Amazon Prime Video released ‘Kuruthi‘ last week, which stars Prithviraj and Roshan Matthew in lead roles. The film managed to get a lot of love from critics and Amazon subscribers alike for the film’s premise, story, overall acting. While the likes of Prithviraj and Mamukkoya was praised for their acting in this movie, Roshan Mathew too had a brilliant, yet understated performance. His on-screen performance on the small screen is not surprising as this is not his maiden direct-to-OTT outing.
Roshan Matthew has been a part of three direct-to-OTT releases so far – ‘C U Soon’, ‘Choked’ and the aforementioned ‘Kuruthi’. Many of you may have forgotten, the first “hit” direct-to-OTT Malayalam film, ‘C U Soon’ had another film lead besides Fahadh Faasil and that actor was Roshan. He also starred in the Anurag Kashyap drama, ‘Choked’, which ended up releasing directly for streaming on Netflix. While ‘Choked’ couldn’t reach its full potential, Roshan Matthew’s performance was praised. With these three films, Roshan Matthew joins the ranks of Fahadh Faasil and Urvashi, as another Malayalam actor who has been a part of three (or more) direct-to-OTT films. Not a bad company to be in.
The actor has also acted in two other Malayalam films which got a quick OTT release after its theatrical premiere – ‘Varthamanam’ and ‘Aanum Pennum’. While the latter of the two didn’t do as well in theatres or on OTT, the former among the two films was praised by critics, particularly for the performances of the two lead characters. His performance in the former was noted to be good as well.
His performances in these OTT streaming features have shown that the actor has range, and his acting “translates well” between the two forms of media. All the five movies mentioned have been about a social issue of some kind or other, and the actor has managed to give us a varied yet nuanced performance in each of his roles. We look forward to his next movie and hope that we will get another direct-to-OTT release soon.