Family Star movie review: Vijay Deverakonda and Mrunal Thakur star in a movie that underlines how fragile a male ego is

Director: Parasuram

Cast: Vijay Deverakonda, Mrunal Thakur

It takes about 45 minutes into Family Star for me to come to the conclusion that the film is not going to be a winner for me. You see, one of the most basics when it comes to making a romantic-comedy or a dramedy is to pace the film right. This is done during screenplay to ensure the film doesn’t drag, and somehow it felt like the team behind Family Star skipped on this exercise altogether. I understand setting up the milieu that the protagonists are set in, but this runs for so long that we cannot wait for the plot to kick in. The plot is simple. Govardhan ( Vijay Deverakonda ) is a young man from a middle-class background who seems to be the breadwinner of his joint family. This results in him tightening the purse strings, enough to seem ridiculous to an extent. Do you think fueling up for Rs 23 is possible in this day and age? Govardhan shows it is. He uses the most random tactics to save on petrol, on dosa batter, among other things. For each instance that establishes that this man is a miser, I lost in the film that fast.

To paint a middle-class person as being untowardly stingy seemed tone-deaf. Majority of the Indian population lead this life, and somehow, I do not see comedy here. At least, it was not sketched well. If running to ensure that you can queue up in time to buy onions when the inflation is high seems funny to you, I guess you have never gone around running for essentials at such times, and you may deem this criticism as being a tad bit oversensitive, but to be fair, I only got upset because this theme repeated for the most part of the first half of the film. So despite my attempt to move on from this observation, the filmmaker repeatedly rubbed in my face, enough for me to call it out at the very beginning of the review.

Now, Imagine I go on and one about the flaws and absence of nuance in the film without explicitly expressing why I disliked Family Star… Wouldn’t that be mildly irritating? You would want to switch the webpage and choose to read something that has more clarity. Watching Family Star, I felt something similar. The urge to switch the channel, so to speak, was extremely high. Govardhan has put his personal life in the back burner to ensure that he can first stabilise the situation in his family. For this very reason, he opts out of a job that seeks to send him to the US, with ample financial support and freedom. When everything seems bleak, and there seems no romantic way out for our hero, Indu (Mrunal Thakur) enters his life and shows him that “not all women” seek a nuclear family.

While I understand the concept of a young man being responsible enough to take care of his family, what I do not understand is the reason to draw this parallel where woman who want to court Govardhan are unfairly painted as selfish for wanting a nuclear family. Sure, joint family may not be for everyone, but putting the onus on the female partner in a relationship to sacrifice their requirements, and desires to fit the male partner spells disaster as this will turn out to be a household where there is no equality. Of course, if the woman is willing to cater to the requirements of this boy, it would be a different ball game. This kind of woman will be Govardhan’s respite, and how fortunate that Indu is just such a woman? Not only is she willing to be a part of this joint family, but she is also willing to “take care” of Govardhan, while he takes care of his family. From the very beginning, it is a one-way street between Govardhan and Indu. Sure, he has a crush on her. Yet, everything that brings her closer to him involves how she is around his family.

From being suspicious of her intentions when she gets close to his family members to wooing her, it doesn’t take much for Govardhan to fall in love with Indu. Alas, his doubts are proven right when he learns that she did have other intentions while getting close to his family. Now, this is where all hell breaks lose, and Govardhan’s ego is hurt. It is so fragile that he refuses to even let the girl that he claimed to love speak in defence of her decision. Somehow, his ego takes precedence here, and it is even “understandable”. Indu continues to allow him to mistreat her, while also continuing to pursue a relationship with him. If the film had a tad bit more nuance to explore between Govardhan and Indu, we may have understood the reasoning behind her decision. However, in Family Star, this just seems like a girl walking blindly towards a walking-talking red flag with stars in her eyes.

In what I found to be the most frustrating dialogues (there are many though), Govardhan tells Indu that taking care of another person means to understand despite misunderstandings rising between them among other things. It is a call back to how Indu had claimed that she would take care of him. He puts the onus completely on her to be the caring, understanding and loving partner. So what will he do in the meanwhile? Act like his whole world has ended because someone deemed it important enough to study his family dynamics and its relation to financial status. Parasuram’s previous outing, Geetha Govindan had its fair share of problems, but it was entertaining to an extent. Family Star, however, has been nothing but a cringe-fest that takes the moral high ground to tell women that men like Govardhan are not just worth your respect for doing the basics of taking on the responsibility of being present for his family, but also deserve your worship. After all, he goes out to buy onions, and presses clothes at home. This is supposedly a huge win for feminism and equality in household. What this is instead is a sloppy attempt at romantic comedy where the majority of moments belonged to singing praises of a man who has done the basic — take care of his family.

Rating: 1.5 (out of 5 stars)

Family Star is playing in cinemas near you

Priyanka Sundar is a film journalist who covers films and series of different languages with a special focus on identity and gender politics.