Movie Review: Mom
by Rachit Gupta | Thu, Jul 6, 2017
Mom
Cast: Sridevi, Nawazuddin Siddiqui, Akshaye Khanna, Sajal Ali, Adnan Siddiqui, Abhimanyu Singh
Director: Ravi Udyawar
Quick take: Intense, taut and gratifying thriller
Rating: 3.5 stars
Mom is a film that excels in its cinematic moments. Its revenge based story is a little too familiar, but the treatment and the obsession with finer details make this thriller an engrossing experience. The film is peppered with strong dramatic moments that keep appearing every few minutes and each one leaves a lasting impact on the viewer. The core theme here is that of a mother, struggling to keep the relationship with her daughter alive. That intimate premise unfolds in a more familiar revenge story where an ordinary mother hatches an unlikely but murderous plot to bring vigilante justice to her daughter's rapists. Mom is a heavy duty, darkly dramatic film that doesn't mince its ideas. It's a story full of brutality and shock. The dramatic punches are what make this film such a gratifying experience.
Sridevi plays Devaki, a teacher and a doting mother. Her family looks picture perfect with husband Anand (Adnan Siddiqui) and two daughters Arya (Sajal Ali) and the young Pihu. Arya doesn't like to call Devaki, Mom. She addresses her step mother as simply Mam. Because Devaki is also her biology teacher. Devaki struggles to break into the good books of her teenage daughter. But she remains hopeful, resolute and positive. Things go haywire, when Arya is kidnapped at a party, gang raped in a car and then dumped to die in a gutter. The tragic series of event, create a massive stress on the mother-daughter relationship. While the mother weeps, wails and tears through your heart. The girl struggles to cope with her tragedy. She pushes the mother away even more, haunting the viewer and scaring them in the process. The first half of Mom crushes the viewers' spirit, deserting all hope and innocence, with clinical precision. Director Ravi Udyawar's treatment of the film is spectacular. The choice of back ground music, the unsettling camera movements, the sense of dread and despair is phenomenal. There's a lot of thought put into crafting each scene, each shot of Mom. Anay Goswami's cinematography and AR Rahman's haunting soundtrack amplify the emotions and the drama. The writing by Ravi Udyawar, Girish Kohli and Kona Venkat Rao is detailed and intelligent.
Mom is not an easy film to watch. The stark power of the first half is quite overwhelming. It's doesn't help when Sridevi acts out of her skin. Every time she trembles and cries, she draws the viewer in. Every emotion that's served up in Mom despair, suffering, frustration, anger etc comes forth with Sridevi's performance. Sajal Ali playing the distant daughter who suffers a horrible tragedy is great in maintaining the coldness of her character. The film also has Akshaye Khanna and Nawazuddin Siddiqui in supporting roles. Akshaye plays an honest and tough cop with great effect. But it's Nawazuddin's act as an eerie but cool private detective DK that steals the show. He's not there in every scene, but every time he shows up, Mom's entertainment value swells up. He handles the comedy, the drama and the heartbreak with ease. Scenes featuring both Sridevi and Nawaz are absolute delight to watch.
The biggest problem with the film is that the second half deviates from the dark and delicious themes of the first, to indulge in the revenge drama track. While the situations in the second half are written with perfect logic, they are bit lofty. The action and the suspense approach distracts from the much more powerful story of mother, daughter and a family slowly nursing itself out of tragedy. But that's how it plays out. The crucial moment in the climax though, makes it all worth the while. Mom is quite literally a thrill-a-minute ride. Its scenes are powerful and the best part is, the effort put in by the actors. Director Ravi Udyawar crafts an intense, taut and gratifying thriller. It's a must watch.
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