There's nothing other than food that holds the world and keeps it going. Some of the best celluloid classics have had food sharing screen space with the main players, though its presence has been subtle. One such Malayalam offering was Sangeeth Sivan's 1992 runaway hit Yodha. The plot was set to bring in Keralites' all-time favourite snack, the round and yummy unniappam.
Cut to Thaiparambil Ashokan and Arasumoottil Appukkuttan, who lit up the silver like never before, with their larger than life on-screen antics. Mohanlal as Ashokan and Jagathy Sreekumar as Appukkuttan will go down in celluloid history as two villagers, sworn enemies, who ventured into the forbidden realms of Nepal’s Lama territory.
To Yodha's perennial popularity is the 'Padakali' song, a superhit then, to which the duo cavorted and in recent times caught the imagination of the hugely popular Orfeo band which set it as their violin cover.
With an amazing and unusual storyline, crisp dialogues, well-built suspense, adventure and some mysticism thrown in, the movie had Sasidharan Arattuvazhi, writing the story for which A R Rahman provided the original score and soundtrack.
Food takes prominence in the initial scenes, especially when the aimless Ashokan creeps into his house stealthily only to be served his meal by his long-suffering mother. She has already set aside his food in a steel plate.
Arch enemy Appukkuttan spends sleepless nights and days learning the ropes of chess so he can score over Ashokan. When he gets home, his mother gives him a glass of milk, all the while stirring the sugar in it. He downs it in one gulp and looks around with sheepish indignation. The sugar was yet to dissolve despite his mother's vigorous stirring.
How about one more glass son, this time with no sugar crystals to crunch, asks his mother, her voice loaded with sarcasm. Yes, says the loafer, but changes his mind as on a whim. He has business to attend to. He has to beat Ashokan black and blue. That’s his mission. So off he goes to the local toddy shop where he drowns his sorrow in arrack, for he suspects that the love of his life Damayanthi is cheating on him with Ashokan.
Meanwhile, Ashokan's mother decides to send her son to his uncle's home in Nepal. But Appukkuttan outsmarts him and lands in Nepal before Ashokan can touch down and gets his uncle to believe that he is Ashokan.
Ashokan finally lands in Nepal with a bagful of pickles and unniappams. But as ill luck would have it, he loses his purse and all cash. All that’s left is his bag with the unniappams. It was while heartily munching the savory that he gets to see the little egghead Rimpocha, whom he lovingly calls Unnikkuttan.
The plot thickens and the evil sorcerers who seek to kill the young Rimpoche, succeeds in blinding Mohanlal. He is looked after by a tribal clan, experts in tribal medicine. While serving his food, the old tribesman deftly moves away the pitcher of water from near Mohanlal.
But our blind hero who has already learnt the science of identifying objects by virtue of their movement, easily gets hold of his water.
The little Rimpoche who has been held captive by the evil forces, keeps himself alive by eating a special kind of leaf, one a day.
