Black Dalia Malayalam Movie

Black Dahlia, actor Baburaj's debut directorial venture, leaves much to be desired. May 14, 2009 By Thomas T

Black Dahlia, actor Baburaj's debut directorial venture, leaves much to be desired. A plot that would have made for a pacy thriller has gone haywire because of a poor script, poorer direction and lackluster performance by the lead players.

The film starts with Dr. Adikeshav (Suresh Gopi), the chief of the Narco Analysis Wing, doing a narco-analysis on a person arrested on charges of being a serial killer. The person, whose identity is not revealed, confesses to killing one of the victims, but denies having killed the others. And from here, we are taken back to where the story begins.

Ten boisterous young girls, studying in a Medical College, live in a hostel outside the campus. Daughters of rich parents, these girls are bent on making the most of their lives. Things begin to go wrong for them from the day their car hits and kills an unknown person in the dark of the night. With the help of Vivek (Arun), who is the boyfriend of one of the girls, they dispose the dead body.

The girls then begin to put their lives back on track when one of them is found dead after having fallen from the top of their hostel building. Very soon Circle Inspector Anwar (Baburaj) begins his investigation, inferring that it's not a suicide, but a murder. And then other members of the group and Vivek as well get killed. And then enters Daisy Wilfred (Vani Viswanath), the smart DIG of Police. She takes up the investigation herself. In the meantime things develop in such a manner that suspicion falls on Anwar. Thus goes the story of Black Dahlia.

Though the plot is strong, the script is weak and direction not up to the mark. The film doesn't excite you in any way. There are many scenes that are conceived rather poorly and executed shoddily. The script-writer and the director (in this case both the same person) should have worked things out in a better manner.

Vani Viswanath, who is the key player, fails to deliver. Compared to her earlier cop roles, Daisy Wilfred IPS is unimpressive. Baburaj as Anwar is just passable. Suresh Gopi is his usual self in a guest role, as Adikeshav and doesn't have much to do. There's nothing much to be said about the technical aspects. The songs are boring. There is an element of artificiality in the dialogues at many places and at some places the dialogue delivery lacks spontaneity. Overall a very poor first attempt by Baburaj as a director.