Okka Kshanam movie review: Love vs destiny

Okka Kshanam movie star cast: Allu Sirish, Surbhi, Srinivas Avasarala, Seerat Kapoor
Okka Kshanam movie director: VI Anand
Okka Kshanam movie rating: 3 stars

While we have let television screens invade our living rooms, high-end gadgets have conquered our bedrooms. We are seemingly undermining our own privacy and unknowingly encouraging voyeurism. Director VI Anand’s new film Okka Kshanam is swarming with characters that have no regards for privacy.

Jyotshna aka Joo (Surabhi), the female protagonist of Okka Kshanam, whose movements are restricted due to a fractured ankle, passes time by watching other people from her apartment balcony. Her conscience even allows her to peep into the bedroom of a couple without any sign of uneasiness. Even hero Jeeva’s (Allu Sirish) mother, played by Rohini, feels very comfortable spying on her fully grown-up son’s phone and proudly talks about it too. Or Swathi (Seerat Kapoor), who prefers video link to direct and personal interaction while apologising to her husband.

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Anand’s characters in Okka Kshanam have serious personality problems. And that’s what makes this film interesting. These characters are far from perfect. Still, we end up rooting for them. We understand that it is a human weakness. Nevertheless, the characters thinking its normal to treat other people like objects for their entertainment still punches us in the gut.

Having said that Anand doesn’t really seem to glorify these flawed traits of the characters. Instead, he uses them to expand the plot and bridge the gap between the lives of two couples, around whom Anand, who is also the writer, has built the entire film.

Joo is keenly interested in the life of Swathi and Srinivas (Srinivas Avasarala), the couple who has hit a rough patch in their marriage. And Jeeva, to entertain the interests of his lady love, befriends Srinivas and begins to learn everything about the married couple. Srinivas creeps the lights out of Jeeva as he begins to tell his life’s story. Jeeva learns that he and Srinivas have been living the same life all along but with different people. The events in Srinivas’ past repeats in Jeeva’s future. And Joo’s life bears an eerie resemblance to Swathi’s life. The couples have been living a “parallel life.”

Anand provides some historical facts and a demonstration with unlit matchsticks to makes us believe in the possibility of somebody else living the exact same life that of ours. He also takes a while before he really beings to engage us with the story. But, following a major twist at the end of the first half, the narration catches up speed. Jeeva knows the fate of Swathi and now he also has the chance to rewrite the destiny.

And, again there is another major revelation, which further thickens the plot with a corporate cover-up of a major crime. And we are hit again with new revelations frequently and are introduced to new characters keeping us on our edge of the seats for the better part of the second half.

Sirish, Surabhi and Srinivas are at ease playing their characters but it is Seerat who throws a surprise. She makes us empathise with her trauma and horrors that she suffers as she drowns herself in survivor’s guilt.

The film seemingly drags in parts as if Anand wanted the story not to end in less than 150 minutes. In order to build up the tension in the narration, the director-writer lags in letting the lead characters think on their feet affecting the pace a little.

In the end, Anand’s imagination and a combination of many other things trumps over all the shortcomings of Okka Kshanam.