Street Lights 2018

Street Lights 2018

James, a Crime Branch police office faces thrilling events during his pursuit to solve a mystery. Mammootty stars as a police officer in a film with a realistic take on the life of people living on the streets. Street Lights is a 2018 Indian bilingual thriller film directed by cinematographer Shamdat in his directorial debut. Simultaneously shot in Tamil and Malayalam, the film is produced by Mammootty under his banner Playhouse Motion Pictures and starring himself alongside a different supporting cast in each language. The Tamil version features Prithvi Rajan, Pandi, Pandiarajan, and Sreeram; while Soubin Shahir, Dharmajan Bolgatty, Hareesh Perumanna, and Lijomol Jose play pivotal roles in Malayalam.

Cinematographer Shamdat is marking his directorial debut. Eager to direct a film, he watched many short films and one of them led him into contacting its maker Fawaz Mohamed. After Shamdat told his idea to Fawaz, Fawaz developed the content into a story within a week. In 2016, Shamdat narrated the screenplay to Mammootty at the sets of The Great Father. Mammootty reacted positively, directly asking about the proximity of the project's commencement, and also decided to produce. Originally scripted in Malayalam, the story featuring a certain Tamil-speaking characters and portions to be set in Tamilnadu prompted the makers to develop the whole film into a bilingual. Shamdat's initial idea of different production of film, as first in Malayalam and Tamil thereafter, was advanced to the simultaneous filming of both versions, since Mammootty was ready to finance also the Tamil version.

Dialogues for Tamil version were written by Shamdat himself, while Malayalam dialouges along with story and screenplay are credited to Fawaz Mohamed, who is also debutant. In March 2017, the film was revealed as an investigative thriller titled Street Lights with Mammootty to play a police officer. Actors Vishnu Unnikrishnan and Lijomol Jose were selected, while the locations were confirmed to be Kochi, Pollachi, and Chennai, with filming planned to begin during end of the month. On Tamil version's titling, when Shamdat asked suggestions from his former collaborator Kamal Hassan, he advised to continue with the same English title and comforted the makers' apprehensions concerning the absence of tax exemption for films with non-Tamil titles in Tamilnadu, saying "the rules are going to change soon". However, neither to Kamal nor to any other actor worked in the film except Mammootty, the script was revealed.

Initial release: 26 January 2018

Director: Shamdat

Screenplay: Fawaz Mohamed

Languages: Malayalam, Tamil language

The Movie has a simple story, which the directed decided to portray in an unconventionel way, which gave the movie a different view and a certain charm, The story revolves around 4 parts of lifes, involving 7 characters whom at points come together and in the end they ties together all the ends. This complications which you feel when you readthis review is not evident when you watch the movie, thats where we could appreciate the work of Director, because he has given a subtle yet clever film altogether for the audience. You all could enjoy the film and never feel let down at any part of the movie. The film is packed and all the performances are equal to the necessity. Mammotty has given his charm and finesse to his character and the antagonist Stunt Silva who has also done the action choreography, have excelled in both the roles. The film is an enjoyable flick, with a combination of action, comedy, love and innocence.

I would rate the movie 4/5. #streetlights #Mammotty #malayalammovie #moviereview #blogging.