Lijo Jose Pellissery's first commercial success Amen is a wonderful treat filled with stunning aesthetics and an extremely creative world of magical realism. The film tells the story of Solomon and Shoshanna, two lovers who strives to be together despite having Shoshanna's family members standing against their relationship. Solomon is a saxophonist in the church band who has great talent in him but fails to express it due to a fearful memory. Fahadh Faasil and Swathi Reddy shined as Solomon and Shoshanna but the best actor award goes to Kalabhavan Mani for playing the role of Louis Pappan. As the story progresses Louis Pappan discovers the artist inside Solomon, from there on happens a change in Solomon's life and situation. The film also tells about choosing humanity over the evil of religious traditions and cultural norms.
Lijo Jose Pellissery created a wonderful movie of magical realism which has creamy cinematography and amazing camera movements done by the skilled Abhinandam Ramanujan. There was a shot which had the camera rotated in a semi-circular path set at a long and wide angle, the focus point of the frame was a boat going through river. I wondered how Abhinandam managed to do this kind of a camera movement from this kind of an angle. The plot was cliche but it was narrated in a different manner that was so fresh. PS Rafeeque's screenplay was well written with freshness and without much errors and it had nice quirky comedy by both Rafeeque and Pellissery.
As a director this film got Lijo Jose Pellissery's level raised among other malayalam directors and also gave a huge hope to cinephiles. The direction was visionary and aesthetically shot with the angles of POV he chose. Prashant Pillai also did a fantastic job in designing the sound and bgm beautifully.
Divine comedy, it's not worth missing!
