I would like u to share your views on malayali on this forum. -- rashmun.

the language is called malayalam; a person who speaks that language is called a malayalee or malayali.

although i am a native of kerala, i was raised in thamizh nadu; my best indian language is thamizh, and i only speak colloquial malayalam. we spoke in malayalam at home, and i was fluent in it. literary malayalam is a loftier version of it, and i don't know it. hence, i'm not the best person to answer your Qs, but will make an attempt.

"malayali speakers speak very fast..."

i don't think so. those who don't know malayalam may think so because of some unfamiliar and unique sounds, and the stringing together of words to form compound words.

"the tongue is twisted in a peculiar way..."

there's no twisting of the tongue at all. there are, of course, sounds that are more common in malayalam than in other languages. those sounds are produced in the usual way, for example, by: the placement of the tip, the flat, or the rear of the tongue, against various parts of the mouth or teeth, constricting or opening the throat, aspirating or not, and making the sound nasal or not.

here are some sounds that are common in malayalam, but not in thamizh: 'nga' (as in "manga" for mango, where the 'ng' is pronounced differently - much more softly - from that in thamizh; the tamilian will spell that word the same way in english, but the thamizh word is pronounced the way it would be read in english), 'gna,' (as in "vignanam," vigyan, i think, in hindi/sanskrit), 'La' (as in "veLLam" for water; the two 'l's in the word "malayaLam" are also different from each other), and the 'nna' (as in "nnamboodiri," and "nnalla" for good). these are only examples, not an exhaustive list. 

ask a friend to pronounce those words in malayalam for you. thamizh also has different letters to distinguish between sounds like the 'l' in "malar" for flower and the 'l' in "kuLir" for coldness, but in the spoken language, malayaLam appears to discriminate between these similar sounds more emphatically. 

of course, the greatest difference between malayalam and thamizh sounds lies in malayalam's free and even enthusiastic use, especially in literary malayaLam, of sanskrit sounds like "bha" and "dha" (as in "bhaaratham" or "bhaaradam" for india and the name "maadhavan"); thanizh does not use those sounds; it's "baaratham" and "maadavi" in thamizh.

i haven't talked about the sound 'zha' at all; it's unique to thamizh and malayalam, but doesn't distinguish the two languages from each other. that's the sound in "pazham" for fruit in both thamizh and malayalam, and the sound in (the word) "thamizh." the closest american (but NOT british) sound is that of the 'r' and the 'rr' when an american says "car," "error," and "farmer" (the american pronounces the last word as "fazhmzh")

"Is it really somehow different from the other dravidian languages?"

it is different, but it's closest to thamizh. as a speaker of both thamizh and malayalam, if i pay close attention and break words apart, i can understand some words in kannada, but not all, and fewer in telugu, but i can't understand an entire sentence. i can rationalize the meanings of more words in kannada and telugu if i think about them or discuss them "offline."

"is it more sanskritised than the other dravidian languages?"

definitely more so than thamizh, and quite likely, differently from telugu. i think malayalam uses more sanskrit sounds and many words with sanskrit roots, and telugu uses fewer sanskrit sounds, but many more words with sanskrit roots. i'm only guessing. i don't know enough about kannada to say even that.

"...whether hindi/hindustani is at least understood in the cities of Kerala..."

i have not lived in kerala, but have spent many summer vacations with my grandfather and uncles in kottayam, thiruvanandapuram (thiru + ananda + puram), ernakuLam, and munnar, and have many cousins who were raised and educated in karaLa. hindi/hindustani is not spoken in the cities of kerala, but more people understand bits of it than people do in thamizh nadu. that's because 90% of malayalees went to school, and 100% of those who went to school learnt hindi as a language. i can assure you that their pronunciation of hindi is awful, and they'd hesitate to speak it, but if your life were in danger, and they could help you by speaking to you in hindi, they'd speak it.

i suspect that the general attitude to hindi among kerala's students is that of pragmatic indifference, like that of a person who doesn't care for mathematics, but must demonstrate minimal proficiency in it to get a high school diploma, so that s/he go on with life.

btw, "malayalee" is probably a slightly anglicized version of "malayaLan" = mala + aaLu + an, where "mala" = hills or mountains, "aaLu" = person, people, or folks, and the suffix "an" = one who is, "wala" in hindi. thus, malayaLan = person from the hills (the western ghats).

flimflam

Rashmun:

                                                    

                                                                                  A typical Malayali Characterestic.

It is a fallacy to say that to speak Malayalam  one needs to twist one's tongue in a special way.  It is like saying that to satisfy a woman a man must have a penis more than 9 inches in length!  Pure myth !!  Beyond a three inch penis any thing extra in length is just a waste!!!  Because a woman cannot feel beyond two and a half inches from the surface of her vagina.  Stupid humans in their ignorance think by enlarging the size / length of their penis, they can satisfy a woman!!!  Trivial nonsense.  

Malayalam and not Malayali as a language :   Malayalam is thought to have developed from Proto - tamil and became heavily sanskritized during the 12th century CE and even to this day, the language gathers a large proportion of its vocabulary from Sanskrit.  

Hindi / Hindusthani is understood in all cities, towns, villages of Kerala, to the same extent as Malayalam is understood in all the Hindi /Hindusthani speaking belts of India. If it is a commercial proposition, then leave it to the Malayali, he will use his ingenuity to clinch the deal, Hindi or no Hindi. The average Malayali is least bothered about the purity of his mother tongue.  To him language is a method of communication, and if he can make you understand what he wants to convey,  I think he has succeeded in his mission.  All this "ende keralam",  "Kerala : God's own country" are gimmicks to make the unwary fall for something that is not there. 

Because of its close affinity with Sanskrit (Deva Basha) Malayalam is a difficult  language for  the average Indian including the Tamilians, Telugus, Kannadigas and of course the North Indians.  A thickened tongue with months of white coating, is most unsuitable, for speaking this language.  Hence we inculcate the habit of cleaning the tongue, with an Earkkal Kutchchi (tongue cleaner) right from our very young age. 

Yes, we speak fast because we think quicker.  Generally, we do not have to laboriously marshal our thoughts to answer queries.  Perhaps you would not have forgotten  V.K.Krishna Menon. 

                                                                  

                                                  Nehru with V.K. Krishna Menon and G.B. Pant (centre). New Delhi, 1958. 

                                                        

                                         The Tea-Fed Tiger : Nehru valued Menon highly as a friend, confidant 
                                              and traveling apostle. He admired his provocative intelligence.    

Regards. 
Rajaputhran.