Gulmohar

A two hour movie, on the final four days of the Batra family living in their 31-year-old family home, is all encompassing, covering aspects like family values, relations, class discrimination, hereditary diseases, LBTGS, family disputes, generation gap, festivals, home, religion, love, hope, need for education, gender, regions, watch/Time. Directed and Written by Rahu V. Chittella. Arpita Mukherjee is the co-writer along with the director. 

This shift in their lives is a rediscovery of the bonds that have held them together as a family with secrets and insecurities. An OTT release in Disney Hotstar, Sharmila Tagore, Manoj Bajpayee, Simran, Suraj Sharma, Amol  Palekar, and others did full justice to the character and bonus was Talat Aziz with his song. 

Gulmohar is akin to that kind of tree that is trimmed more regularly than watered by the gardener. It looks good but doesn’t always feel right. As their Gulmohar villa is being brought down to give way to a high rise, the family meets up for one last party before the packers and movers take over. However, over the course of ghazal and gossip, the discordant notes in their relationships get exposed and one gets sucked into their tumultuous present and turbulent past. The house shift becomes an opportunity to clear the cobwebs in the relationships. as Kusum’s son Arun, Manoj Bajpayee squeezes out the emotional pus that Arun has been carrying for years when the will of his deceased father suddenly pricks his latent anxieties and fears. The way Simran navigates between her imposing mother-in-law and the doting but complex-ridden husband is absolutely relatable. A delima of every home maker, the need to have 10 hands, to cater to various personality was just amazing. Loved the dialogue in the hotel room. Shanty Balachandran as the housemaid Reshma, Jeetu the watchman, her old class mate the supervisor, and their story in the back ground reflected various layers of the society.