Cold Case Movie Review: A Hotchpotch of a Crime Thriller That Wastes Prithviraj Sukumaran

There are two firsts in the Malayalam movie, Cold Case, just out on Amazon Prime. This is Tanu Balak’s debut directorial outing and Prithviraj Sukumaran’s maiden OTT apperance. Wasted entirely, I would say. To me, the film looked like a classroom lecture on criminology, boringly verbose and crashingly repetitive (What happened to the editor?). And I could not understand the idea behind mixing and matching a perfect case of crime with the supernatural.

Cold Case begins with a couple of men from two different faiths trying to exorcise ghosts from a woman and a little boy in two different cases. But the main narrative kicks off when a fisherman nets a plastic bag containing a skull. What is the big deal in this; dozens have been found over the years. But in this case, a “special investigative team” is formed to get to the bottom of the skull mystery. Assistant Commissioner of Police Sathyajit is asked to lead the probe. Essayed by Prithviraj Sukumaran. Obsessed with turning out nattily in impeccable attire, his hair always neatly brushed, he may well have been on a catwalk modelling rather than getting his teeth into the mystifying popping up of a skull.