Here are the reasons why Non-Malayalis loved ‘Goat Life’ more than Malayalis

Yes, you heard it right. I am not talking about box office figures. But the truth is, non-Malayalis appreciated 2024 survival drama film, The Goat Life (Aadujeevitham) more than Malayalis. Malayalam reviews were average to mixed, while other reviewers find it great, and they empathized more towards the character played by Prithvi. There is a special kind of liking from every corner, received a lot of praises and the movie listed among the top movies of the year. But that was not the case among Malayalam reviewers. Though not trolled as Pushpa sequel (Allu Arjun movie was a flop in Kerala), the movie didn’t garner that much positive reviews from regional language as expected. What could be the reason? The movie ran in theatres, that’s different, and needs another discussion.

Reason lies in the adaption of a popular novel to big screen

As everyone knows, the movie Aadujeevitham is an adaptation of the 2008 best-selling Malayalam novel Aadujeevitham by Benyamin. This single novel, based on the real-life story of Najeeb, a Malayali immigrant labourer in the Gulf, made Benyamin popular among the masses. This novel received Kerala Sahitya Akademi Award in 2009. Know more about him. Needless to say, ever since the novel was published, it’s one of the best-selling works from Malayalam. Majority of Malayali readers have read this novel. There lies the reason.

The problem is exactly like remaking an original film. When people already know the storyline, the makers really have to work hard to make a movie special. Otherwise the remake won’t work. That’s what happening in Bollywood nowadays. Ever since the novel Aadujeevitham was published, many editions have come out, thus making it one of the most popular novels of present times. So, people already know the storyline, even if they haven’t read it. They have been hearing it for more than 15 years. But that’s not the case of non-Malayalis. To add, Aadujeevitham share some striking similarities with Sreenivasan’s Malayalam movie, Arabikkatha released in 2007. So Malayalis are familiar with the premises.   

It’s not easy to transform all flavours of a book to celluloid

A book is not at all about story only. It’s about how the writing style hooks us to read without getting bored. Same thing happens in a film too; how a director manages us to keep us engaged, through storytelling, and both are different. It’s next to impossible to give exactly the same theatre experience (with commercial elements added) for any great work, when looking from a reader’s perspective. It’s not that easy to add all elements and flavours which readers love a lot. When we read a book, we fictionalize the scenes in our mind according to our imagination, while when we watch a film, the director takes us to his own creative world.

The movie is in spotlight in national media in the recent times only. So, when they hear about the storyline, it’s fresh, and something which is never made on Bollywood screen or other regional languages. When they know, it’s a real incident, it gives a spine-chilling experience too. To add, Prithviraj played his career best performance in this film, and the efforts he took to lose weight putting his life in risk is worth appreciating. Prithviraj already has a Pan Indian appeal and his work has been appreciated across the languages.   

Honestly, when I compare Blessy’s early works with Aadujeevitham, I couldn’t emotionally connect with the film. But Prithvi’s transformation, performance and makeup, and the premises where the movie was filmed, is just outstanding. That transformation scene, where he appears near to a skeleton, literally blew my mind. Hats off for that. He took a lot of efforts to pull that role. But still, when I think about Blessy’s movies like Kaazhcha, Thanmathra, Pranayam or even Palungu or Kalimannu, they are emotionally connecting to core, and some of their scenes are truly disturbing, and going to stay in our hearts forever. For me, Aadujeevitham is a mediocre film comparing his last works. As a viewer, I doubt if Goat Life is going to stay with me forever, except that transformation scene, which should purely go to Prithviraj’s credit, not Blessy’s. Background score by A. R. Rahman also didn’t work for me. But still, I liked the film though I can’t say, it’s a great film. The movie received numerous honours at state awards, including best direction and best male actor.

Though it’s Blessy’s dream project which he wanted to bring it to big screen since late-2000s, he has done 2 movies and one 48-hour documentary film, 100 Years of Chrysostom which received the Guinness World Record for the longest documentary in the world. So it’s a blatant lie that he has been solely working on this project for last 15 years.

Also read: Top 25 films of last 25 years.