Kartik Aaryan, Tovino Thomas, Bhavin Rabari: Five acclaimed performances from 2022

2022 featured some fantastic performances by male actors, but just a select few were discerning enough to be in their own league. Here's looking at five distinct performances that were shocking, beautiful and mesmerizing all rolled into one.

Kartik Aaryan’s dentist act has a whole lot of sharp teeth. And that’s the whole truth. It takes guts for an on-the-rise star like Kartik Aaryan to play a down-and-out loser with no hope of ever finding the love that he craves for. Kartik’s portrayal of desolation is near-perfect. His slouch, his slow walk, tentative demeanour and hesitant body language ooze out the anxiety anguish and humiliation Freddy faces on a daily basis. Kartik walks on the dark side of the moon without inhibition. He is aware he is going into uncharted territory. But he sinks deep into the morass of Freddy’s doom.

Some seasoned Indian A-listers, many of whom have been reigning for decades, still can’t deliver their dialogues with the right pauses, must watch Jayasurya in Meri Awas Suno. He is an actor in the truest sense of the world. He has had brilliant performances earlier in films like Sunny, Vellam, Captain and Shakespeare M.A. Malayalam. Jayasurya in Meri Awas Suno is in a league of his own. He plays a radio jockey who loses his voice to cancer. Jayasurya walks us through his character's fall and rise with such deep empathy it's reminiscent of William Hurt in The Doctor where he too survived throat cancer. The life-changing process is beautifully adumbrated in both the films. The man is incredibly into his part. Watch him in the sequence where in a fit of (unspoken) anger he tries to strangle his wife. Goosebumps. Slow clap.

Tovino Thomas is one of the most interesting actors in India right now. He had four releases in 2022. Of them Dear Friend left the strongest impact. Tovino plays a favourite roommate to a bunch of youngsters whom he betrays in the ugliest way possible. There is a Minnal Murali moment at the start of Dear Friend when Tovino is made to dress up like Superman by his friends on his birthday. It’s a moment that comes back to haunt the characters. Betrayal, you see, has so many indescribable offshoots. Tovino trapezes through the labyrinth of trust and betrayal. Dear Friend leaves you shattered with its equanimity and how the concept of betrayal really works when you are feeling most vulnerable. Tovino refuses to pander to our expectations.

Ayyub never fails to bring something extra to his character. This time he is made to walk a very thin line between credible nobility and doctored dogood-ism. While Diljit Dosanjh’s heroic determination to save all his loved ones makes him an instant messiah, the real hero of the anarchic carnage is the Hindu cop played by Ayyub who risks his life, family, career to drive Jogi and his family and neighbours out of Delhi into the safety of neighbouring Punjab. It’s a patently heroic role given size and structure by Zeeshan.

The brilliance of Chhello Show is difficult to grasp all at once. It is an exceptional synthesis of stillness and turmoil as seen through the film projector by a boy who is destined to be a renowned filmmaker. Pan Nalin perhaps? With no acting experience behind him, Bhavin Rabari’s large expressive eyes convey a wealth of searching, probing questions on how cinema works, and how the world outsid this bucolic oyster works. This is a drama of moments, of a silently stolen time. And it is no coincidence that the protagonist is named Samay in this timeless film that takes every cineaste in the world to the magic of those moving images on silver screen. Bhavin Rabari is hard to forget. His flowing tresses do not conceal the excitement in his eyes every time he sees the flickering images on the sooty silver-screen. All the untrained little actors who are part of Samay’s boygang deserve on Oscar each. As for Richa Meena and Deepen Ravel as Samay’s parents, they are so right in their moves it seems they never lived anywhere but in Chalala where the film is set. Chalo Chalala!