“When Blessy started the movie, his hair was black [now it’s all grey],” said AR Rahman jokingly during one of the promotional events for Aadujeevitham — The Goat Life. And that’s how long Blessy was working on this film. To put it exactly, he was associated with the movie for 16 years. Aadujeevitham — The Goat Life, which released today, March 28, 2024, has been in the talks since 2008 and was a highly anticipated pan-Indian film starring Prithviraj Sukumaran in the lead role of Najeeb Muhammad, on whom the movie is based.
A 3-hour long saga, the film takes off slowly giving enough glimpses and backstory of the lead character and how he ends up in the vast deserts of Masara, Saudi Arabia. Surrounded by dunes and only goats and camels to interact with, Najeeb is stranded in a desolate village where he is tortured brutally as a slave. The original story, which Benyamin penned in his popular novel, The Goat Days, has 43 chapters, and it is understandably difficult to translate the story exactly into a 3-hour film. Hence, there are certain aspects that the movie misses out on, which would have given some more emotional quotient to the viewer.
For instance, Amala Paul, who plays the role of Sainu, Najeeb’s pregnant wife, only has 2 flashback scenes to establish her role and relation with the lead character. For those, who haven’t read the book or even for those who have read the book, you will find it to be disappointing that Blessy decided to keep it extremely limited when it comes to Najeeb’s family.
The film builds up and also showcases some of the hardships that Najeeb experienced during his time at the village surrounded by goats and camels. With almost no food and limited water, Blessy has aced the part of showcasing the hardships slowly and gradually as and when the time goes by. A clean-shaven and healthy Najeeb, who lands in Saudi Arabia, transforms into a person with dreadlocks, a stiff beard, thin skin, and bones over time, and Prithviraj, with his acting, has surely bought the horrendous time that Najeeb went through back to life. One can only wonder how a human being could have survived and gone through what Najeeb dealt with for years.
Though the challenges of adaptation are clear, certain elements and scenes in the film show how Najeeb eventually starts relating with the goats and how even a small gesture by the animals is the only kindness that Najeeb can get during his time in the desert. Amidst all the torture, and failed attempts to get escape, in comes the angel — Ibrahim Qadri, played by Hollywood actor Jimmy Jean Louis. This is where the film starts to gain momentum and showcases not just Najeeb, but also Hakim and Ibrahim’s attempt to make it back to the civilised societies or to the safe place they call home.
Miles and miles of endless desert, daunting heat and to make it all worse, no water or food. The trio follows the way the sun heads. However, out of the three only two survive the test of time. With the fire of hope about to die, Najeeb rolls down a steep sand hill to see himself rolling on the roads after days of painful walks in the desert. Prithviraj with every blink of his eye and every decibel of his voice shows how grateful he is to an Arab who picks him up from the road and drops him in the city of Saudi Arabia.
Once he is back to life, Najeeb is deported back to his hometown on his way into the flight, climbing the stairs on the Tarmac, Najeeb looks back with tears and joy in his eyes, this is where Blessy leaves you. Feeling incomplete yet? That’s exactly the emotion that was felt throughout the cinema hall when the movie ended. It lacked the final emotional aspect of Najeeb reuniting with his mother, and wife and seeing his newborn for the first time since her birth. Why did Blessy leave all of this to our imagination is something that only he would know. But besides this, acting, cinematography, story, and screenplay, everything makes it a cinematic experience you should not miss out on.
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