Kaalapani (1996)

Sorry, this movie sucks

People are voting emotionally.

Crappy film

A movie that not only functions as a solid scarefest but a razor-sharp satire.

The cellular jail or kalapani was imprisoned in 1906 by the Britishers in India to imprison Indian independence fighters. This notable prison shelter is located in Port Blair in Andaman.Vd. Prominent freedom fighters like Savarkar, Barin Ghosh, Hemchandra Das, Maha Beersim, Kamal Nath Tiwari, Bhukteshwar Dutt, Shiv Verma, Jaidev Kapoor and Gaya Prasad were also jailed for cellular imprisonment. It was later made a memorial in 1969 after Independence.G. S. Sethu of the Indian Army goes to Ross Island, Kaalapani to find the whereabouts of his aunt Parvathi's husband, Govardhan Menon(Mohanlal) who has been sent to jail in the year during the British Rule. In an old room containing record of prisoners held at the jail, Sethu comes across Govardhan's records and learns his story.indicating that she will never come to know about Govardhan's death and will keep waiting for him for the rest of her life.

A very good movie acted superbly by the leading actors. The movies story revolves around the lives of Indian prisoners during British India. Some says its inspires from Schindler's list but i don't think there is a single scene to scene copy. though there is some similarity in the story like 1) one bad jailer who kills prisoners without reason and both dies in the end. 2) A white guy trying to help prisoners(in this movie a doctor and in SL- schindler).But overall I believe the movie is original and there is no frame to frame to frame copy like now-a-days. The dedication of actors for the movie was unbelievable. Mohanlal goes to the extent of licking Amrish Puri's shoes! The movie is very violent and has lot of blood and gore. Though the movie cannot be watched with family, it is probably one of the finest south Indian movie showing freedom fighting of India. The direction of priyan is very good. Most of the scenes are original and some scenes are really good too. Priyan is wasting his real talents by copying other movies. Overall a very good movie with good acting and good direction. 4.5 out of 5

I wish that I could agree with the viewers below about the cinematography, sound, and overall quality of the film but the Eros DVD completely failed to capture any of that. The picture quality was somewhat grainy like an old 70s film and, halfway through the film, I had to reduce the sound substantially because of all the static and distortion. Finally, I had to spend close to 45 minutes to finish the last chapter since it kept stopping and, at times, had to see it frame by frame.Aside from the technical aspects, I felt that the acting by the British actors was either stilted, poorly acted or over acted. I also wish that the two main actors did not look so much alike -- same moustache and body type. In one scene, when they were fighting, it was frequently difficult to tell them apart. Had the same problem with some of the leads in LA Confidential. Teen Deewarein was much better at giving three very distinct characters in every way. I also wished that the director would not have borrowed a scene from Schindler's List -- where all the prisoner's are registering on the island. For anyone who has seen Schindler's List, this scene lessens the impact of the film from then on since, in the back of your mind, you start to wonder what else has been taken from what movies and how much of the overall film can really be believed.Despite all my misgivings above, I felt the story was well-written and all the Indian actors performed exceptionally well. I only wish that I had seen the same film that everyone else saw.

"Kalaa Paani" is one of those films that the Indian film industry churns out from time to time to convince the rest of the world that Indian film-makers are perfectly capable of making great films, films that will have a powerful impact on the viewer, films that you cannot easily forget (if at all you can). It rises above established conventions and is of the same class as films such as "Gandhi" and others.Be warned that, below, although I have tried not to give too much away, I am including a summary of the plot.The film features a good cast, although not a perfect one: Mohanlal and Prabhu play the leading roles, those of Govardhan Nair and Mukund Iyengar respectively, Tabu is Paarvathi, Govardhan's wife, Alex Draper is David Barry, the tyrannical jailor, Amrish Puri is Mirza Khan, his sub-ordinate officer, and other actors such as "Delhi" Ganesh, Sreeni, "Cochin" Hanifa, and several others. We are basically told a story about the lives of prisoners in a prison in British India and their relationships. This is where the film shows originality. We are not being told about the Indian Freedom Struggle itself, we are told about what it was like to be in prison in British India, that is all. A point to be noted here is that the lives of prisoners in FREE India, and indeed, perhaps almost everywhere else in the world, is just as horrifically sad as we see in this movie.Govardhan Nair (as already mentioned, played by Mohanlal), a doctor, intending to help some friends of an old aquaintance of his, unwittingly helps a group of terrorists plant an explosive on the path of a train carrying a few British officials. Despite his desperate efforts to avert the tragedy when he realises what he has done, misfortune strikes him, the bomb explodes, killing fifty-five people and he is sent to prison on charges of murder. Here, he meets other people who have actually committed crimes involving participation in terrorist activity and "revenge" attacks (and he also meets other people, who are actually innocent of committing any crime, just as he is). He forms relationships with these people, partly in the hope that he will have a positive influence on their lives, i.e., intending to turn them away from violence. We also see that sometimes, beneath their hardened, disturbing exteriors, criminals can have human sides, too. After all, as they say, sometimes criminals are made, not born. The rest of the film tells the heart-rending story that can sometimes be nastily play out in innocent people's lives. I think I have to mention that there is one scene in this film that is really saddening. It's probably the saddest scene in any film ever made. But strangely enough, while I could feel a lump in my throat, I wasn't really moved to tears.The cinematography is excellent. The sound was stunning when I watched the movie in the theatre, the film being one of the earliest films made in India to utilise the "dts" sound system. The makers of the film did not make a gimmick of this fact, but it got noticed anyway - the way a film should gain praise. The art directors and the set decorators are the people who, in my opinion, have let the rest of the crew down slightly. There are several occasions when you can clearly see that you're actually being shown a set, but there certainly are several other occasions when this is in a way, made up for. And of course, you can sometimes see that you are being shown showers from hose pipes in place of rain. The music by Ilayaraja, one of India's finest musicians, is excellent, except for one song, which isn't too bad, but still not as good as the rest of his work in this film. The make-up crew have worked really hard and have done a good job, at least by Indian standards. It is unfortunate that these few flaws are present in an otherwise great film.To sum up, if you've never watched Indian films and you want to watch one, this is the one.