Generative Artificial Intelligence has become so intertwined with our day-to-day lives that even calling out its use is now a question of privilege — come on, how many of us have time to add ‘-ai’ to Google searches? So, even if it feels hypocritical to speak about the environmental impact of AI data centres, using this technology in filmmaking is absolutely a choice. Even as films continue to be made with traditional methods and human-made CGI and VFX tools, the fear of AI taking over filmmaking looms large, with satirical reels visualising a future where AI-generated films will compete with human-made films. Now, before you worry that you have clicked the wrong link, this is the review of Yezhu Kadal Yezhu Malai,director Ram’s much-delayed chamber drama, in which the filmmaker has shockingly used AI extensively, so much so that there’s AI slop appearing in the frame almost every fifth minute throughout the first half.
Is there something else in the film worth discussing apart from its AI slop? Of course there is, but imagine the plight of the audience watching AI-generated videos run almost like a parallel narrative in a film that ironically speaks about how all lives are important and that all life forms deserve the kindness of humankind — how could an AI elephant or an AI rabbit inspire this message?
If this reads more like a rant than a review, it perhaps is. The irony in this predicament is that this film could have been a unique cinematic experience without any of these synthetic shots. In the film, a nameless immortal man (Nivin Pauly) living for 8000 years traps his fellow passenger, a nameless mortal (Soori), in an empty express train. This weird meeting between the two spirals into hysteria when the former begins talking about his millenniums-long life or the deeds he alleges the latter to have committed in his previous births; the descriptions in the dialogue and sound effects from those previous worlds he ventured into could have been allowed to fill our senses, except AI shots accompany them.
A still from ‘Yezhu Kadal Yezhu Malai’
| Photo Credit:
Special Arrangement
Even if one sets all the above aside, the rest of Yezhu Kadal Yezhu Malai still only resembles a Ram film, with the filmmaker strangely seeming less confident in his instincts. At its heart, this should have been a unique chamber drama with heavy philosophising and many anthropomorphic elements coming together to make a cinematic statement about human civilisation’s continuous lack of empathy.
Ram, through his immortal man, says that we have never truly learnt from our mistakes and that the children of this world, human and otherwise, have always suffered. But Ram strangely tries to commercialise the idea by infusing humour, possibly inspired by Soori’s casting, a former comedy actor who, ironically, has turned over a new leaf as a serious actor. If these moments of comedy, accentuated by jolly sound effects, click for you, there’s little else in this train journey that should displease you.
Yezhu Kadal Yezhu Malai (Tamil)
Director: Ram
Cast: Nivin Pauly, Soori, Anjali
Runtime: 136 minutes
Storyline: An immortal man in search of his long-lost soulmate traps a man in an express train and teaches him an invaluable lesson
For much of the film, the immortal man, the passenger, and a rat with a new litter get entangled in a repetitive cat-and-mouse game, with the passenger always learning his lesson the hard way. Nivin and Soori, two stars who recently gave two blockbuster films (Bethlehem Kudumba Unit and Mandaadi), give their all and keep you glued to the screen. Even the CGI rat shows so much emotion that it becomes a one-of-a-kind live-action character.
The film, however, is strongest when it moves away from this forever-running express train and shows how this immortal man is searching for a woman (Anjali, Ram’s frequent collaborator, is as impressive as ever) he believes is destined to be with him in all her births. The most recent crossing between them, which apparently happened twenty years ago at a seashore, shows glimpses of the Ram audiences adore. From shots of the immortal man running after her with a kerosene lamp on a breezy beachside road in the dead of night to something as simple as the woman embracing a mentally disabled man, there’s a lot that affects you.
A still from ‘Yezhu Kadal Yezhu Malai’
| Photo Credit:
Special Arrangement
This eternal love story, however, ends prematurely, and the rest of the film feels as emotionally distant as the AI elephant that often appears in one of the flashback sequences. The very concept of an immortal man with millennia of wisdom meeting a modern-day mortal has enough storytelling potential to birth a franchise. But Yezhu Kadal Yezhu Mazhai leaves you wanting more from this mythical hero. An unnecessary fight sequence, a sudden twist featuring a young boy, and an ambiguous ending close what is Ram’s weakest, most emotionally distant feature film yet. In the midst of all this, there’s a compelling Ram film somewhere, but one wonders if the cost of searching for it is two hours of a mortal audience’s time.
That said, Ram admirers would be pleased to know that, chronologically, Ram directed his much-acclaimed Paranthu Po after Yezhu Kadal Yezhu Mazhai. So, recollecting the breeze and petrichor in that film’s frames, and how excellently the filmmaker executed humour, suggests that we might be seeing, through a fatefully inverted lens, a filmmaker’s redemption after a misstep. After all, how could Ram, a filmmaker whose school of filmmaking is known for earthy frames, abandon his ideals and make AI slop?
Yezhu Kadal Yezhu Malai is currently running in theatres
Published – October 01, 2026 10:35 pm IST
