Roshan Mathew’s Ibrahim in ‘Kuruthi’, streaming on Amazon Prime, takes the actor through a maze of emotions

Ibrahim’s search for closure after a tragedy takes him through the crucible of vengeance and fury. For actor Roshan Mathew, Ibrahim, his character in Manu Warrier’s Malayalam film Kuruthi, is a new one in his oeuvre.

“Ibrahim loses his loved ones and is struggling with the loss every day, even with the will to live. That is where the story of Kuruthi begins. A series of events make him question many things he believes in. It puts him in a situation where he is forced to fight, a fight he was not prepared for. Eventually, he has to face his demons, physically and emotionally,” says Roshan, about the film that is currently streaming on Amazon Prime.

On his second outing with Prithviraj after Anjali Menon’s Koode, Roshan says the senior actor’s passion for cinema and discipline inspire him. “For Kuruthi, we were together from the first day to the last day of the shoot. Day in and day out, I noticed that he comes in with the same level of energy and it stays till pack up. It is the process of making a film that gives him the energy.”

In the OTT space

Kuruthi is Roshan’s fifth film that is premiering on OTT, after the success of Mahesh Narayanan’s C U Soon, Anurag Kashyap’s Choked, Siddarth Siva’s Varthamanam and Aanum Pennum, an anthology.

OTT releases has come as a blessing in disguise for Roshan. With subtitling mandatory for such releases, Malayalam films have garnered wide audiences. Although Roshan’s Kappela was pulled out of theatres just as Kerala went into a lockdown in March 2020, it gained more viewers after it was released on OTT. Roshan agrees that OTT platforms have been a lifeline for the film industry once theatres were closed.

He feels he was fortunate to have done some work before the lockdown and those were released during the lockdown. CU Soon was the only film that was shot during the first lockdown.

“I am lucky that even in these times, there was an avenue and an audience for the films. OTT platforms have made movies from regional industries much more accessible,” he believes.

He adds that while Malayalam movies have always been relatable even to non-Malayalis, OTT platforms take it into the homes of viewers and so these films are getting the attention they deserve. “Malayalam films have been innovating because viewers encourage such efforts. That sort of evolution may have run out of fuel if it were not for our films accessing a different sort of audience through these platforms,” he explains.

Asked if he would enjoy working in mini-series made for OTT platforms, he asserts that there is no restrictions on language, format or platform if he is working with people whose work excites him. “ I am open to anything I feel like trying. Who I get to work with is a big factor in choosing my films. Fortunately for me, a lot of those decisions have paid off,” he says, citing working with Geetu Mohandas for Moothon as an example. As an example, he says that as soon as Geetu Mohandas called him for a meeting for Moothon, he knew he was going to do the film even before he heard the story.

The actor has just wrapped up the shooting of Chathuram (Malayalam) and the big-budget Darlings (Hindi), directed by Jasmeet K Reen and starring Alia Bhatt, Shefali Shah and Vijay Varma.

“A comedy, Darlings is entirely different from the dark and comparitively small-budget Choked in terms of scale and the amount of planning that goes into each scene. I have seen some of them in theatre and it was wonderful to act with them. Almost all my scenes have one or the other character as the entire film revolves around the three characters and I am the only other person who is there,” he says.

Roshan is also working in Tamil film Cobra and veteran Sibi Malayil’s Koth with Asif Ali. The other projects he’s looking forward to include Ranam-director Nirmal Sahadev’s Kumari with Aiswariya Lekshmi, Liquor Island with Suraj Venjaramoodu and Sreejith N’s Oru Thekkan Thallu Case starring Biju Menon, Padmapriya and Nimisha Sajayan.