Killa

Young Chinmay shifts to an unknown place after his mom’s work transfer and transforms emotionally.

Review: At some point in our childhood, many of us have had to face this situation of having to move to a new place and even if it meant shifting to a new house in the same city, the pain of moving from a place that you are emotionally attached to is a lot to take. The pain is even more when you have to move to a completely new place of which you know nothing and where you have no friends to spend time with.

When Aruna (Amruta Subhash) moves to Konkan from Pune with her son Chinmay (Archit Deodhar), this is exactly the feeling that Chinmay has. Debutant director Avinash Arun has presented this emotion coupled with the dilemma of a single mother who doesn’t want to keep shifting places but has to, in order to run the house.

Soon, Chinmay finds his band of boys in Bandya (Parth Bhalerao), Yuvraj (Gaurish Gawade), Ondya (Omkar Mali), Umesh, Prashant and others and starts settling down. Meanwhile, Aruna faces problems at her workplace and after a trivial fight with his friends, Chinmay again starts going into a shell. More than anything else, 'Killa' is Chinmay’s coming of age story. The people he meets, the situations he encounters and Aruna’s struggle, arm him with a sense of understanding and help in shaping him up as a person.

Technically too this film is a marvel when it comes to the background score and cinematography. Avinash, who is also the cinematographer of the film, has captured the essence and breathtaking beauty of the Konkan through ample number of long shots of locations and close-ups of the folk of the region. The monsoon, which too is a character in the film, couldn’t have been shown in a better way than this.

Choosing to unfold the story through a school-kid’s point of view is a bold decision as the sorrows and questions are universal to adults too. Hence, finding the right person to do the job is as essential as finding the mother who at times is marred by the same questions. Killa’s casting is simply perfect. Perfect because Amruta is a great performer which is on display throughout the film and Archit has the talent of playing the emotionally harmed kid which he does here again after Siddhant. The other major characters are Parth’s Bandya and Gaurish’s Yuvraj. Parth is a gem and commands much of the film with his histrionics (which ultimately prevent the film from slipping into monotony). Yuvraj has a small role but does well as the kind-hearted bully from school.

'Killa' is one of the best films to have hit screens this year and the global recognition at various film festivals that it received, stands as a precursor to the success after its theatrical release. The film comes with English subtitles and is not one to be missed under any circumstances by anyone.