whether Odysseus is a protagonist or an antagonist. Instead, he allows him to exist somewhere between the two. He is a hero capable of terrible choices. A victim who creates victims. A man fighting monsters while slowly becoming one to the people who follow him.

That complexity is what makes him so compelling.

Christopher Nolan has always been interested in damaged men.

Leonard in Memento was trapped inside memory. Cobb in Inception was trapped inside guilt. Cooper in Interstellar was trapped between love and duty. Oppenheimer was trapped beneath the consequences of his own brilliance.

Odysseus may be trapped inside something even more dangerous.

His own belief in himself.

Adapting Homer’s classic was already an enormous challenge. The Odyssey has been interpreted, reinterpreted, studied and discussed for centuries. Most filmmakers would probably approach it with extreme caution, quietly polish the mythology and hope nobody from a university classics department becomes angry.

Nolan does something braver.

He humanises it.

He does not treat Homer’s work as a sacred museum piece that must be admired from behind glass. He enters the story, takes the mythology apart and rebuilds it through recognisable human emotions.

Pride.

Fear.

Love.

Grief.

Guilt.

The desire to return home, even when home may no longer recognise the person returning.

Nolan’s screenplay respects the original story, but it is not afraid to question it. It challenges the idea of the legendary hero. It asks whether history remembers great men honestly, or whether it simply edits out the inconvenient parts.

Legends usually become cleaner with time.

Nolan makes Odysseus dirty again.

And I mean that as a compliment.

The film’s greatest achievement is that the gods, monsters and mythical creatures never overshadow the human beings. The mythology remains powerful, but it is always connected to fear, temptation, grief and consequence.

One of the most inspired examples is the sequence involving the Sirens.

Most filmmakers would probably approach the Sirens as an opportunity to create the most seductive song ever recorded. There would be haunting voices, dramatic close-ups and perhaps a soundtrack album released immediately after the premiere.

Nolan chooses something far more interesting.

He presents much of the sequence from the point of view of Odysseus’ crew, who have blocked their ears with wax to avoid being tantalised by the singing.

They cannot hear the Sirens.

And because we are placed with them, neither can we fully experience what Odysseus is hearing.

Instead, we see him reacting to something invisible.

We watch him struggle, twist and desperately fight against the ropes restraining him. The crew can only observe their captain being consumed by a sound they cannot hear and a temptation they cannot understand.

It is terrifying.

By withholding the song from us, Nolan makes it more powerful. We are denied the beauty that is driving Odysseus mad. We only witness the madness.

That is brilliant filmmaking.

The scene also says something important about Odysseus. He knows the danger. He prepares for it. He orders his crew to protect themselves.

But he still wants to hear the song.

That is Odysseus in one decision.

Wise enough to understand temptation.

Arrogant enough to believe he can experience it safely.

The performances are excellent throughout the film.

The entire cast manages to make this ancient world feel inhabited by human beings rather than statues brought to life. Nobody appears to be performing mythology. They perform exhaustion, loyalty, fear, resentment, love and survival.

Even the smaller roles carry emotional weight. You feel that every member of the crew has lived through the war and is now slowly realising that surviving the battlefield may have been the easier part.

But the film belongs to Matt Damon.

Damon gives one of the strongest performances of his career as Odysseus. He does not play him as a conventional warrior king. There is no effort to make him permanently heroic or endlessly noble.

His Odysseus is tired.

He is stubborn.

He is frightened.

He is brilliant.

He is selfish.

He is broken.

Sometimes all within the same scene.

Damon has always been very good at playing intelligent men under pressure. Here, he adds something darker. You can almost see Odysseus calculating the cost of every decision, even when the cost involves the lives of others.

Yet Damon never allows him to become completely cold.

There are moments where the mask slips and we see the man beneath the legend. We see the burden of command. We see the guilt he refuses to express. We see a man who desperately wants to return home, but may no longer remember how to be the husband, father or king who left it.

The performance works because Damon does not beg for sympathy.

He earns our attention instead.

Even when Odysseus makes a terrible decision, Damon makes us believe that he has already found a way to justify it to himself.

That may be the most frightening thing about him.

The cinematography is magnificent.

Although I watched the film on an average screen, I could still feel the spectacle and epicness of what Nolan had created. This is clearly a film designed for the enormous canvas of IMAX 70mm, but its power is not limited to the size of the screen.

Even on a normal screen, the film feels huge.

The sea appears endless.

The skies seem to weigh heavily over the characters.

The ships look fragile against nature.

The landscapes do not merely provide beautiful backgrounds. They make the characters look small, vulnerable and temporary.

That visual contrast is important.

Odysseus may believe he can outthink gods, monsters and fate itself, but the images constantly remind us that he is still only a man standing beneath an enormous sky.

The cinematography also has a physical quality that I loved. The world feels rough, wet, cold and dangerous. You can almost feel the salt on the characters’ skin. The ships creak. The wind has force. The waves do not look like visual effects designed to impress us. They look like something capable of killing everyone before the next scene.

There is beauty in the film, but it is never comfortable beauty.

The camera often holds on faces long enough for the mythology to disappear. In those moments, these are no longer legendary figures from an ancient poem. They are simply frightened men wondering whether they will ever see home again.

The score is equally powerful.

It does not merely announce the scale of the film. It carries the emotional weight of the journey.

At times, the music is thunderous and overwhelming. At other times, it becomes quiet, mournful and almost intimate. It understands that The Odyssey is not only an adventure.

It is also a tragedy.

The score does not constantly ask us to celebrate Odysseus. Sometimes it asks us to fear him. Sometimes it asks us to pity him. Sometimes it seems to mourn the people being dragged behind his ambition.

And sometimes, particularly during the quieter moments, the music feels like the memory of home itself—distant, fragile and slowly fading

What I thoroughly enjoyed most was the humanisation of the classic.

Nolan gives us spectacle, monsters, battles, seas and myth. But beneath all that, he gives us a deeply human story about a man trying to return to the person he once was.

The tragedy is that the journey keeps changing him.

By the time Odysseus reaches closer to home, the real question is no longer whether he will arrive.

It is whether the man who arrives is still Odysseus.

Perhaps that is why I found the film so powerful.

It is not merely about returning home.

It is about whether home can survive what you have become.

And whether you deserve to enter it.

The Odyssey is a brave, visually breathtaking and emotionally complex retelling of Homer’s classic. Nolan delivers the epicness expected from the material, but refuses to let spectacle become the heart of the film.

The heart remains Odysseus.

A hero.

A liar.

A survivor.

A destroyer.

A protagonist who frequently behaves like his own antagonist.

And perhaps the greatest monster he encounters on the journey is not waiting on an island, beneath the sea or inside a cave.

Perhaps it is the man tied to the mast.

A must-see.

MAAVEERAN (2023): THE LOUDEST VOICE COMES FROM WITHIN

Every now and then, a film comes along that makes you wonder why nobody thought of that before.

Not because the idea is impossibly complex.

Quite the opposite.

It’s one of those concepts that feels so beautifully simple that, once you’ve seen it, you almost convince yourself it had always existed.

That’s exactly how I felt after watching Maaveeran.

On paper, it sounds like familiar territory. A timid cartoonist. A corrupt politician. A crumbling housing project. The ingredients for another commercial action film are all there, waiting to be mixed into the usual formula.

Fortunately, director Madonne Ashwin had something much more interesting in mind.

Instead of asking how an ordinary man becomes a hero, he asks a far more fascinating question.

What if the biggest battle isn’t against the villain?

What if it’s against yourself?

The answer arrives in the form of the film’s most inspired creative decision—a mysterious voice (Vijay Sethupathi) that begins guiding Sathya (Sivakarthikeyan). I’ll leave the details untouched because discovering it for yourself is half the fun. But from that moment onward, Maaveeran stops being a conventional mass entertainer and becomes something surprisingly original.

As a screenwriter, I couldn’t help admiring the construction of the screenplay. Every joke, every awkward moment, every apparent detour quietly serves a purpose. Nothing feels random. The setups and payoffs are planted with remarkable confidence, making the climax feel earned rather than manufactured.

That, to me, is good writing.

Sivakarthikeyan delivers what I believe is one of the strongest performances of his career. We are used to seeing heroes walk into danger without blinking. Sathya does the exact opposite. He hesitates. He panics. He looks for exits. He would rather apologise than fight.

Ironically, that makes him far more heroic than many invincible protagonists.

Because he behaves like the rest of us.

The supporting cast fits perfectly into the world of the film, while the antagonists are just grounded enough to remind us that corruption doesn’t always arrive with dramatic background music. Sometimes it comes wearing a smile and speaking politely.

The humour deserves special mention.

Too many commercial films treat comedy like a separate department. Maaveeran doesn’t. Here, the laughs emerge naturally from character and circumstance. Even during tense moments, the humour never undercuts the stakes. Instead, it makes the characters feel more human.

Technically, the film rarely misses a beat. The cinematography captures the oppressive nature of the apartment complex beautifully, while the background score knows exactly when to amplify the emotion and when silence can do a better job.

But what I liked wasn’t the action.

It wasn’t even the clever concept.

It was the film’s understanding of courage.

We’ve grown up believing courage means not being afraid.

Maaveeran quietly argues otherwise.

Courage is being afraid…

…and choosing to move anyway.

That is a far more powerful message because it belongs to ordinary people, not superheroes.

No, the film isn’t flawless. A handful of sequences could have been trimmed, and in the second half, its commercial instincts occasionally become a little too eager. But those are minor distractions in a film that consistently punches above its weight.

When the credits rolled, I realised something.

I hadn’t just watched a hero defeat a villain.

I’d watched a frightened man slowly become the person he was always capable of being.

And somehow, that’s infinitely more inspiring.

Maaveeran proves that commercial cinema doesn’t need to choose between brains and entertainment. With the right story, it can have both.

Highly recommended.

DRIDAM (2026): SOME MYSTERIES ARE WORTH WAITING FOR

I love a good thriller.

Not the kind that mistakes loud background music for suspense or throws twists at you every ten minutes hoping one of them sticks. I’m talking about the kind that quietly sits beside you, patiently drops breadcrumbs along the way, and then, at just the right moment, smiles and says, “Now… watch everything fall into place.”

Dridam is that kind of film.

From its opening moments, the film pulls you into an investigation that appears straightforward, only to slowly reveal that nothing is quite what it seems. Like any good detective story, every answer opens the door to another question. Every suspect carries just enough mystery to keep your mind busy, and before long, you find yourself doing what every thriller hopes you’ll do—playing detective from your seat.

The beauty of Dridam is that it never insults your intelligence.

Instead of relying on cheap jump scares or exaggerated action sequences, it allows the mystery to breathe. It trusts its screenplay, its characters, and, more importantly, its audience. That confidence is refreshing.

Shane Nigam delivers one of his more restrained performances, and I mean that as a compliment. His police officer isn’t portrayed as the stereotypical broken hero carrying emotional baggage heavier than his service revolver. He’s simply a young officer trying to navigate an investigation that keeps slipping through his fingers. His understated performance grounds the film, making the escalating mystery feel believable.

The supporting cast deserves equal praise. Every character feels like they belong in this world, and almost everyone becomes a potential piece of the puzzle. The screenplay cleverly invites you to suspect one person, then another, and then another, without ever feeling manipulative. It is a difficult balancing act, and Dridam handles it remarkably well.

Technically, the film is equally confident. The cinematography creates an atmosphere that constantly whispers that something isn’t right. The editing keeps the investigation moving, while the background score knows exactly when to lean in and, more importantly, when to step back. Silence, after all, can sometimes be the loudest sound in a thriller.

And then…

…comes the final act.

Without revealing even the slightest detail, I can honestly say this is one of those endings that reminds you why you love mysteries in the first place.

It’s shocking.

Not because it appears out of nowhere.

Quite the opposite.

When the truth finally reveals itself, your first reaction isn’t, “I never saw that coming.” It’s, “How did I not see that coming?”

The screenplay doesn’t cheat. It doesn’t invent answers at the last minute. Everything you need has been quietly placed before you. The clues were always there. Hidden in plain sight. Waiting patiently for the right moment to make sense.

As the final pieces click together, earlier scenes instantly gain new meaning. Conversations you barely thought about suddenly feel important. Casual moments become loaded with significance. Even expressions on certain faces begin to mean something entirely different in hindsight.

Those are my favourite kinds of endings.

The ones that don’t simply conclude a story—but transform everything that came before them.

It’s the kind of finale that leaves you sitting through the end credits, mentally replaying scene after scene, wondering how the filmmakers managed to guide your attention exactly where they wanted while quietly hiding the truth in the very same frame.

That is not easy to achieve.

As someone who spends a great deal of time thinking about screenplays, I have enormous respect for films that earn their twists rather than manufacture them. A satisfying ending isn’t about surprising the audience. It’s about making the audience realize the answer had been staring at them all along.

Dridam understands that beautifully.

By the time the credits rolled, I wasn’t thinking about individual performances or technical achievements anymore. I was thinking about the screenplay. About structure. About perspective. About how a single revelation can completely change the emotional weight of an entire film without asking you to suspend your disbelief.

That’s a rare accomplishment.

If you enjoy thrillers that reward patience, invite you to participate in the mystery, and leave you replaying the story in your head long after you’ve left the theatre, then Dridam is absolutely worth your time.

Just do yourself one favour.

Watch this gem knowing as little as possible.

Some mysteries deserve to unfold exactly the way their writers intended.

And Dridam is certainly one of them.

Highly recommended.

INGILI (2013): THE BET THAT CHANGED DHIVEHI CINEMA FOREVER

Twelve years ago today, a small Dhivehi film quietly walked onto an international stage and did something no Maldivian film had ever done before.

On 26 May 2014, Ingili won the Bronze Award at the SAARC Film Festival, while Ismail Rasheed brought home Best Actor. For the first time in history, a Dhivehi film had won at an international film festival.

Today, many may have forgotten the film.

And that’s okay.

Because some films are not made to dominate the box office. Some films are made to push boundaries. To test courage. To ask uncomfortable questions. To experiment with storytelling when playing safe would have been much easier.

Ingili was one of those films.

It was not a commercial success. It did not arrive with songs, glamour, or crowd-pleasing formulas. It was strange. Minimalistic. Dark. Unusual. The kind of film that made some audiences confused and others deeply curious.

But the producers took the risk anyway.

That is the part worth remembering today.

At a time when it was safer to repeat familiar formulas, a group of people decided to gamble on something different. Not because success was guaranteed. But because cinema grows only when someone is brave enough to fail publicly.

And honestly, there is something beautiful about that.

Because every industry needs films like Ingili.

Films that tell younger filmmakers they are allowed to try, to be different, and even to fail while searching for something new.

Without risk-takers, cinema becomes predictable.

Without experiments, industries become stagnant.

Looking back now, I don’t think the true victory of Ingili was the trophy itself. The real victory was proving that Dhivehi cinema could stand shoulder to shoulder with international films and still be noticed for its originality.

That moment mattered.

It gave confidence to many filmmakers who came after us. It reminded us that stories from a tiny island nation could travel beyond our shores. And perhaps most importantly, it proved that creativity does not always need permission.

Twelve years later, Ingili remains an important memory for me not because it was a hit… but because it dared.

And sometimes, daring is the first step toward history.

To my fellow producers, Ravee Farooq and Hussain Munawwar (who also beautifully masterminded the visuals behind the camera) — we were young, ambitious, and just crazy enough to believe we could pull this off. Thank you for sharing the risk and the vision. Ravee’s brilliant direction and Munawwar’s eye changed the game.

To our indomitable cast, Abdulla Muaz and Ismail Rasheed — you both carried the entire weight of this narrative on your shoulders. Ingili required you to strip away your layers performance-by-performance, building a psychological tension that still holds up flawlessly today.

And to our small crew, including our melody maestro Ikram, and our ever-dependable Production Manager Sofee, thank you all for carrying this film on your shoulders with passion, exhaustion, madness, and love. We were small in numbers, but our dreams were ridiculously oversized. Somehow, that helped.

You all proved that you don’t need a crew of hundreds to make a masterpiece. You just need the right people who refuse to compromise on quality. A special shoutout goes to the youth and community of K. Gulhi, who welcomed us and helped us wrap this project against all odds.

Twelve years later, I remain proud of every single person who stood behind Ingili.

History rarely begins with certainty.

Sometimes it begins with a small crew, a strange script, limited resources… and a reckless decision to try anyway.

Here’s to the legacy of Ingili. Let us once again dare to make a bet!

A PLAN B FOR PLAN B

Yesterday, I watched the unreleased rough cut of Plan B — a screenplay I wrote 13 years ago for Maaskey Production, directed by Vishal Zaki (Vittey), starring Jummayil Nimal, Ismail Rasheed and newcomer Mohamed Faisal in the three principal roles.

Plan B had a very simple premise. Two druggies decide to rob their own dealer. Easy money. Bad idea.

But once they enter the dealer’s apartment, the story starts peeling itself apart. Layer by layer. Twist after twist. Because everyone inside that apartment has their own secret plan. Nobody is playing the same game.

Production itself went smoothly back then. The film was completed. But somewhere during post-production, things fell apart. The producers were unhappy with the CGI work at the time, and unfortunately there was no actual “Plan B” for Plan B. So the film was quietly shelved.

Then in April 2021, Maaskey, one of the producers contacted me again. First, he asked me to update the events and references to fit that year. A month later, they wanted a complete re-vamp while keeping the same core premise alive.

So once again, Plan B returned from the dead.

Production restarted.

And once again… it was shelved before even reaching halfway.

Some films really test your patience. This one apparently wanted a PhD in it.

Fast forward to last month. I met director Vittey, and for the first time in years, there was genuine positivity in his voice. He told me he had now taken charge of the production himself. But there was one condition.

I had to rewrite it again.

This time around the timeline and events of the original rough cut itself.

That was when I asked him to finally show me the rough cut.

And honestly… I was blown away.

Even after 13 long years, the film still felt potent. It never felt “old” except for some exterior shots where certain locations no longer even exist today. Almost like accidental time capsules of a different Malé.

But once the story locks itself inside that apartment, the tension becomes suffocating. Everything spirals beautifully out of control.

The three principal actors delivered nuanced performances. And newcomer Mohamed Faisal genuinely surprised me. He almost steals the entire film without trying too hard.

Watching that rough cut felt strangely emotional. I had always looked forward to this film releasing someday because personally, it remains one of my favorite screenplays I’ve written.

After watching it, I immediately called Vittey and Maaskey just to tell them one thing:

“Job well done.”

And now, with that positivity, I’ve begun the rewrite yet again.

But this time feels different.

For the first time in 13 years… it finally feels like they actually have a Plan B for Plan B.

DACOIT (2026): MESSY, WOUNDED AND STRANGELY BEAUTIFUL

There’s something strangely beautiful about damaged people trying to love each other while the world around them keeps collapsing.

That’s the feeling I felt after watching Dacoit.

At its heart, this is not really a crime film. Not even a heist thriller. Beneath all the guns, betrayals, chases and simmering revenge, Dacoit is really about two emotionally broken people carrying unfinished pain like unpaid debt.

And honestly, that part worked for me.

The film follows a rugged convict whose life collides again with a former lover under dangerous circumstances. There’s betrayal hanging in the air almost immediately. Nobody fully trusts anybody. Every conversation feels like it has a knife hidden underneath it. Somewhere along the way, the story keeps expanding into darker territories involving greed, manipulation and survival during desperate times.

The plot gets increasingly tangled as the film moves forward. Sometimes intentionally. Sometimes… maybe not.

There are moments where Dacoit feels like it’s trying to sprint emotionally and narratively at the same time. A few transitions feel abrupt. Certain twists arrive with such urgency that you almost want the film to sit down for a glass of water before continuing. But strangely, I was still invested.

Because the emotional core keeps pulling you back in.

Adivi Sesh brings a tired heaviness to his character that suits the film perfectly. He looks like a man who hasn’t emotionally recovered from life itself.

But for me, Mrunal Thakur becomes the soul of the film. Her performance is exceptional because the role itself is layered in such a difficult way. On the surface, she has to maintain one version of the character almost constantly, while underneath it, you can feel an entirely different emotional storm quietly suffocating her. That balancing act could have easily gone wrong in lesser hands, but she pulls it off beautifully. There’s pain in her silences, confusion in her eyes, and warmth even in moments where the character is emotionally guarded. I genuinely loved her in this film.

And the film wisely allows silence to do some of the heavy lifting.

Some of my favorite moments in Dacoit are not the loud scenes. Not the action blocks. It’s the quieter pauses. The held-back glances. The conversations where characters sound like they’re speaking about one thing while actually talking about something else entirely.

That emotional undercurrent kept surprising me.

Now yes, the film does wobble at times. A subplot here and there could have used tightening. Certain narrative choices ask for a little too much trust from the audience. And there were moments where I could almost hear the screenplay saying, “Don’t think too much, just come with me.”

So I did.

And I’m glad I did.

Because by the time the climax arrived, the film stopped trying to impress me and simply chose to hurt me instead. There’s a reveal towards the end that genuinely caught me emotionally off guard. Not because it was shocking for the sake of shock… but because suddenly all the emotional wreckage underneath the film quietly surfaced at once.

I actually welled up.

Not many films manage to do that anymore.

Dacoit is imperfect. Messy in places. Over-ambitious occasionally. But it also has heart beating beneath all its scars. And sometimes, that emotional honesty matters more than structural perfection.

Some films entertain you.

Some films impress you.

And some films stumble a little while trying to reach somewhere deeper.

I think Dacoit belongs in that third category.