'Kudumbasthan' Review: A superb Manikandan anchors an uneven yet engaging family entertainer.

Amidst a barrage of heavy duty, serious films, finding something that keeps us light and enjoyable is few and far between. With the new Nakkalites team's 'Kudumbasthan', the film takes us back to the middle class family dramas, that resonate on a larger level, much like Middle Class Madhavan, Budget Padmanabhan and many other vintage films.

Kudumbasthan takes a very realistic topic of middle class lifestyle and deals with all its complexities and conflicts in a rather sugar coated manner. The idea to treat this topic, similar to a satire or on the levels of a comic caper does warrant some lighter moments and the film scores bigger in this front. The pacing with which the screenplay progresses never lets the eyes down or nowhere, with comic situations sprinkled one after another. The laughs do range from knee-slappers to screamers to chuckles but the good part is that the laughs are free flowing.

The more we enjoy the humorous parts, the less we get to see the emotional front for this narrative. The drama holds superb potential for much better emotional tightness but the film is content with giving more laughs. On one side, we see Naveen played by the superb Manikandan struggling to make ends meet with overarching loans and family burdens, but we don't really feel the pain from the characters or from the screenplay, let alone the relatability factor of them. 

An inter-caste marriage at the beginning is brushed off with one smart quirk in a marriage hall and we don't see more of that complexity. A man pushed to shed his self-respect by his own family members is not that heart-wrenching to feel the pain of him. It all ends up in the able shoulders of Manikandan, who does a great job at selling this character as a very relatable middle class 'kudumbasthan'. A caricaturish sketch of Rajendran played by Guru Somasundaram does work in a few places, but the character feels underwritten with little to no reasoning on how the character is such and we don't get the reason for his change either, leaving a lot to the able actor.

The actors and the supporting cast are in fine form and they save the film at the weaker links of the narrative. Several stretches of impactful and emotional drama gets interrupted with humour, which keeps the emotional impact at check constantly. The first half takes some time to settle down with the kind of humour it plays with, but once it's done, the film really takes off with engagingly comical scenes. The second half is rather too contrived and meanders a lot, losing focus on the major issues. 

There are individual moments where the emotions do work, for instance a scene where Naveen has to save himself from the loan sharks by sitting in a stinking toilet, or another character who gives a reason as to why she wears a red saree. We get the pain of the character, but the screenplay doesn't keep the emotion lingering in our minds, and the scene cuts to quirks. Towards the end, a superb monologue followed by a much powerful and surprising moment from another character is a nice touch, but even before we savour the emotional weightage of the moment, we shift to the typical last minute chaotic fun portions, which do work nicely.

Kudumbasthan had the chance to turn into something a lot more memorable and satisfying, had it been more tighter in terms of emotions and focus. We get the confusion of either focusing more on comedy or on drama, but the film ends up choosing comedy and it does work in its favour. With all its flaws and inconsistency, Kudumbasthan ends up being a hilarious family entertainer, and it's quite happy at giving us more and more laughs.