Farhana (film)

Farhana is a 2023 Indian Tamil-language thriller drama film written and directed by Nelson Venkatesan and produced by S. R. Prakash Babu and S. R. Prabhu of Dream Warrior Pictures. The film stars Aishwarya Rajesh and Selvaraghavan. The music for the film was composed by Justin Prabhakaran.

The film was released on 12 May 2023.

Plot
The story revolves around Farhana, a middle class woman who is living with her father and her husband Kareem. Farhana is always in need of money as the shoe shop, which her father and Kareem are running, is short of money.

As she is in need of money, one of the seniors of Farhana's friend, calls her for an interview at a bank call centre. Farhana who is reluctant at first, later clears the interview and goes to the job, because of which she gets a lot of money. So she decides to keep it further until her youngest infant, Nabha, gets hospitalized because of her health condition, which causes a lot of money.

Now, Farhana is in need of money when she notices her friend, Nithya, getting a lot of incentives when she recently shifted her department. Farhana requests her to put her also in that department to which Nithya assigns her a name, 'ISHA', in a friendship chat center. But people there, talk in a lewd and inappropriate manner, which causes a lot of mental pressure and disgust for her.

As she is about to quit, a random person talks to her in a sympathetic and sweet manner. Since nobody has ever talked to Farhana like that, she feels overwhelmed and reciprocates his energy and talks back in the same way. Soon they both strike and talk to each other almost everyday. This causes a feeling in both of them. Later he also confesses his name to be 'Dhayalan'. So Farhana started to fall for him. But one day, he stopped calling her which caused a lot of confusion in Farhana.

Later, as this became a concern, Farhana confessed her feelings when he started calling her. He too tells her that they would meet immediately the next day, but Farhana refuses as it was Eid the next day. But yet she decides to meet him but goes back when she comes to know that her friend and colleague, Sofia, died because she did like this too, but unlike Farhana, she gets killed when in an instance with her boyfriend, whom she met in the call, accidentally kills her. So Farhana, feeling hurt, decides to stop talking to Dhayalan, thinking about Sofia.

This wreaks havoc in her life as Dhayalan starts to torture Farhana to love him and marry him, by blackmailing her that he would send all their recorded calls to Kareem. A fed up Farhana decides to fight back and find him. With the support of Nithya and her colleague, Prithvi (who has a crush on Farhana), she locates Dhayalan and finds him, but that becomes a failure too.

A failed Farhana finally confesses everything to Kareem, to which Kareem understands and tells her that he loves her so much that he cannot tolerate that she cheated him (later when Farhana goes to meet Dhayalan, Kareem sees her and follows her). Farhana who feels hurt, hugs Kareem and says that she has to end this as soon as possible, to which Kareem tells that he will support her at any cost.

They both plan to make Farhana go to Dhayalan's house. But when she goes there, she finds out that Dhayalan faced a lot of humiliation when he mistakes a girl to be Isha and then gets slapped by the girl. He also tells her that he loved her more than anything else, but before he could speak any further, Kareem and the Police arrive just in time and arrest Dhayalan.

Farhana, later joins her previous job and feels satiated.

Production
Dialogues of the movie is written by Manushyaputhran and the writers Sankar Dass and Ranjith Ravindran have worked along with Nelson Venkatesan in the screenplay. The cinematography of the film was done by Gokul Benoy, and the editing of the film was done by V. J. Sabu Joseph. This film is the third collaboration between the director Nelson Venkatesan, editor V. J. Sabu Joseph, music composer Justin Prabhakaran, and cinematographer Gokul Benoy after the films Oru Naal Koothu and Monster. The first look poster for the film was released on 5 October 2022. Farhana movie is censored in CBFC as U/A, the teaser of the movie is released on 22 April 2023.

Music
The soundtrack of the film was composed by Justin Prabhakaran in his third collaboration with the director.

Controversy
After the Trailer released film has been surrounded by controversy and demands for a ban. The producers of film S. R. Prabhu, Dream Warrior Pictures, issued a statement that read, "Farhana movie is for all fans: Not against any religion or sentiments".

Release
Initially, the film was scheduled to release on 26 January 2023, but it was postponed, and it was released on 12 May 2023.

Digital rights have been bought by Sony Liv.

Reception
Gopinath Rajendran critic of The Hindu wrote that "Macroscopically, Farhana is an extremely simple and straightforward story. But it’s the treatment and performances from its cherry-picked cast that make the film deserve a place on a higher pedestal." Logesh Balachandran critic of The Times of India gave 3 stars out of 5 and stated that "While Farhana may encounter occasional pacing issues, it ultimately soars, showcasing its strengths". Kalyani Pandiyan S critic of Hindustan Times wrote that "On the one hand, the credibility of the scenes conveys that this is happening to a member of the Islamic family, and on the other hand, Justin's music conveys it perfectly. The climax where Farhana finally meets him gives the film an incomplete feel. Farhana would have tasted great success if she had handled the space a little better". Anusha Sundar critic of Cinema Express rated 3 stars out of 5 and wrote that "Farhana lacks due to tepid stretches".