Appan movie review: Sunny Wayne, Alencier drive this drama about a cruel father and the burden of his sins

3.5/5

Story: Itty, a cruel womansier, is bed-ridden but he clings onto life, much to the chagrin of his wife Kuttyamma and son Noonj, who have to endure his spiteful taunts and the burden of his inhumane ways. The villagers too want to end his life for what he has done to them. Noonj is the only one preventing them, but how long will be able to resist the sins of his father?

Review: Director Maju’s Appan, which is streaming on Sony LIV, begins with Kuttyamma (Pauly Valson) falling asleep while letting the water boil for morning tea. She finds bliss in this short nap, evident from her smile. These few minutes of sleep is all she could gather the whole day, after being ‘tortured’ to stay awake all night by her husband Itty (Alencier Ley Lopez), who is bed-ridden and full of spite. It’s a beautiful start to this dark comedy drama, when Kuttyamma’s daughter-in-law Rosy (Ananya) wakes her up and she describes her dream – the funeral of her husband where her son Noonj (Sunny Wayne) keeps on stuffing Itty’s nose with cotton because he just can’t have enough of it.

Appan revolves around the hardships the family has to endure because of the sins of the patriarch, who still clings on to life. Itty is a cruel womaniser, someone who has earned the anger of the entire village that people are “standing in queue” to finish him off. His family too wait with bated breath for him to pass on, but Itty refuses to let go – in fact, he manipulates them, using his physical state, to fulfil his desires that range from having arrack, smoking marijuana to sleeping with the sex worker beside their house – all with the intention of further infuriating his son and wife.

For a film that is set entirely in and around a house, Appan is quite engaging, because of the various tense moments between the dysfunctional family all united against its patriarch. Maju and Jayakumar, who have scripted the film, also use the nuances in the relationships within a family to full effect, showing that when it comes to blood, everything is complex. We get this through consistent doses –be it by how Noonj’s sister’s equation with her mother and father changes once the latter reveals that he wants to give her property or how Rosy begins to doubt Noonj for being kind to the sex worker next door. But none more startling that how Kuttyamma reacts to Noonj, when he tries to choke Itty, whom they all wanted dead anyway and tells him that his cruelty reminded her of a younger Itty. The sequence is all the more poignant when the writers also reveal what Noonj has had to endure due to his father’s misdeeds and how he has only ever cared for protecting his mother.

Maju’s directorial shines in the way he has handled the story. There are scenes such as the family coming together to fulfil Itty’s desires with mixed emotions as well as performing the last sacrament that brings out the dark humour while handling the story about a toxic personality and its lasting impact. The movie does slow down in the final lap when another character from Itty’s past is introduced, taking away the humour that worked till then.

The highlight of Appan are the performances by each and every actor. Sunny Wayne as Noonj puts on his career best performance in the film, showing restraint and a controlled aggression – as his enemy in life has always been his father, for him as he confesses in the film he doesn’t have any hatred against. He is also caught up in this tangled mess, where his son is also witness to what’s transpiring and this further hurts him when Itty says Noonj’s son will also become like him.

Alencier puts on an acting masterclass as Itty, who is bedridden but has the fire of a demon, spitting curses at will and spewing venom with each breath. The writing is smart in the sense that we get to hear Itty’s stories through other characters in the second half, making him hate him even more. Pauly Valson is another standout in the film as Kuttyamma, who puts up with Itty as her moral duty; not for him or herself, but for her son. Grace Antony, Ananya, Radhika Radhakrishnan and Anil K Sivaraman all contribute to making their characters memorable.

Verdict: Appan is a well-acted and brilliantly-told dark comedy-drama that deserves a watch for its performances as well as how the makers have handled the subject.