New Delhi: Thrillers seem to be the ticket to Kerala actor Mohanlal’s continued success. The box office success of his latest movie Thudarum, on the back of L2:Empuraan, also released this year, shows how the evergreen superstar is still a fan favourite.
In Thudarum, he plays an ‘ordinary man’—a taxi driver—trying to protect his family. Tharun Moorthy’s drama is a crowd pleaser, having earned Rs 44.1 crore within five days of its release. It’s no Drishyam (2013), the movie that wowed audiences with its twists and turns, but it shows that Mohanlal is at his best in this genre.
“Thrillers, especially Thudarum and Drishyam, that have a family at the centre tend to expand the audience base. That does not happen with genres like action, which appeal more to young people. Mohanlal has been doing a lot of thrillers, and then experimenting with other genres in between,” said senior film critic Ramesh Bala.
Mohanlal’s first release this year, L2:Empuraan, earned Rs 265.5 crore worldwide. It also turned out to be the only profitable movie among 15 Malayalam releases in March.
But according to Bala, the genre on the whole is having a moment in the Malayalam film industry. Two other Malayalam thrillers released this year—the crime investigation drama Officer on Duty starring Kunchacko Boban, Priya Mani and Jagadish and the speculative alternate history movie, Rekhachithram starring Asif Ali—got rave reviews.
“In Telugu, there is more inclination to massy movies, and in Malayalam, it’s thrillers. Even Tamil thriller movies released in Kerala do very well. The audience there has an appetite for the genre,” said Bala.
Also read: Prithviraj says Bollywood’s crisis is a phase. ‘Not long ago we looked up to Hindi cinema’
A track record
Thudarum is also buzzing because it reunites Shobhana and Mohanlal as an on-screen couple after over 20 years. Their last film as a couple was the 2004 film Maampazhakkaalam. They also appeared together on-screen in the 2009 film Sagar Alias Jacky Reloaded, though they were not paired opposite each other.
The pairing has been a fan favourite since the 80s. They were first paired together in the 1985 film Avidathe Pole Ivideyum. They peaked in the 90s, and they delivered hits like Manichitrathazhu (1993) and Minnaram (1994).
Thudarum has heavily leaned in on the nostalgia of this pairing. One of the film’s posters features an AI-generated version of their younger selves.
Thudarum shares some similarity with Jeethu Joseph’s Drishyam in that Mohanlal plays a family man in a larger-than-life situation in both films. In Drishyam, he plays a college dropout cable TV operator who accidentally kills his daughter’s stalker and now has to hide the body and hoodwink the police. It was remade into Kannada, Hindi and Telugu, with all versions achieving commercial success.
But in between the two, Mohanal delivered more flops than hits. From Lailaa O Lailaa (2015) and Aaraattu (2015) to Alone (2023) and his directorial venture Barroz (2024). He’s had over 30 releases since Drishyam in 2013, and almost 20 of the films have been commercial flops. And there is a clear theme with the films that did exceptionally well. Pulimurugan (2016) Lucifer (2019), Drishyam 2 (2021) and Neru (2023) are all thrillers.
And Mohanlal seems to know this. He announced the third instalment of the Drishyam franchise earlier this year.
(Edited by Theres Sudeep)