Keedam movie review: Suspenseful but simplistic tech thriller scores by overturning the man-as-protector trope 

Language: Malayalam  Keedam is a thriller about a tech expert punishing the men who harassed her on her cellphone, it is also more than that. Initially, Radhika Balan (Rajisha Vijayan) is painfully ethical in her use of technology. The turning point in Keedam is her decision to go after her stalkers outside the framework of the law. But the film’s defining scene that sets it apart from others in its genre is the one in which her father, Balan (Sreenivasan), tells her in a voice limp with fear that he is afraid, and she reacts to this revelation.   It is unusual for a prominent male character in a commercial Indian film to confess to being vulnerable, more so to a daughter, and for such a man to not be derided by the tone of the film. Unlike male protagonists in similar situations with women they love, Radhika does not become a roaring lion who single-handedly vanquishes gangs and armies. Nor does she conform to Indian cinema’s ‘strong woman’ trope by metamorphosing into a Kali/Durga/Chandi-like raging figure who is the absolute opposite of the more dominant cinematic cliché: women who hang around waiting for men to save them. What we get instead in Keedam is a real woman. She loves her father, is capable of and intent on taking care of herself and him, makes mistakes that normal people do in such circumstances but is not indifferent to the dangers she faces.   Writer-director Rahul Riji Nair’s Keedam is proof that men can write tough women without resorting to stereotypes.

Keedam is centred around the bright, hard-working, independent-minded Radhika who runs a tech start-up. She shares a home with her father who is a retired and respected lawyer. Her furious reaction to a lascivious caller one day angers the fellow so much that he begins hounding her. He is a hardened criminal, and she a cyber security professional. A battle follows in which he resorts to physical aggression that she counters with her knowledge of technology.   What does a predator do when his potential prey turns on him? The keedam (pest) of the title is not who you might assume it is at first glance.   The film works on many fronts. The technical language used and the processes followed are neither indecipherable nor apparently dumbed down, but sound plausible to an inexpert ear. The scenes unveiling the gravity of the threat to Radhika are chilling. The narrative trots along with new developments coming at us at a steady pace. An extended chase and fight scene involving the police and gangsters is played to sound design more realistic than the usual biff-bang-dishoom-dishoom that action thrillers rely on and stunt choreography more believable than the standard larger-than-life fare.   Radhika’s somewhat risky behaviour at a certain point is not glorified or (with her gender in mind) viewed through a judgemental lens. Her conduct is depicted as a natural progression of responses to a challenging scenario, the sort of foolhardiness brave people sometimes exhibit.

Keedam is, wisely, not prescriptive on the question of technology-driven vigilante justice. It just shows what it shows and offers a cautionary note from Balan about possible misuse.

The film comes up short though by avoiding taking his point further. Though Radhika and the police in Keedam are well-intentioned, we know that the powers that be worldwide have been making a mockery of citizens’ privacy by misusing surveillance techniques, but the film stays away from addressing these complexities and their disastrous effects.   [caption id=“attachment_10715821” align=“alignnone” width=“641”] Rajisha Vijayan in a still from the film[/caption] Where Keedam scores is with Radhika’s easygoing equation with her father in their democratic home. She is protective towards him but not overbearing. He is anxious about her future and her safety in the present, but does not use his concern as an excuse to control and curb her. There has been a small crop of rather nicely written father-daughter relationships coming from star-led Malayalam cinema in recent years featuring ambitious women and a single parent: Parvathy and Siddique in _Uyare_ , Anna Ben and Lal in _Helen_ , and now, this. Sreenivasan really kills it as a worried parent in Keedam, especially with that stand-out heart-wrenching scene in which Balan confides in Radhika. Rajisha never once strays from her pitch as a feisty genius who is not, however, Wonder Woman. Violence against women, online harassment and its offline perils are recurring topics in Rahul Riji Nair’s works. Nair debuted with the excellent Ottamuri Velicham (The Light in the Room, 2017) about a physically abusive husband and a timid new bride in a sparsely inhabited, high-altitude countryside. His Kalla Nottam (The False Eye, 2019) was about illegal surveillance, voyeurs and self-appointed moral police.   While Keedam makes for interesting viewing, it does not match up to Nair’s maiden venture. Part of the reason is an absence of the rootedness he once captured so well. In Ottamuri Velicham, the smell of the pure mountain air and the soil of that treacherous landscape almost wafted off the screen. In Keedam, he seems to be striving for an Anyplace Everyplace feel, which is rarely a good thing.     This aim is underlined by the inexplicable use of Hindi lines in the film’s soundtrack. . The choice of language has no contextual relevance, and has the effect of dragging Keedam down into a sort of cultural limbo. Malayalam filmmakers need to stop unthinkingly shoving Hindi and English lines into their scripts and songs. (For more on that, click _here_ and _here_ .) In this and other ways, Keedam does not live up to its promise. Still, the overall narrative flow, the acting, the timeliness of the socially important premise and the consistent centrality of Radhika in the plot even while other characters are given sufficient space and substance make it worthwhile. In an impressive supporting cast, watch out for Renjit Shekar Nair who played the sweet, simple village school employee with a bobbing head in _Kho Kho_ , and for this film has transformed himself into a menacing, physically intimidating villain. His role in Keedam could easily have been over-done and hammed, but there’s a line he is careful not to cross. Tech-based films are not common in Malayalam, but like 2021’s Operation Java, Keedam too seems at home with its chosen subject. The thriller aspect keeps the film going, but what helps it rise above the simplistic take on its theme is the heartening manner in which it re-imagines the representation of the father-daughter bond and overturns cinema’s man-as-protector trope.     Rating: 2.75 (out of 5 stars)  This review was first published when Keedam was released in theatres in May 2022. The film is now streaming on Zee5. 

Anna M.M. Vetticad is an award-winning journalist and author of The Adventures of an Intrepid Film Critic. She specialises in the intersection of cinema with feminist and other socio-political concerns. Twitter: @annavetticad, Instagram: @annammvetticad, Facebook: AnnaMMVetticadOfficial  Read all the  **_Latest News_** _,_  **_Trending News_** _,_  **_Cricket News_** _,_  **_Bollywood News_** _,_  **_India News_**  and  **_Entertainment News_**  here. Follow us on  Facebook_,_  Twitter and  Instagram_._