‘Paranthu Po’ movie review: A gentle reflection on escaping the grind

It is a polaroid of characters a million Indian middle-class families could see themselves in — it’s about the dreams that have caged them to a lifestyle and environment, the ebbs and flows in the pursuit of those dreams, and the comfort in breaking out of the rut and seeing the world as an eight-year-old boy who knows how to climb mountains but not how to climb down. With a mystifyingly simple language and a tone that is casual and humorous, Paranthu Po is a striking departure from the perceived seriousness of Ram’s filmography. The writer-director manages to achieve a lot through an elegant premise and austere filmmaking.

The very first sequence encapsulates the essence of what follows. A drone shot and a song akin to a nursery rhyme take us to an upper-middle-class apartment in Chitlapakam, Chennai — the lyrics suggest how the house was built by encroaching over a lake, which becomes a pointed political commentary as well as a metaphor for the delicate footing over which working-class dreams are built. The apartment is home to the naughty eight-year-old Anbu (even his name means affection; child actor Mithul Ryan shoulders the film), whose hyperactivity and curiosity need all the attention of his parents. His father, Gokul (Shiva’s performance would make every middle-class father feel like an ‘Agila Ulaga Superstar’), owns an organic foods business, while his mother, Glory (we need Grace Antony in more Tamil comedies), is currently busy at her saree stall at an expo in Coimbatore, yearning to return to her haven.

Grace Antony in a still from ‘Paranthu Po’
| Photo Credit:
Special Arrangement

From afar, Anbu has almost everything a boy of his age would ask for: dotting parents who work hard to ensure he gets the best education; expensive toys, even a ‘crush’ who responds to his heart emojis! There are hints of how spoiled he is in his parents’ endless attempts to pacify him. From the way Gokul cuts the call from Anbu’s annoyed school teacher, or how he locks the gate whenever he leaves Anbu alone, or how the child casually speaks to a delivery agent delivering a peace offering pizza from his mother, there are signs that this is habitual in this household.

But this isn’t just the usual case of a child throwing tantrums. There’s an inexplicable restlessness in the child, which is what we and Anbu’s parents begin to understand more about when Gokul and Anbu (whose waveboard-riding mimics a bird flying) go on an improvised road trip to the suburbs, a journey that brings one too many surprises and colourful characters — like Emperor, an old man with an heart nobler than any king; Dharma The Great, a boy who climbs atop trees and makes bird calls; and Vanitha (Anjali), Glory’s long-lost ‘crush’ and her soft-spoken husband Gunashekhar (Aju Varghese). We also dream about going to Mars on a rocketship and wish for a dinosaur to come out of a duck egg.

Paranthu Po, as the title suggests, is a story about the need to fly away from the burden of dreams. It’s a gentle musical road comedy — a rarity in Tamil cinema — that makes you want to climb mountains, walk through a sunflower field, swim in a lake, or hold a duck’s egg in your hand.

Sequences move gradually in a linear fashion, and the information we need about their pasts is either told matter-of-factly or becomes pivotal subplots for characters, like how Glory’s family hasn’t spoken to her since she married someone from a different religion. A major strength of Paranthu Po is the gentle, deadpan comedy that leaves you in splits every five minutes. Allowing songs written in simple Tamil and English, like a catchy school-time poem, to accompany the narrative works like a charm. Moreover, nothing feels out of place, and the initial shots of the child playing with a tractor toy or donning a football jersey become hilarious details on reflection.

Shiva in a still from ‘Paranthu Po’
| Photo Credit:
Special Arrangement

The language Ram opts for has the appeal of those bedtime stories you could revisit at any age and always find a little more to love, cherish and think about. This is a film that acknowledges the bad in the world but urges you to look at the good and to expect kindness from fellow human beings. A tea-stall owner goes to great lengths to help a stranger. An auto driver is empathetic to the plight of a helpless woman. A father witnesses a painful but hilarious ‘no smoking’ campaign by his son. A poor old homeless man buys breakfast for his unlikely, richer guests. The kindness people put into the world finds a way of coming back to them.

This is, after all, a film that makes ‘Saathaaney’ (‘devil’) turn into a term of endearment. Ram does touch upon some worldly topics, including caste, religion and class, but as in the analogy he keeps mentioning in his interviews, these commentaries are like pebbles under a river, visible only to those who look for them.

In colloquial Tamil, ‘malai erittaan’ — which translates to ‘he scaled the mountain’ — refers to someone throwing a tantrum. Paranthu Po is a film about a child learning to climb down a mountain, literally and metaphorically, but it is also a story that urges us to fly away to the hills and to remember when we threw a tantrum every time life seemed unfair. Perhaps it is a romanticised perspective on life in the modern world, but there’s romance in listening to Ilaiyaraaja on an old tape recorder while sitting on a hilltop. Paranthu Po reminds us that life loses its magic when we can no longer dream of dinosaurs hatching from duck eggs.

Paranthu Po is currently running in theatres