“Art should comfort the disturbed and disturb the comfortable,” said Jake Gyllenhaal during his Donnie Darko (2001) interview, and it is still relevant today as Chithha released this year.
Chithha is about a government employee (Siddharth) who takes care of his sister-in-law and her daughter (Sahasra) as his own after his brother’s passing away and how he gets trapped in sexual assault, finding his missing niece and how he gets out of it is the story. S.U. Arun Kumar directed Chithha to make the right sound about child abuse and not preach about parenting but rather make the parents rethink themselves.
In this film, we can see and empathize with the characters and feel the trauma and post-traumatic events. This movie also takes serious note of false sexual accusations, lethargic behavior of officials, and day-to-day abuses faced by women. That episode where Nimisha Sajayan reveals her trauma experience and where she says “Don’t make this her identity” when Siddharth rages for his revenge hits everyone hard.
As we reached out to people who watched the film, Vignesh said “This film disturbed me in every aspect and it was heart-wrenching when I happened to watch the traumatic experience of the victims”. This particular film is well received by the audience after it’s streamed on Hotstar because of its engaging content. And finally, this movie sends a strong message with the dialogue “Even if Chithha did it, you should tell me”.
– AkashKumar S