Through striking and heart-wrenching performances, Sathyan personifies an era in Malayalam cinema and Kerala history – one on the cusp of nationalist and socialist hopes on the one side and a colonial and feudal lineage; one awakening from the shackles of the past and looking to a new era of hope and independence, nation-building and idealism.
Born in 1912, in Sathyanesan, Thiruvananthapuram (Renamed Sathyan by producer-director P. Subramanyam) had been through several avatars before he met his destiny in the cinema: he was a clerk in the Records Office, a teacher in the college, a Subedar Major and commissioned officer in the British Army (he fought against the Japanese), a sub-inspector of police in Alappuzha, the epicentre of Communist uprising, and a theatre actor right from his school days. Read more