Kingston Movie Review: GV Prakash's sea adventure drowns in the curse of a complicated and convoluted storyline

2/5

Kingston Movie Plot:

The coast of Thoovathur has been banned from fishing, despite a hamlet living by the coast whose main source of income is from the sea. Rumour has it that the sea is cursed and the fishermen who venture out into the waters are never to return. Kingston (GV Prakash) is a part of the fisherfolks, who is the handyman of Thomas (Sabumon Abdusamad), the kingpin of the smuggling trade of the region. Things get complicated when Kingston gets to know that he is used to smuggling drugs instead of sea cucumbers, and decides to venture out into the haunted sea himself, only to unearth dark secrets of the past.

Also read: Director Kamal Prakash Interview: Kingston is completely a rooted story 

Kingston Movie Review:

The title card of Kingston, a film touted to be India’s first sea fantasy adventure film, comes right in place of the interval card. Be it for a creative choice or not, it feels only logically correct because for a film which has been marketed as first of its kind, the element of sea fantasy horror only kicks in the second half. It marks the first disappointment from Kingston, for those who thought the genre would be explored right from the start.

Since the beginning, there is a lot going on in Kingston, a film which shuttles back and forth the timeline to tell the story of Thoovathur’s fishing community that is banned from fishing. Thanks to the cursed waters, which is said to be haunted by monsters, fishermen are asked not to venture out into the sea. In parallel, we see hero Kingston, a morally grey character who works for the local kingpin, smuggle sea cucumbers until one day when he discovers the truth and it changes his life. There is also the belief of a locked-up coffin buried in the sea, haunting the waters and treasure of gold lying somewhere in the depths. For most parts, the film travels in a non-linear screenplay which already has a lot going on. This is further complicated when the narration is too quick and one hardly can register the story before it moves to the other. Another point that makes Kingston a weak film is its character establishment. Right from the beginning, we are given cues on what we could see in the aftermath, and dialogues are peppered to hint us, but these breadcrumbs are not enough to set right what the disjoined and convoluted screenplay has to offer. The play between Kingston’s grandfather’s Solomon (Chetan Kadambi) and Stephen Bose (Azhagam Perumal) in the flashback, and who is right and wrong, feels amateurish and needed more fleshed-out writing.

Also read: Kingston teaser OUT: GV Prakash headlines a swashbuckling sea fantasy; release date revealed

For a specific genre-based film like Kingston, it is confused right from the writing stages. The film has set its ambitions high and flying, but the efforts put into the writing seem less. Kingston wants to take a rooted story, and make it into a fantasy adventure, but the film fails to capitalise on both fronts. Neither is the rootedness explored, nor the genre. The second half, which might thrill you, for its zombie-like creatures, and jump scares, does the bare minimum to make the film work. Had the film taken one of its strands, either the gold treasure, or sea ghosts and zombies, Kingston could have gone somewhere.

The lead characters of Kingston also seem to be half-baked. We don’t really understand the moralities of Kingston who can do anything for money, and his relationship with Rose (Divya Bharathi) does not add any value to the story. The presence of ghoulish creatures in the second half, too, seems to be added for merely being loyal to the advertised genre, but nothing else.

Kingston is grand in its visual, but yet does not stand out. For a film that is supposed to happen in the middle of sea, and have intriguing set pieces, not one is memorable. Even as the art direction is commendable, the film had a bad basement to begin with, due credit to its weak writing.

Kingston Movie Verdict:

With its convoluted screenplay and no breathing space for character development, Kingston is a half-baked attempt to make a first-of-its-kind genre film. You will be in for a disappointment if you had thought Kingston would be genre loyal for its entirety. Even as the film has angles that might have worked, the writing feels less explored, making Kingston a washed-out attempt.