Director Rojin Thomas’s Malayalam film #Home is an impressive case study. While it tells the story of a slightly dysfunctional family, the film cleverly masquerades as a neglected father’s tale while slyly guilt-tripping his children. In the early 2000s, Sheela-Jayaram starrer Manasinakkare managed a similar feat, but the Sathyan Anthikad film was neither as dexterous nor as crafty. It painted a black-and-white picture of evil children and an affectionate, loud mother. In 2021, when we are plagued by a pandemic, smartphones and social media, Thomas chronicles a similar family setup. Somehow, its loyalties are oddly partial to the elderly leading man, Oliver Twist (Indrans).
#Home is not necessarily a bad film. Its writing introduces several characters you might recognize from your own family. Thomas’s filmmaking is on point, but his writing soon becomes manipulative. The primary setting – a beautiful house surrounded by lush greenery – exudes the coolness of Kerala’s rain-kissed landscapes and the warmth of an intimate family. That said, the film startled me with the way it designs a one-dimensional trajectory: the father is eulogized to a near-godly stature, while his filmmaker son Antony (Sreenath Bhasi), despite his obvious shortcomings, is excessively villainized.
Indrans’ Oliver is named after Oliver Twist, as his father used to work as a typist translating Western literary works. His siblings are named Peter Pan and Mary Poppins. Given how naming systems work in Kerala, this peculiarity didn’t surprise me. From an everyman’s point of view, however, Oliver’s uniqueness ends with his name. He once ran a VHS library that eventually went defunct. The family’s expenses were largely managed by his wife Kuttiyamma (Manju Pillai), a nurse. In Antony’s eyes, the extraordinary one is his to-be father-in-law, Joseph Lopez (Srikant Murali), an achiever who recently penned an autobiography. Antony looks up to the man for reasons best known to him.
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Oliver, in turn, looks up to Antony, whose debut film was a superhit and bagged the Kerala State Film Award. To him, Antony is a reflection of everything he couldn’t be, someone who’s left a mark in the world and might go on to have a biography that exceeds a page. Antony is constantly connected with his girlfriend Priya (Deepa Thomas). The toxicity in their relationship is so glaring that it affects his creativity. The film, instead of addressing its problematic facets, spends time emphasizing how the man had neglected his parents.
Understandably, Antony is an adult with a different mindset. Oliver is sensitive and communicative, whereas Antony is brash and does not believe in reciprocating through words. In the bargain, Oliver begins to feel undervalued. In a key scene, Antony mocks him for leading what he calls a “listless life.” He is rude, and his sibling Charles (Naslen K. Gafoor) points it out. But, as we know, Antony is not the hero of this story – Oliver is. The old man is aided by Rahul Subrahmanian’s unimaginably melodramatic original score. You could practically play a drinking game with the number of times a manipulative tune erupts along with Indrans’s close-ups begging for sympathy.
On the surface, Oliver broadly represents fathers of his generation. His niceness can often be misread as interference. He is technologically challenged and tends to suppress his emotions. But #Home childishly exposes some of his deficiencies. The prime twist occurs when he visits a film set and meets superstar Vishal (Anoop Menon) – an incident that nearly jeopardizes Antony’s career. While one cannot wholly blame the father, the incident makes you wonder how simple their lives might have been with better communication. Hypothetically, #Home is that film where a character pleads, “Please listen to me,” only to be yelled at, “No, I don’t want to hear anything.”
Piqued by his son’s question about what made his life extraordinary, Oliver recounts an episode from his past. Antony scoffs at it. I enjoyed the sepia-toned flashback despite its excessive sugar quotient. However, the chapter nosedives in the final act with a jarring Katha Parayumbol-style déjà vu moment. The film then shifts to emotional blackmail in the most brazen way possible. This isn’t a spoiler, but yes—the son eventually learns a lesson (groan!).
Among the bits I did appreciate are some of the secondary characters. Manju Pillai plays Kuttiyamma with fantastic flair, and Naslen K. Gafoor is a mega hoot as the disobedient yet affectionate younger son. Anoop Menon is sweet in a special appearance, as is Johny Antony as Oliver’s best friend, Suryan. I liked how Rojin Thomas designed Suryan’s family dynamic, his daughters address Oliver as “Papa” out of respect, and he has a say in their household decisions. The reverse isn’t true; Oliver’s sons are formal, almost indifferent, toward Suryan. The hypochondriac old man doesn’t notice or care. There’s also a formal lesson on mental health, introduced via Dr. Franklin (Vijay Babu) – a caricature of Mohanlal’s Dr. Sunny from Manichitrathazhu. The episode is dull and adds unnecessary length to a film that takes an eternity to make a small point.
To be clear, I do not doubt the leads (Indrans, Bhasi) and their nuanced performances. It’s just that the screenplay unintentionally exposes the cracks in their character designs. #Home refuses to address what it ideally should—the need for open conversations, or the toxicity in a romantic relationship. I get the film’s good intentions when it critiques smartphone addiction, but the real issue here isn’t as simplistic. Rojin Thomas (whose debut film, Philips and the Monkey Pen was decent fun) breaks no new ground as a writer or director. #Home, intentionally or otherwise, exists in a similar make-belief universe but succeeds only in polarizing us with faulty intergenerational politics.
Rating: ★★ 1/2
#Home premiered on Amazon Prime Video.
