Ken Karunas Youth, a Tamil-Telugu bilingual is releasing on 27 March 2026. The film is directed by Ken and let us see what it offered to movie lovers. The film's OTT rights are yet to be finalised.
Youth story revolves around a youngster and his experiences in love, relationships and breakups and how he evolves over the time. Praveen (Ken Karunas) right from his adolscence experiences various developments through his relationships at various stages.
Where this leads to and what role Preshika (Meenakshi Dinesh), Sonal (Priyadarshini Yadav) and Kanagavalli (Anishma Anilkumar) played and how his Dad Unnikrishnan (Suraj Venjaramoodu) and Mom Saroja (Devadarshini) reacts form the rest of the developments.
Ken Karunas is believable in the role. He looked natural and realistic with his performance. His timing suits the character well. Meenakshi Dinesh and Anishma did justice to their roles. Suraj Venjaramoodu and Devadarshini brought in their experience to come up with impactful performance. Others performed according their roles.
Youth story is penned by Ken Karunas. Right from the start the film has many relatable elements which made the audience connect to the film. While the first half had youthful elements, the second half is loaded with family emotions and drama. The film has a very thin story but fun and emotional elements worked in favour of the film.
Though the major part turns out to be ordinary the coming of age part with a shift towards emotion worked to an extent . Father and son part along with climax creates much needed impact.
Ken as director did not try to change the genre and experiment much from the known plot. He filled the scenes with known elements like childhood crushes, FLAMES, and tried to make it interesting to some extent. But few scenes turned out to be bodyshaming and this may not appeal to all.
The music of GV.Prakash is decent. The background music carries the youthful vibe. Vicki's cinematography is in sync with the film's story and according to the budgetary constraints. Nash's editing left many scenes unattended and it impacted the pace of the film. Couple of dialogues are ok. Production values are good.
Altogether, Youth turns out to be an out and out youthful yet emotional tale. Ken Karunas tried to blend both genex elements and family values and succeeded to an extent. However the predictable tone, flat narration, played the spoilsport. While the first half had fun and the second half had emotional elements which we don't usually expect from a film of this genre. Considering all these aspects, Cinejosh goes with a 2.25 rating for Youth.