The fact that Priyadarshan-mohanlal combination was responsible for the resurrection of Nair supremacy and tharavad centeredness in Kerala movies is a well known.
Although he always enjoys good box offices for his movies, Priyan’s stature as ‘special’ movie maker is virtually nonexistent, possibly because of his day-light robbery of foreign movie themes. So thalavatttom was never a critically acclaimed movie. The movie, while hovering around the tharavad nostalgia (nedumudi venu’s character and his relationship with mohanlal), do (mis)handle a group
of patients in a mental asylum.

Blessy does the same thing in thanmathra. The difference
here is the support from the critics. The media gives him
the tag of the most promising director.

In a nutshell, although both these directors are one and
the same, the status they enjoy in the malayalam cinema is different. While priyan maintains his position was a ‘popular’ director for the masses, Blessy enjoys a seat
among the ‘parallel’ directors of malayalam movies.

As an aside, I think there has recently been quite a remarkable move towards what Rat says reclaiming of the feudal and patriarchal essence of samskarika keralam. The nostalgia for a nalukettu architecture, obviously in opposition to the concrete shelter of the Gulf returned, for example. I’m sure it is not just the comfort of the structure that makes naalukettu appealing…….

Since I have no detailed clinical information on Alzheimer’s disease, I can not comment on the way Belssy had portrayed the patient – a man getting the disease in the morning, turning to a full scale mental patient by evening and dying a week after !!!

One thing is sure; this Padmarajan disciple is nowhere nearer to his mentor’s class and vision.