On the other hand, most of the second half is crass humour about impotence. The film wants to show us that pre-marital sex is common, but it can’t resist making a big giggly deal out of it. So, they move to their car, parked in the lot in their building. He gets pissed one day when Subbu’s friends come home and he can’t have sex in the house. Darling can’t stop thinking about it nor talking about it. Speaking of the male sexual organ, Bachelor makes a big deal of the sex. In absolutely no time, the film turns into a dick-measuring contest between Darling and her brother-in-law. He snatches her phone and uses information in it against her because Darling once told him off. When Darling and his coterie are not discussing what Subbu should do, her brother-in-law is. So much so that in a film about heterosexual relationships, sexual health, living in, pregnancy, abortion and domestic violence law, we only hear men talk - every single one of them making excuses for him. It wants us to feel bad for the asshole and empathise with him. But, in choosing the point of view that it does, Bachelor is hellbent on showing Darling as the poor misguided child. Even when his Coimbatore accent feels off, he is believable as the small-town boy overwhelmed by the big city’s ways. To his credit, G V Prakash Kumar does a convincing job as Darling, his selfishness and lust sparkling in his eyes.
She gets no backstory, her family is one-dimensional, her emotional journey is unexplored. In contrast, we barely see, hear or understand anything about Subbu. It is so sympathetic of the abuser that there are long lingering scenes showing his plight, while he is the one making everyone’s life miserable. The cinematographer, Theni Eswar, is generous with slow-motion shots, building him up as the hero, while Sidhu Kumar’s background score pumps up adrenaline further. There are barely any frames where we don’t see Darling, so many of them showing him making a puppy face. It is stuck in a Stockholm syndrome with its protagonist. In that, the film knows and understands that Darling is an abusive, arrogant and selfish chap. The biggest problem with Bachelor is that it is self-aware. At the end of a film that lasted nearly three hours, we leave wondering what just hit us.
They get proof, Subbu withdraws the case and shows him the middle finger, literally. The aforementioned dozen men go around all of Chennai and Pondicherry to prove his impotence (or erectile dysfunction, I couldn’t tell). To save himself, Darling claims impotency. The case gets serious, Darling’s entire family is thrown in disarray - his sister, mother and brother are remanded to custody. Her brother-in-law is a criminal lawyer, who foists a domestic violence case on Darling and his family, faking documents to prove their marriage. She leaves the city and goes back to Chennai, to her sister’s house. His friends come to his rescue, trying to talk Subbu into abortion because “his family will be heartbroken.” A row ensues. Darling wants her to abort that very instant. In a Visu film-level imaginative twist, he makes her kanji, she is attracted to him and they have sex. He even makes an elaborate ruse to buy a condom and everything. He lives in perpetual hope of sleeping with her. He manipulates a friend - who is also Subbu’s flatmate - to take him in as her flatmate. One day, he meets Subbu at a friend’s party and falls in lust with her. He is an arrogant, careless, irresponsible drunk, who shows no respect for his friends, who give him physical and emotional space in their lives. The film begins with a painstakingly detailed introduction of Darling. īachelor is the story of a dozen or so men, who get their panties in a twist trying to force an unassuming young woman to abort her twins. If you’re wondering what kind of silly person will make coconut barfi for a hungry woman recovering from sickness, you will soon realise that it is the least worrying of the myriad questions you’ll have after watching Sathish Selvakumar’s debut film Bachelor. Darling gives her an all-knowing smirk, walks into the kitchen and starts grating a plateful of coconut. She asks him to make her something to eat.
Prakash Kumar) that she is tired from sickness and hospital visits. About an hour into the film, Subbu (Divyabharathi) tells Darling (G.