Guruvayoor Ambalanadayil

Although some of the humor in the movie is slapstick or references to viral reels and class movies, the movie mostly evokes genuine comedy. It starts off quite well with a captivating plot and good writing but gets predictable once the plot points fall in place. Prithviraj and Basil are at their comedic bests. Basil excels in such roles where he comes across as a realistic character we meet in our daily lives. He may be naive at heart but is no way overtly pure or innocent. Prithviraj as Anandan feels like a character we have seen him play before and pulls it of with ease. Anaswara and Nikhila play their roles well if you exclude some of over and under acting respectively. Nikhila in particular has very few lines and comes across as stoic despite having a major role in the movies plot. This is not her fault as the character development is lacking for all characters.

Despite some subpar writing and forgettable songs,"Guruvayoor Ambalanadayil" is a good family watch for the weekend.

Watched the movie yesterday,the movie is ok.l don't know why people are giving soo much of hype for these movies nowadays. First half of movie,is more entertaining than the second half. There are many funny moments in the film initially with Basil and Prithviraj combo. But as the story progresses,there was some ....lag or logic missing in the movie. The character played by prithviraj could have been more entertaining if it was played by actors like Nivin pauly or soubin, who could handle comedy easily. People expect heroic roles from actor like Prithviraj. The is nothing special about the role played by Yogibabu. Compared to other Basil movies like Janagana mana and falimy,this movie is little bit ...low. The movie is just ' A one time watch'.

Movie focused on entertainment and comedy - but is not perfect or even close to perfect interms of logical consistency, profound story. Message or even screenplay - but was enjoyable nonetheless!

The movie is focused pretty much on the hot and cold bromance and relationship between Prithviraj and Basil - at the cost of the side characters. In a comedy, this could be forgiven - though felt many stellar actors are wasted due to this - mainly Nikila (who apart for a brief window towards to end) was a mute spectator, similarly Jagadeesh, Baiju etc.

The cameo by Yogibabu though was funny - but for those familiar with his Tamil movies would find it pretty flat and un-original - there are 10s if not 100s of films were he has done the same (expression, dialogues, actions all pretty much the same)

The main problem I had was the below average music - none of the songs made any lasting impressions. After watching movie I could not even recollect a single song from the movie !

Guruvayoorambala Nadayil follows the path of so many great 90s family comedy movies of Malayalam and updated it for the new generation. The bRomance between Basil's and Prithviraj's characters is truly the highlight of the movie. When Basil says "Ente Aanandhettan" that's better than all the romantic movies I've seen recently. The comedy of errors in the last act wasn't perfect but it had enough things going on well, that it worked really great. Guruvayoor in Malayalam cinema couldn't be mentioned without Nandhanam and that part was really nicely executed. Non-Malayalis who started watching Malayalam films recently would totally get confused by some of the things at the end.

The Guruvayoor sets were incredible. If I didn't know it was a set, I would've believed it was the real temple where I've visited so many times. Seeing places near Guruvayoor that I know very well was nice too.

I wasn't really impressed with the songs but the way they were visualized was nice. The really sad thing is how underutilized the female characters are when there is space for them to do things. Both Anaswara and Nikhila could have done way more in so many scenes that felt unfinished. Especially Nikhila Vimal is wasted with showing such potential for the character with that intro and plot points. That intro she got was really awesome and a fan inside me was ready to watch her do something but alas, she got to do nothing. It felt like there might have been more that was shot but they couldn't really coherently put it together, so opted to sideline them instead.

But despite all the flaws it had, it was an entertainer from start to finish in a purely Malayali way. Having a houseful responsive audience really do help with these types of films.

I watched Aavesham just before watching this movie, so half my review might be rant on that garbage-fest (Aavesham) - hence I apologize for sounding elitist beforehand. But I consider being able to be especially good at detecting subtlety in humour a great quality in a person and I adore comedy movies that try to engage that subtlety-detection radar... and add in a nice dose of sarcasm and satire for good measure.

This, while not perfect by any means, is a far better movie than that crapfest "Aavesham", and while I see the raving reviews for that crapfest, I don't find the same enthusiasm in the reviews for this movie, which in my opinion, had genuine charm and humour. I re-emphasize my earlier apology for sounding elitist, but it is what it is. Aavesham was crap, this is not. This is an actual good movie.

Prithviraj was great, but Basil is a star. He can make you laugh with the silliest of expressions. The supporting cast did a good job too, and so did the screenwriter and dialogue writer, setting up all those nice little scenes. Of course, it ain't perfect, but it did its job, and made me chuckle, laugh, and feel good.