I live with my father, he’s 84. He’s capable and mentally agile. If anything, the proverb that old age is when the son becomes the father and the father becomes the son does miss out on the fact that the son in question will stay up late on YouTube and be stroppy A.F. about the slightest thing when they’re bored. As such, the idea of just leaving him with my 14-year-old nephew, aka ‘Spider-Man: India’, would be a delight.
However, the ‘concerned’ often stick their oar in several ways. It’s like once he admits to forgetting which day of the week they want to get the net out. Hell. I remember having that conversation with some simperer and shouting, “Look, his mobile and mentis, I’ve been unemployed for three months, I don’t know what day of the week it is, and your lucky I’m wearing matching fucking shoes to the pub!”
It’s these emotional strains that Arabella displays and orchestrates with great skill and precision in the ‘odd couple’ classic of Chloe and Peg. both frustrated and fitful and funny and furious at the world for all the passion and irritation you can have at those times of life. An excellent ensemble that meets the archetypes but never quite stereotypes complements it. The pill-popping mum is not quite as highly strung as Stradivarius. The three humoresque platitudes of the disengaged dad show that not all is that easy for suburban life.
As the fuck it list takes hold, and we do see the classic car deism moments, but bringing them to the fore with a teenager rather than an adult shows both the strength and the burden put upon youngsters in such a situation. It’s crafted and emotive, and the outcome shows a great sense of reality underneath its rather romantic stylings. This is more Mike Leigh than Ken Loach, and the rather pantoeqsue views of evil granny snatchers fit more with the perspective of a teenager than the reality of their world. The relative skimming of getting support may seem slight, but it is a canny move to focus on the leads themselves.
Some elements could be related to trimming in some ways, but that’s difficult to say and be objective about. I was a carer for my mum, not Alzheimer’s. It was cancer, and it was locked. Caring for the extended family is also relatively normalised in most of my background, with 2nd generation migrant values being the tail end of childcare. It’s coming to the fore in more stories in mainstream culture and the cost of care homes, ‘the reluctant carer’ showing it a situation as much as a vocation for many. As such, it’s hard to say that while some elements may seem to me to be expository in some places, they are frankly too raw in others. They are slight and may impact the audience who have not been in those shoes yet.
But as a whole, it’s a bold, awkward, and strong debut with a bold, uncomfortable, and strong lead who shines. Casting sound and music tracking elevate a dragon eye behind the camera. This is a debut to watch and learn from, and I’m sure there will be many more very soon
The Irish Indian Times. 
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