'Ronth' review: Shahi Kabir's golden run continues in a spiritual successor to 'Nayattu', with the best from Roshan Mathew and Dileesh Pothan

As a a filmmaker and screenwriter, Shahi Kabir has by now firmly created a certain impression in my mind that, whenever I set out to watch a new film written or directed by him, I get very nervous — in a good way. How does he imagine some of the darkest stories ever? Ronth, which marks his second directorial after the extremely haunting Ela Veezha Poonchira, and starring Roshan Mathew and Dileesh Pothan, is a refreshingly bleak twist on the buddy cop thriller. Well, I'm not even sure I should use the "buddy" here, because Shahi, who also wrote the script this time around, paints a tense picture of a senior cop and a junior cop with opposite personalities, revealing their differing viewpoints throughout the film as they navigate one unsettling incident after another.

Ronth (which translates to 'night patrol') marks Shahi's fifth police thriller and is once again coloured by his real-life experiences as a policeman who has seen all kinds of disquieting events. As expected from him, Ronth doesn't promise you a warm, feel-good experience. (The closest he came to making a feel-good film is the climax of Officer on Duty.) It's not as heavily depressing an experience as, say, Officer on Duty (which he wrote) or Ela Veezha Poonchira (which he only directed). However, it delivers the same — or nearly the same — chilling after-effects of Joseph or Nayattu, two films he wrote. Ronth is, yet another tale of flawed policemen who are ordinary individuals grappling with various inconveniences and past trauma.

One of Shahi's strong qualities as a writer and filmmaker is the way he designs the dynamic between a seasoned police character and a junior guy. It's very essential to have both characters have strong personality traits. The senior cop in this case is Yohannan, played by Dileesh Pothan; the younger cop is Dinanath, played by Roshan Mathew. These two men make an unlikely pair — you could even assume it's a toxic working relationship — but you also know that they'll have each others' backs. Despite the multiple taunts that the seasoned and battle-weathered Yohannan subjects the inexperienced and sensitive Dinanath to, there are also times when the former stands by the latter. The film suggests that these are human beings just like us, with all inherent shortcomings, and if we were placed in the same circumstances as Yohannan or Dinanath, we might have done the same thing. Ronth contains what I would call the career-best performances of Dileesh Pothan and Roshan Mathew. These two are absolutely brilliant!

We see in Ronth some of the recurring themes that Shahi explored in his previous films. We see policemen with families that are severely affected by their profession. We see more than one character — be it a man or a woman — expressing concerns about suspicious partners. We see a character having trouble going to a certain place because it recalls a devastating tragedy. We see a character bending the rules because he knows perfectly well that the very people he is serving wouldn't look after his best interests despite being so deeply committed to his profession. There is a strong existential and cynical bent to Shahi's scripts, and nowhere is it more dominant than in Ronth. It's one of those films that, if you're not a father yet, makes you reaffirm your belief that this is not a world to which we should bring children. After all, it's the young ones who get the most affected in Ronth, whether it's the kids belonging to the families of the policemen or those belonging to the troubled strangers they encounter during their regular night patrol.

Despite the thematic similarities Ronth has with Shahi's other films, he is careful not to follow the same structure or formula he did in them. The method of generating tension and conflict is different from that in Joseph, Nayattu, or Officer on Duty. In Ela Veezha Poonchira he confined the events to a single location with only a few characters. In Ronth, the characters venture to the exteriors, to areas that are either desolate, haunting or breathtakingly beautiful (captured effectively by cinematographer Manesh Madhavan). There is a strong sense of alienation following these two characters.  

Yes, Ronth doesn't have big stars, but when your script is so powerful, you don't necessarily need them. As I mentioned earlier, what Shahi is doing with his script of Ronth is not the same as what he did with his script of Officer on Duty in terms of the paths they take. You don't flexible actors, who are capable of oscillating between dark and light, to take on a heavy subject like this. I would say it's closest to Nayattu in terms of mood and spirit. I'm not giving away anything when I say that Ronth is a spiritual successor to that film. I say this for a reason, which you'll get once you see the film.

Film: Ronth

Director: Shahi Kabir

Cast: Dileesh Pothan, Roshan Mathew, Arun Cherukavil, Lakshmi Menon

Rating: 4/5

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