Watch: ‘Error’, a Malayalam short film on virtual dependency

The film is directed by PS Manu, who made the critically acclaimed Malayalam film ‘Mundothuruthu’.
Short film 'Error'
Short film 'Error'
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If you hadn’t known for a fact that it is a short film, the first few minutes of Error may seem like a random conversation between two friends that someone accidentally recorded.

PS Manu, director of the critically acclaimed film Mundrothuruthu, made this Malayalam short as a lockdown project, with everyone included in the project working at a different location.

“Even before this, I had some health issues and was in self-containment. By the time I was ready to work on a few scripts I had with me, the coronavirus happened,” Manu says.

That’s when he began to seriously observe the increasing dependency of people on virtual life. The film is about the ‘error’ of this dependency.

In the film, you observe Chinnu Kuruvila and Abhija Sivakala, two proven actors active in theatre and films, comfortably settle for a conversation over their gadgets. They display the excitement that friends do when they see each other after a long time, waving their animated hellos and asking after each other. Chinnu plays Malu, a filmmaker who had a few shots left to do in a project when the pandemic hit. Abhija playing Chinnu is an actor living in Bombay, rented to her by a ‘Toppiwala’ (Indrans in a lovely cameo) and his wife. Both women are alone in their apartments at the moment.

The conversation happens smoothly and easily till Malu notices someone move in the background of Chinnu’s room. From there, it takes a thriller mode, driving the viewer tense with the unexpectedness of what's happening around the two women.

“More than to celebrate fear or crime, it is about how to make a film during a lockdown. The film was shot in three locations – Bengaluru, Mavelikkara and Thiruvananthapuram. I was in Kottarakkara, directing it. The audio was done in Kollam, the editing in Ernakulam, the dubbing in Aluva and the graphics in Mumbai," Manu says.

Apart from Chinnu, Abhija and Indrans, a fourth actor plays a masked character. But since the artiste did not want to be named, Manu credits the person as Sub Rosa – ‘a theological term for a secret meeting’, the director says.

Watch the film:

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