Jack N' Jill


Jack N' Jill is a 2022 Indian Malayalam-language science fiction comedy film directed by Santosh Sivan. It stars Manju Warrier, Kalidas Jayaram, Soubin Shahir, Shaylee Krishen, and Esther Anil in the lead role. The film marks cinematographer Santosh Sivan's directorial comeback in Malayalam cinema after nearly seven years. It was released in theatres on 20 May 2022. The film is partially reshot in Tamil under the title Centimeter with Yogi Babu replacing Soubin Shahir and was also released on the same day. It was a box office bomb. This movie was last movie of veteran actor Nedumudi Venu released after his death in October 2021.

Plot

Kesh is a young scientist who returned from abroad to his grandfather's ancestral home in Kerala after winning an award in AI Robotics. He, along with his colleague, a miniature robot named Kuttaps, and childhood friends, plans to complete his deceased father's dream project named 'Jack N' Jill' which would boost the human brain to its maximum level. They search for a test object who is suffering from a brain-related disease, like dementia/amnesia, and eventually abduct an elderly person. However, phase 1 of the project fails due to a mistake made by Kesh's friend. Afterward, they find Parvathy, another potential test subject, as she is mentally unstable due to post-traumatic amnesia. Kesh makes her their next test subject. They successfully complete phase 1 and 2 of the project. After phase 2, Parvathy regains her memories and develops some combat skills. The antagonists of the story are Stephen Tharakan and his son who want to establish a chemical factory, even though it would be detrimental to the environment. Stephen and his henchmen slaughter the entire family of Parvathy when her family tries to protect Aarthy, the daughter of Stephen Tharakan's deceased partner. Parvathy is injured badly during the incident and loses all her memories. Whether she avenges the death of her loved one forms the remainder of the story.

Soundtrack

The songs are composed by Jakes Bejoy, Gopi Sundar and Ram Surendar.
  • "Kim Kim" - Manju Warrier
  • "Angane" - Sithara
  • "Jack And Jill" - Jithin Raj
  • "Enganokke Enganokke" - Ram Surendar, Sree Nanda
  • "Annatha Pokki" - Kavya Ajit, Ram Surendar

Release

Theatrical

The film was released theatrically on 20 May 2022.

Home media

The digital rights of the film is acquired by Amazon Prime Video and started streaming on 17 June 2022.

Reception

Critical reception

The film received highly negative reviews from critics as well as the audience. S. R. Praveen of The Hindu stated "A bad advertisement for AI and cinema". Sanjith Sidhardhan of OTTplay gave 2 stars out of 5 and wrote "If Jack N' Jill was Santosh Sivan's attempt at making a quirky sci-fi film set against a village backdrop, it falls way off the mark with the screenplay all over the place. The actors look equally confused in this experimental film that fails to hold interest and gets bizarre as the story progresses.". Anjana George of The Times of India noted "There is violence, drugs and women assault, if not, this could have been a good children's film for the summer vacation." and gave 2.5 ratings out of 5.