Review: Dear Dad

Cast: Arvind Swamy, Himanshu Sharma
Director: Tanuj Bhramar
Rating: 3/5 ***

The burden of acceptance told through the complex relationship of a father and child, set in a realistic, relatable and humorous world. The movie is gentle and subtle, without any enforced emotions and remains light-hearted and protective, while building on a twist of fate. The best part, however, is the scenic locations and the journey.

The STORYLINE starts with a quirky scene of a young girl applying her mother's lipstick and moves quickly onto a typical morning in a household, where a nagging wife is shocked at the lazy jest between a father and daughter. Eventually, we find out that neither of the women is all that significant in the development of the remaining story and appear infrequently - as background reminders. The awkward father, with lipstick on his face, shares an awkward scene with his son, Shivam, informing him that he will be coming to drop the boy to his school - an overnight journey away.

Eventually, the father and the child rest to eat, where the child meets his apparent idol - a celebrity running away from the sets of his reality TV show. The child wishes to help the hitch-hiking celebrity who the father says is a stranger.

With a stop at the grandparents', the father (Swamy), confesses to his mute father that he is gay and tears up, in possibly his most believable scene of the movie. The scene also beautifully shows cross-generations of fatherhood and the complexity of parenting. The son (Sharma) overhears this conversation between his father and grandfather and decides not to acknowledge his father's confession. Being stuck with his father in the car, the child ignores and blocks out what he has just discovered. The journey continues through the scenic drive up to the boy's boarding school, silent and painful with montages of complex teen emotions and ideas of heteronormative homophobia. The father, in a bid to make amends notices that Shivam's celebrity and his idol is stranded once again and offers to take him into the car and drop him on the way.

The journey continues with Shivam continuing to think and be sullen while his father and the celebrity make small talk. In a moment of hopeful conversation, the child asks his father, "What about mom?" and discovers that his parents are going to get a divorce. Shivam reaches out to his friends who are also on their way to the school and asks if he could join them in their car.  

The father's car, uncomfortably, for all involved, reaches a bridge, with a traffic jam and passerby's inform them that there has been an accident. With no place to go and no immediate solution, the father books the last remaining hotel rooms for Shivam, Shivam's friends and the celebrity. Shivam attempts to run away leaving his friends, idol and father behind - only to come to a climactic argument with his father. The burst of emotions is portrayed wonderfully where Shivam tells his father to kill himself.

In the most bizarre and absurd seeking of solutions, Shivam confides in his best friend and the two children reach out to a witch-doctor who assures conversion therapy. The humourous sequence and the equally funny best friend lighten the mood of an otherwise downward spiral and a borderline preachy movie. The medicine meant to cure the father of his homosexuality backfires and the father gets loose motions with a terrible fever. Shivam goes away to school with his friends and informs his mother of that father's stomachache. 

The turn of heart comes for Shivam comes in this separation from his father. The father goes to meet his child at the school and they share a moment of bonding, following which, Shivam sheds his shame of being the son of a gay man, and their relationship is magically mended.

The PERFORMANCES are temporary with hints of complexity shown across the movie. Despite having fewer characters, the movie simmers and pauses at the expense of the acting performance.

Arvind Swamy plays Nitin, the father, and portrays the character with a very thick accent. His expressions show the character's pain and dilemma all through the movie but is portrayed with subtle emoting. Swamy relies on his eyes and often looks at the camera with lesser intensity than is required, this, however, aids in making his character look like the tired and worn-out father he is. There is a sense of the portrayal being one-note and in a constant dilemma. Swamy's dad-bod along with his salt-and-pepper add to making the character relatable and human. 

Himanshu Sharma plays Shivam and is easy to watch. His portrayal is as nuanced as a child actor could offer, oftentimes, stealing the scenes from the veteran older actors with him.

Aman Uppal as Aditya the idolized celebrity is interesting to watch and brings fresh energy into what could have been a temper tantrum. Uppal's portrayal is bubbly and superficial at worst and does little to offer to resonate with and as the audience perspective.

The most memorable performance apart from these are of Shivam's best friend and Bengali Baba (the witch-doctor), who bring the much-needed humour to this otherwise paced and indulgent movie.

The DIALOGUE is preachy and reiterates through every perspective and lens the theme of the movie. The dialogue is important and also takes away from the enjoyability of the movie.

The COSTUMES are stark and convey the upper-class identities of the characters. The colours of the movie and costume are complementary but not experimental, setting the story just as it may have occurred in India.

***

On the whole, Dear Dad is a journey-movie told without any particular point of view or judgment while being set against the interesting landscape of India. The complexities of parenthood, as opposed to the minefield of sexuality, are shown in stretched and continuously reminded moments of preaching. The movie needs a stronger dose of humour to be watchable without losing interest every few minutes. This is a slow movie that takes its time to convey a message that was evident all along. The beauty of the story comes out through the paced and slowly progressing relationship between father and son.