WITH LOVE MOVIE REVIEW
Cast: Abishan Jeevinth, Anaswara Rajan, Kavya Anil, Sacchin Nachiappan, Harish Kumar, RJ Ananthi, Saravanan
Director: Madhan
Rating: 3.5/5
Tracking down an old school crush to confess what you never said sounds like either the most romantic idea in the world or a restraining order waiting to happen. With Love splits the difference.
Sathya (Abishan Jeevinth) and Monisha (Anaswara Rajan) meet through an arranged marriage setup and quickly discover they went to the same school in Trichy. Old crushes come up. Regrets follow. Monisha, being the bolder of the two, proposes they track down their respective school flames and say what they never could. It’s the kind of idea that sounds romantic over coffee and slightly unhinged by the time you’re actually on the road looking for someone you haven’t spoken to in years.
The school flashbacks are where debutant director Madhan’s film really comes alive. Both leads get fully developed backstories, and neither feels like an accessory to the other. Sathya’s teenage infatuation has the right mix of goofiness and earnestness, while Monisha’s flashback lands with more emotional weight than expected. The film gets that school love stories aren’t just cute preamble, they’re the actual foundation. Kavya Anil, as Sathya’s school crush, brings warmth and dignity to a role that lesser films would’ve reduced to a plot device.
Where things wobble is the present-day half. The leap from “we literally just met” to “let’s go on this emotionally loaded quest together” needs more runway than the script provides. Some arcs resolve too neatly, and you can feel the screenplay ironing out wrinkles that would’ve been more interesting left alone. The arranged-marriage-to-love-story track works in broad strokes but doesn’t quite nail why these two click beyond shared nostalgia.
Anaswara Rajan is the engine. She has that effortless quality where even undercooked moments feel alive because of what she brings. Her Tamil debut as a lead is convincing and then some: expressive without being loud, charming without trying. Abishan Jeevinth has natural likeability and delivers his best work in the quieter, more emotional stretches, though he occasionally overshoots the quirky energy. When he pulls back, the performance clicks. Together, they sell a chemistry the writing only partly earns.
Sean Roldan’s soundtrack does steady, reliable work. The Yuvan Shankar Raja-sung number is a nice touch that the film earns contextually rather than as stunt casting.
With Love runs a familiar playbook. The second half could’ve used a trim, and a few emotional beats land softer than intended. But Madhan shows real command over tone, treats his characters with genuine respect, and gives both leads room to breathe in a genre that rarely bothers. For a debut, the instincts are sound and the heart is where it should be.