Widely regarded as an institution which recognizes quality cinema, the Kerala State Film Awards have come in for sharp criticism in its 45thedition and has also kicked up a storm in Mollywood for some of its choices.
One of the biggest controversies has been over awarding the best actor and best actresses awards to Nivin Pauly and Nazriya Nazim respectively. Nivin won the award for his performance in both “Bangalore Days” and “1983”, and Nazriya bagged it for her roles in “Om Shanti Oshana” and “Bangalore Days”.
It is almost as the performances in these two films could have equalled the performances of some other actors in a single film.
Naturally, social media users had a blast making memes and counter memes, but mainly poking fun at the award winners. But many from the industry too have jumped into the fray, flaying the jury’s choice.
One of the first to criticise the award was actor and film maker Joy Mathew who chided the jury in a sarcastic Facebook post.
Although she congratulated the awardees, actor Meera Nandan raised questions about why actor Jayasurya was ignored by the jury. She was Jayasurya’s co-star in the much acclaimed movie Apothecary released last year.
Another point of criticism over the jury’s choice of best actor, was a jury member’s revelation that Mamootty was too glamorous to be believable in his role as Raghavan, a prisoner, in the film “Munnariyuppu”. These views were lambasted by writer R Unni who said that if “glamour” was a reason for rejecting the awards, then Mammootty did not need that award.
As more members from the film fraternity and others started trashing the award, actor Manju Warrier who was seen as a serious contender for the Best Actress category, tried to douse some of the fire. In a Facebook post, she congratulated “little sister” Nazriya and added that she enjoyed Nazriya’s performances as much as the public did.
Criticism of the 2014 awards comes in the context of the State Awards increasingly being seen as the only platform for the recognition of good cinema against the backdrop of the mushrooming of film awards being instituted by private players in the last few years, which mainly focus on commercially successful and appealing movies.
With both best performance awards going to two actors who played breezy roles in light movies, questions were bound to be asked; especially when the jury was spoilt for choice. Malayalam cinema, which is known for its strong scripts and narration, had no dearth of talent for the year 2014 too, with many powerful performances from many actors.
In the meanwhile, Malayala Manorama published an editorial questioning those who poked fun at Nivin Pauly’s award. The editorial reminds its readers that Nivin Pauly gave up a job at tech giant Infosys for the love of cinema and and that Malayalis should not show their ingratitude with memes and jokes on him.
The State Film Awards getting reduced to a standing joke is indeed a disappointment. Nivin Pauly’s love for cinema may be unquestionable, but the award is for a performance, not anyone’s dedication to the industry.
While all awardees are undoubtedly talented in their own right, handing out state awards de rigueur is not cool. Justifiably, the expectation is that the jury would be guided by the aesthetics of cinema and its elements and not how well a film fares at the box office.
No compromises there.