L2 Empuraan Movie Review: Prithviraj Effectively Scales Up Mohanlal’s Lucifer To Greater Heights
L2 Empuraan will leave you wondering about Prithviraj and Murali Gopy's boldness with its subtle political context.
L2 EmpuraanU/A
L2 Empuraan Movie Review: The genius of Lucifer and Empuraan is that, despite spanning more than six hours of runtime (two films put together), the filmmakers continue to maintain the suspense about the origin of Stephen Nedumpalley (Mohanlal). What’s more impressive is the way director Prithviraj has scaled up this character. Stephen is not just a political kingmaker anymore. In Empuraan, he becomes much more, and to be honest, the conflict in Empuraan seems to be too small for him. That’s the downside of the film, as the villains are no match for the powers of Stephen.
The first part, Lucifer, ended with a major reveal that Stephen Nedumpalley is a crime lord named Khureshi Abraham, a most wanted leader of an international syndicate. While Lucifer showed us, Stephen, Empuraan unravels his other facet: Khureshi Abraham. The film opens with a flashback to a violent riot in India. Director Prithviraj is clever in not delving into the details of the riot. Yet, the animated sequence of a burning train that kills Hindu pilgrims is enough to deliver the intended message. The aftermath of the riot leads to bloodshed and we find a kid named Zayed Masood, a lone survivor of a small Muslim community, which gets butchered, raped, and killed by Balraj (Abhimanyu Singh) and his bloodthirsty mob.
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The film swiftly shifts to the current state of God’s Own Country, where Jathin Ramdas (Tovino Thomas) has gone astray. His hate for his father persists, and the rogue son wants to start his legacy. He leaves IUF and joins a communalist and extremist party, which is headed by Balraj, who now goes by the name Bajrangi Baba. If you follow all the symbolism, colours, and vocabulary, you understand the subtle political subtext of the movie, which is bold in a scenario where habitats of dissent are destroyed and ransacked.
What’s more impressive about Empuraan is that despite its dense plot, it serves as a standalone film. While it is still a sequel to Lucifer, it just takes the plot to a new dimension where the stakes are humongous. Two narratives unfold simultaneously. One is about the local problem in Kerala, which requires the return of Stephen, and the second one deals with an international conflict between two crime syndicates. Prithviraj and Murali Gopy manage to find a common point to merge the two narratives, which feels a bit forced. However, the direction and the writing do convince you and buy into the plot.
What works majorly for Empuraan is its heroic moments, and they are not just written for Mohanlal. The best heroic moment goes to Manju Warrier’s Priya, who becomes an unstoppable force in the film’s narrative. Empuraan has many such moments to keep you engaged, despite its long running time. The other strong point of the film is its aesthetics and style. Sujith Vaassudev’s cinematography, Deepak Dev’s effective original score, and Mohandas’s production design have together made a slick political thriller that is engrossing from start to finish.
However, what stands out at the end of the day is the writing that has gone into creating this mysterious character: Stephen Nedumpalley aka Lucifer aka Khureshi Abraham. The Lucifer trilogy, in essence, is a myth creation. Prithviraaj and Murali Gopy aim to create a character like Dark Knight, the necessary evil, a devil, who will fix things when angels fail to restore the balance of the universe. Stephen is the bad man who keeps the other bad men from getting inside. While there have been innumerable films that have explored this story of a man with a past, what makes Empuraan stand out is the political and religious subtext that’s scintillating. Be it the scene where Lucifer meets Govardhan (Indrajit) or the one where he meets the pastor, it leaves the viewer with goosebumps.
The trend of sequels and Pan-Indian movies left many heroes and directors to scale up their films to something bigger than they were. Such failures can mostly be attributed to a lack of giving depth to the hero, and Prithviraj has succeeded on that account as Lucifer has now become a convincing pop culture figure. The film ends with a glimpse into L3, which will finally reveal the origin of Lucifer, and one cannot wait to see the birth of this fallen angel.
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