‘96: Of Nostalgia, Missed Opportunities, Sound of Memories and K. Ramachandran's Closure

Johannes Hofer, a Swiss medical student in his 1688 thesis coined the term 'Nostalgia' and categorized it as a form of disease, which according to his research is driven by a form of pain which a person might feel, when they are far away from their home, or through a fear, driven by the belief that they might never be able to cherish that feeling of comfort of being in home. With time, Nostalgia evolved into something more layered and complex, from a disease, that it was earlier believed to be, it turned out to be more of a fundamental emotional state, additionally bringing several other feelings with it. It's like that vehicle which drives us away from confined space of reality and time, and take us into that zone with which our subconscious mind is so closely associated with. When the nostalgic stimulation hits the right nerve, it is often accompanied by loneliness, stubbornness, feeling of detachment with the world, and most probably meaninglessness.

When I think Nostalgia, the instant reaction that comes in my mind is how extensive its functions are in our life, at some point we may feel our life has become ordinary and mundane, at that point, nostalgia serves the purpose of providing us with a clear perspective of our existence, that much required direction is what it provides, leading us to understand life through a larger context. This context is basically us understanding or rather I should say treating life as a collection of moments crafted in a long narrative, once we start to understand this aspect, what comes next is fairly easy realization on our ends, that once there were certain crucial moments, and those became important part of our lives, and continued to remain intact in that narrative, and nostalgia takes us back into those moments. The other side of the coin, which functions almost similar to nostalgia is 'anticipation', both these entities needs to calibrated delicately in order for a more well clear narrative, one takes us into ethereal times, while the other serves to gives hope that the moments that are to come by in the near future will be of love and happiness, or as per our desires, that hope is what helps in difficult times. That feeling of sweet sadness in our hearts is what nostalgia is all about, the amalgamation of sadness arising from the loss of something very crucial, be it a person or the moments spent with that person, and a hope in the form of a feeling of contentment of being able to be in those moments. 

In the first scene of the song 'The Life of Ram' we see our protagonist, K. Ramachandran (Ram) jump into an ocean to capture the life under water, this is just a simple straightforward thought that very smartly establishes what we are going to witness throughout the film. Ram (Vijay Sethupathi) will be given an opportunity to jump into his ocean of memories, but before we are taken directly into his memories, we are introduced with the character through a beautifully narrated song, that lays the foundation for the protagonist for us to connect with him on a certain emotional level, his mental state is what is shown in the song, the song is staged in such a manner that on the first viewing it might primarily look as a song to let us get familiar with his lifestyle and his occupation, but it feels like a deceptively staged move on the director's part to let us try and understand Ram more closely rather than the life of Ram.

'96 (2018) is a Tamil film written and directed by C. Prem Kumar. The IMBD synopsis of the film goes like this "Two high school sweethearts meet at a reunion after 22 years and reminisce about their past over the course of an evening" It is somewhat accurate, but in some ways, after watching the film, it doesn't do justice to the broad experience it gave me, the experience is too abstract and difficult to capture in words, and that is when I decided to write a long post about this endearing and heartwarming film. It's certainly about 'Their' reminisce, but somewhere it's slightly more about Ram going back to his native place, and rediscovering those old, unforgettable memories which for years, he has kept very safely close to his heart. The film is about an opportunity that is being thrown to K. Ramachandran and Janaki 'Jaanu' Devi (Trisha Krishnan) to sit and ponder about the missed chance that they have lost over the course of their life of not ending up together. Both the central characters forms a crucial part of the narrative, but the narrative feels more diverted towards the perspective of Ram, who hasn't found his closure in life, and hence this aspect of the film finds a mention on the title of this post.

Ram is a travel photographer, he travels throughout the country on exotic locations, the song 'Life of Ram' starts our journey to know him more closely, the song is shot in spectacular fashion by Mahendran Jayaraju, and N. Shanmuga Sundaram, but apart from the visually aesthetic images, the more important thing that has been given major importance is to establish the psyche of the character and the theme of the film with subtle hints of how he perceives life. Ram is seen roaming inside Jungle, trying to find those perfect frame which he could capture and later on define, as we proceed further, we see him traveling ahead in his journey, water getting removed from the windshield of his car giving a more clear picture of Ram, thus signifying how he is lost between the world of his memories and real world. We see him traveling in water, feeling lost, but always in search of his perfect frames.

Water, Desert, Mountains, Jungle, Sandstorm, Waterfall, Monumental Locations, these places constitute the entire life of Ram, and how he finds moments in these places to be captured in his camera. The seashore he stands around indicates the level of how deep he has stored those memories of school inside him and how desperately he wants to immerse himself into those memories, yet he doesn’t, he just stands at the edge between the two worlds, the real one and the one he has created for himself, the burning sensation he feels in the hot sand of a desert brings him back to face the reality of his present life, he faces a sandstorm all alone, highlighting how tough it has been for him to reach at this point of time in life where he always fights alone, he finds a moment of solace under a water fall, and keeps looking at the Sun with an optimistic view, perhaps somewhere, searching for a light of hope that he knows he needs, but is unable to locate. He is seen driving his car in a desert, he finds a certain euphoria in driving his car and creating impressions of a loop, it's such a beautifully captured moment, he yells, and when we see him come out of his car, and gets a moment of peace, the loop is almost parallel to his present mental state that he is constantly wondering around (the memories from his school days). He moves from one city to another, finds simple moments and captures them with his own rationale that makes them appear extraordinary. At one point, he is walking with his baggage, alongside the Kolkata's hand driven rickshaw puller, Director C. Prem Kumar clearly tells us that Ram has been carrying an emotional baggage with himself for years, and he still continues to do so, both literally and in a metaphorical sense. Similarly, he lifts a heavy stone from the edge of the river, and tosses it into the river, he wish he could just lift the heavy baggage of his memories, and toss them somewhere deep in his heart. There is no stopping Ram and his life, he may catch a moment of pause, but the world around him is constantly moving ahead, that what drives Ram to get out of that pause mode, and go ahead with his life, a perfect example to prove this assumption of mine is one shot, where Ram is quietly sitting near a river, and it's raining, comes a boy from behind and makes a big jump straight into the river, that clearly points out the pattern in which Ram leads his life.

It's quite ironic that Ram's profession was written as a travel photographer, I mean we are knowing a man's story who appears to be so lost and out of focus in his present life and regularly travels back to his past life, and yet despite these qualities he teaches young kids about finding the right focus to capture a photograph, and continuously travels to different places, I found this aspect of '96 very clever, a man who is so out of ‘focus’ in his own life is teaching young kids to find perfect focus in an artistic sense, I agree that these two situations are entirely independent from one another, but I just need to admire the beauty of this irony. He tells his students that photography is that rare form of art where one can actually freeze time, another big hint here is that Ram's definition of photography feels so close to his idea of love that he shared with Jaanu, those moments he spent in the school are not present in a physical form via a photograph (except one group photograph), but somewhere the negatives of those memories are still kept intact in his mind. It might not be entirely a wrong idea to assume that Ram choose to be a photographer solely because of this reason.

A YouTube user by the name M. Sathis Kumar has compiled the list of places Ram visits in the song

We observe a sudden change in Ram's behavior as he approaches his native place, it's almost as if he has been waiting to come back home, he tells his student, to feel the air of the dawn, and experience the utter joy from it, obviously she cannot relate so easily with Ram's excitement, that euphoric tone with which he starts describing about each of the important locations of the city resonates a childlike response from Ram, who till that point in the film had been quite formal with all the people around him.

Ram's entry into the school is one of the most endearing and heartwarming sequences I saw on the big screen in 2018, He opens the gates of All Saints Matriculation Higher Secondary School, and as he enters, there is a phenomenal background score that illustrates his anxiety, happiness and nostalgia. Notice how smartly the director has avoided the usual rush in the school, almost giving a feeling that the emptiness in the corridors and the playground of the school were anticipating the return of K. Ramachandran. The freedom in his walk, him feeling the texture of chalk powder assimilated around the notice board, recalling his name from the roll of honor board, where he was a winner in High Jump and Short Put, him listening to the sound of the school bell, it still sounded pretty much same to him, he quench his thirst for the water of his native place by drinking the tap water from the school, now this is where the magic of '96 lies, recall the song 'Life of Ram' on two occasions we observe am unusual thirst from Ram, one inside the Jungle where water from his Bottle is finished, and yet he isn't satisfied, and the other scene where he opens his mouth, and anticipate that the rain water might satisfy his thirst, but when he drinks water from his school, one can sense that fulfillment of missing satisfaction. The athlete who left the school has grown old, and when he visits his classroom, there are two specific benches he goes toward, Jaanu’s seat and his own, from where he used to see her.

The screenplay then takes back in the past when Ram and Jaanu were school friends, The young Ram is played so brilliantly by Aadithya Baaskar and the Young Jaanu played  so confidently by Gouri G. Kishan. Ram is shy and anxious to talk to Jaanu that even a mere physical closeness with her increases his heartbeats and results in him fainting away. The affair between the two is kept simple and sweet, the emotional attachment I felt as a viewer is simply driven through the straightforwardness of their connection, Ram is in awe whenever Jaanu sings, and constantly requests her indirectly to sing a song "By the banks of River Yamuna (Yamunai Aatrile)" from 'Thalapathi', which she never agree to sing, only because she wants Ram to request her personally, and not through anyone else. Their connection ends abruptly when after the vacation, in a new class, when everyone is answering their regular attendance, Ram is not seen, Jaanu is left all alone when she comes to know that Ram has left the town and the school, she is devastated because she didn't get a proper goodbye from Ram. Her longing for Ram continues in college also, she then decides to pack her emotions in a bottle and move ahead in life. It is in these scenes that Gouri G. Kishan steals the show, and for a moment makes the film and the story all about herself and her desperation to see Ram. She infuses confidence of being in an indirect relationship and sadness of separation with great maturity, easily making her performance one of the highlights of the film.

A reunion of the batch from 96 is planned through a WhatsApp group, and Ram, who although appears excited about the prospect, does somewhere expects to see Jaanu, and the moment he hears her name, that introvert Ram turns into the shy teenager Ram, and when Jaanu, finally arrives at the reunion, and one can feel that her presence is marked by a soulful background score, and C. Prem Kumar holds the delicate moment very carefully, it's over two decades, since Jaanu saw Ram, the image of Ram in her mind is still the one with White Shirt and Blue trousers, just standing away at a certain distance, again not able to express what he feels for her, and this is reason when Jaanu meets Ram, for a brief period we imagine Ram from her perspective. In my opinion, that few seconds of Jaanu imagining Ram as the same guy who requested her to sing Yamunai Aatrile is one of the best cinematic moment from an Indian film in 2018. Ram might have changed physically, but the dynamics between them hasn't changed even a bit, Ram's heartbeats keeps on increasing, and when she tries to feel those heartbeats again after all these years of separation, he faints, yet again. One can say that the director is repeating the scenes, and argument can be given that when Ram and Jaanu meet, the moment should have been more dramatic, but it's not, and C. Prem Kumar doesn't even try to make it loud, and that holds a key here, because as Ram has kept her memories safely guarded with himself, the moment, which is meant to be special is very intelligently changed into something which feels very real and personal.

Another important aspect that deserves a discussion is the two important supporting casts, which acts as catalysts as well as anti-catalysts of sorts in the love story of Ram and Jaanu. Murali (Bagwathy Perumal) and Subhashini (Devdarshini) play the this unusual friends who try to bring Ram and Jaanu together yet keep them apart, and almost every time both of them reminds these couple about their individual realities. I say Anti-catalyst because they are aware of the fact that it's too late for both of them to get back together. They are the voice of Ram when he is unable to express his feelings. I got a feeling that throughout the reunion event, both Murali and Subhashini acted as Guardians for bunch of nostalgia hungry adults, who might be bored from their life, and wants to get fresh air of their beautiful memories, they are ones who made sure apart from drowning in their memories, the mirror of reality and present time is kept moving around in front of Ram and Jaanu. 

There are numerous points in the film, where the director takes Ram's eating and sleeping habits and juxtaposes them with the longing he feels in his life for Jaanu. In the introduction song, we see Ram eating all alone in a restaurant, and once out in wild forest we see him trying to grasp a fruit out of a tree, and when he is tired from his constant traveling, he finds a space near the trunk of a tree and get some sleep, now later on in the reunion event, when Ram brings Jaanu a well cleaned plate of food, and after eating a bit, she offers the food to him and insist him to eat, the camera slows down for a bit, and as Ram takes the first bit, it's a high point of the film, because Ram was tired of eating alone, he wanted to share his food with someone, that moment of sharing food with Jaanu brings him an internal satisfaction, later on when Jaanu cooks him dinner, he tells her that the taste reminded him of his mother's food, which leads Jaanu to throw a slight smile, that smile is a valid proof of what she thinks about the present day Ram, he later sleeps on the floor with utmost calm, perhaps that short nap is the deepest he might have slept in years.

I feel the most captivating part about the film is how C. Prem Kumar and Editor R. Govindaraj constructs a long solid narrative, I can imagine a lot of people complaining about the film to be boring, and dull at times, but here is the thing, once Ram and Jaanu decides to spend more time together, what follows is plain conversations, the high point or the dramatic peak so to speak that we have been made so accustomed to see on the big screen have totally made us the forget the beauty of a long, uncomplicated narrative that simply relies on the unspoken conversation between two people, the nuances of the actions between two people, how the camera moves during those conversations. Jaanu tells Ram that how she waited for him to come back, and how she felt his presence most of the time, and when Ram starts speaking to her how he believed that she refused to come and meet her, there was a moment where I believed that this could lead to a dramatic end, but this is where the film won me as a viewer, C. Prem Kumar kept on giving the characters a reality check, that it's too late now, all they could do is talk and ponder over about "What if" scenario. It could have been a totally peculiar end, where he could have given these two characters a colorful shape, but he decides to not do so, and kept it real. ‘96 represent that “What if” moments/phenomenon of our lives through the story of Ram and Jaanu. No one is wrong, nor they are right in anyway, it's plain sad illustration of destiny that they were not meant to be together. When Jaanu starts singing inside Ram's apartment, while he is searching for a torch, and as soon as he hears her sing, that chaos, and panic mode he switches into, that's another poignant moment of the film which made me realize the beauty of relying on simple things to drive your character in a story. Also, notice the names of the lead characters, Ram and Janaki, feels a strong mythological association with Ramayana.  

It's quite interesting how Ram's sexuality is represented in the film, I believe that all these years of loneliness had made him sexually dormant, when one of Ram's students tells Jaanu how strict he is with them that he doesn't even allow them to wear sleeveless dress, and when Jaanu inquires to him about his virginity, that further gives me a more strong reason to believe this. I haven't seen such a honest and pure character written for the male protagonist in recent times, and the reason I felt this is because he how often we see our lead "Hero" show his back to the camera, he doesn't want to be in the center of the frame all the time, he wants to be left alone with his own thoughts, He can take 'No' for an answer, considering the times we live in, that quality is on the top of the list to make him a desirable man. 

For a film that starts with life of an individual and slowly morphs into thinking over "What If" between two people, I was quite impressed with the soundtrack of the film and the way it was used as a strong supporting aid to build the narrative, Govind Vasantha's music is therapeutic in every sense, the high moment in a romantic film is usually placed through a dramatic climax, or by letting the people in the story reach their point of catharsis, but how does one lead to a high point in a film like '96, C. Prem Kumar and Govind Vasantha's soundtrack helps in building that high point in the narrative, instead of giving the moment on screen a dramatic touch, the sound is given that artistic liberty to have a pause and when no is expecting, burst out all the emotions, it wouldn't be wrong to say that the music of the film might have been composed keeping in the mind a thought that how would memories and Nostalgia sound. I still don't understand a word that's been sung, but its music about love and language cannot restrict it from conveying its meaning. Kalyani Menon's version of "Kaathalae Kaathalae" is that kind of song which initially seduces you with its tune, but later on captures your mind with feelings behind the lyrics. “The life of Ram” feels sad, despite the visually pleasing cinematography, because the sound is conveying the lost frame of Ram’s mind, yet during the end portion of the song, when after a slight pause, Ram continues his journey, the sound is really up there for us to feel the longing to belong to someone in Ram’s heart, but even with that burden, he goes ahead with his work. My favorite song from the album is "Anthaathi", the song which I feel is the song of nostalgia, and it’s the kind of song that fills the tiny little gap between feeling sad about the old time and hopeful that you might just be able to relive those moments again in life. The modern beats representing the modern times which has meteorically changed the meaning of love and romance, yet the song retains the charm of old school romance when “Kaathalae Kaathalae” is brought into it, the fusion of both these themes gives a beautiful outcome.

The relationship between Ram and Jaanu is like a love song composed by IIaiyaraaja, which instantly grabs your attention, an A.R. Rahman soundtrack, which will grow exponentially with time in your subconscious mind, a Mani Ratnam film, which no matter how many times you come across in life, it will give you a new aspect to discover each time you watch it again without any motives, a perfect frame captured from the lens of P.C. Sreeram, which will convey a thousand words through a still image.

Love constitute different meanings to people, each one in their own world will surely come up with an accurate definition of their own, it's a feeling that will be contradictory, hypocritical, beyond one's mind, full of hypothetical scenarios and conversations that if you are lucky enough will occur in real life too, it is something that is too hard to explain, but that's how it is, and that's how it gives us a sense of purpose in our lives. Ram is still living with that incompleteness in his life, Jaanu also feels that emotional void, but she has moved into a cosmopolitan culture of Singapore, she tells Ram that most woman would love to have a guy like him, she feels guilty when she learns that Ram is still alone, I wonder how marriage can be regarded as the proof of a person moving on over someone they once had feelings for, but C. Prem Kumar doesn't let his characters take cinematic liberties and construct a false notion of lost love, he stays honest with his subject, he holds a sense of respect for both of these individuals and their respective personalities, rather than giving them false hope to be together, he gives them a platform through a realm of silence, and leaves them in their own privacy. Perhaps Ram is destined to live in that incompleteness, and longing, his closure comes in an alternative form, when he gets to spend some time with Jaanu, I don't think he will ever be able to move on in his life, because if he had to, he wouldn't be waiting for this long. Just notice the difference in the color of clothes that both Ram and Jaanu wear throughout the film, it also reflects a major character trait of their individual personalities, Ram is seen in mostly dull color clothes throughout the movie, whereas Jaanu is seen in bright yellow color dress, the colors are truly symbolic of their specific points in life, her being in a more optimistic, stable, whereas him being in those dull colors mirrored a thought that he is just getting along with each day of life as it brings new challenges. When she wears Ram's clothes, for a brief period we see her in dark shades, I could totally relate to her emotional outbursts towards the climax once I realized this point, because for that brief period she might have felt how colorless Ram’s life has become and worst part of this whole situation is that she cannot bring those colors back in his life. 

The film does not have a quintessential climax to be honest, it's just that at one particular point, C. Prem Kumar leaves you with a moment in which Ram seems to have accepted his incompleteness which actually appears quite thoughtful, because Ram gets his moments with Jaanu, and the time in those moments will stay in his memory forever, similar to the ones he has been capturing in all of his photographs. '96 is a film, which deserves our time and attention solely because C. Prem Kumar crafts a magic show with his strong narrative of unfulfilled love, he makes an actor like Vijay Sethupathi who is so versatile with his choices of roles blush so genuinely which is so rare to be found in films, and in those moments of him feeling shy, the pure cinematic joy of ’96 is felt.