‘Theatre: The Myth Of Reality’ Movie Review: Rima Kallingal In An Astute Take On Truth And Superstition

At the centre of Sajin Baabu’s film is the story of a mother and a daughter, living an isolated, seemingly peaceful life on an island in Kerala. While the daughter climbs coconut trees and forages for fruit in their farm (Rima Kallingal is Meera), the mother is a gentle magnet for rescue animals (Sarasa Balussery plays the matriarch who chooses to believe in the power of herbs and serpents rather than modern medicine and science). Theatre: The Myth of Reality is essentially an emotional onion, one which you have to peel to uncover new truths delicately. But unlike slow, searing psychological thrillers like Ullozhukku (2024; which also featured two women navigating grief during a torrential downpour in a Kerala sea town) that came before it, Theatre uses a different, more direct narrative approach to get there. The film is a blend of found-footage drama with a touch of magic realism. 

Meera and her mother live an idyllic life in their tharavadu. “They were once from a prestigious family, but look what happened to her:” thus goes the town gossip. While the film is in no hurry to fill us in on the details of this family, it shows us the depths of their isolation and loneliness through montages of them at leisure and at work. Their family consists of two dogs and a kitten (one that Sarasa gingerly rescues at the beginning of the film, even as floods begin to threaten their own safety). But these are not the only animals they have for company. Snakes, which take on the meaning of several things in the film, guard and sometimes provoke these women. 

A still from the film

The film begins with the myth of Parasurama creating Kerala and coaxing the power of coexistence among human beings who have to live around poisonous reptiles. Theatre uses this myth to tell us about the role of nature in human existence, both in superstition and reality. Meera’s family has a rich background in traditional healing of venomous bites, which makes her and her mother big believers of nurturing and celebrating the reptile through routine rituals. A past about a family curse resurfaces, and so is a haunting Childhood memory that keeps Meera awake at night.

But the film really picks up when Meera, who swears off the luxuries that modern life can provide, is bitten by a strange-looking insect in her backyard. When the mother and daughter are finally dragged off their dingy home on the island to the noisy city hospital, their realities change. Their lives are publicised by incessant vlogging, and the isolation that they once experienced now shines like a privilege they yearn for retrospectively. 

Rima Kallingal and Sarasa Balussery play the leads with tenacity in a film that reflects the realities of single women. In its commentary on the hostility and occasional idiocy of social media—through ignorant and rage-baiting comments on posts, a reality that everyone navigates daily—it also observes how it is always the woman who is dragged through the mud, whether in myth or in reality.