Vartha

1986 163’ col/scope Malayalam d I.V. Sasi pc Grihalakshmi Prod. s T. Damodaran lyr Bichu Thirumala c Jayanan Vincent m A.T. Ummar, Johnson lp Mammootty, Mohanlal, Seema, Rehman, Nalini

The fearless newspaper editor Madhavan Kutty (Mammootty) takes on Kerala’s corrupt political establishment in order to vindicate his sweetheart Radha (Seema), the district collector accused of illegal practices. The villain is the owner of the Manikyam financial group, who appears to control the state’s entire bureaucratic and political apparatus. Personal rivalries weave into political conflict as Manikyam implicates Radha’s kid brother Unni in a smuggling operation. Eventually, when all legal means fail, the editor, the kid brother and Vasu (Mohanlal), a reformed gangster formerly in Manikyam’s employ, establish a secret hideout where they assemble the documents that would appear to indict virtually everybody in power of criminal conspiracies. The film’s dramatic and wholly unexpected end has all the good guys gunned down by corrupt cops, making the fight for justice a virtually hopeless cause.

Film