Warning: This blogpost may contain SPOILERS.
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When I made my way into grade 8 at Majeediyya School in Maldives' capital island Male', I chose an Arts stream class which taught Fisheries Science, for the sheer reason that I am personally interested in fish, and because the grade 10 class had an "experience trip" to Felivaru island in the northern Lhaviyani Atoll where we can observe the works of tuna processing at the factory's cannery.
What captured my imagination on this visit was been allowed into the spacious cold storage room with its freezing temperatures. We couldn't stay inside the freezer for more than a few minutes. As I, belonging to an eternally tropical country, had never been to a cold country at the time, I wondered whether this is how winter is felt in the polar regions of our planet.
Which brings me to this interesting and engaging Bollywood film released last year, based on a true story, of how an employee, the eponymous "Mili", of a restaurant in a plush mall, accidentally gets stuck in a freezer!
Promoted as a "mystery thriller", director Mathukutty Xavier raises the stakes by initially twisting and turning the plot points to make it appear that her (played by Janhvi Kapoor) chances of survival are thin.
I will leave it to visitors to wonder whether Mili miraculously survives or not after spending close to 5 hours in confinement in the freezer.
But let me give a hint: she always had a smile for the security guard of the mall, and he is the one who first suspects that Mili might still be “stuck” inside the mall as he clearly remembered Mili not going home that day because he missed her smile of acknowledgement.
Why I wanted to blog about this film now is because this week, Voice of Maldives, in the radio station's "Baajjaveri Hendhuneh" ("Good Morning") program, while not mentioning this film, referred to an anecdote where a security guard suspects that an "employee" is "stuck" in her workplace because he is sure she didn't go home as he did not witness her smile at the end of that day.
The presenters of Voice of Maldives were discussing this anecdote not to promote the film but to emphasize on the "power of a smile".
Interestingly, way before "Mili" was released, and way before Voice of Maldives caught on to this anecdote, I clearly remember Internet memes on this anecdote been circulated to stress on the importance of smiling.
Why I wanted to blog about this film now is because this week, Voice of Maldives, in the radio station's "Baajjaveri Hendhuneh" ("Good Morning") program, while not mentioning this film, referred to an anecdote where a security guard suspects that an "employee" is "stuck" in her workplace because he is sure she didn't go home as he did not witness her smile at the end of that day.
The presenters of Voice of Maldives were discussing this anecdote not to promote the film but to emphasize on the "power of a smile".
Interestingly, way before "Mili" was released, and way before Voice of Maldives caught on to this anecdote, I clearly remember Internet memes on this anecdote been circulated to stress on the importance of smiling.
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