9.0 points, the Thai film "Grandma's Grandson" can make such a heavy topic into a fresh and refreshing one
2024-08-27
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Recently, a movie with a Douban score of 9.0 was released, which is the Thai movie "Grandma's Grandson". This movie is currently the box office champion in Thailand in 2024. After being released in mainland China, its Douban score rose from 8.9 to 9.0.
"Grandma's Grandson" has the usual fresh style of Thai movies, but it is not a love story of adolescent boys and girls like "A Little Thing Called First Love". The topics involved in the film are relatively heavy, such as elderly care, empty-nest elderly, death issues, inheritance, preference for boys over girls, filial piety in East Asia, etc. None of them are easy.
But "Grandma's Grandson" reveals a fresh style from the inside out. It does not show off skills, does not use twists and turns in the plot, does not need to add jokes, and does not have sensational elements. It just tells a story that you can know the ending after seeing the beginning, step by step, as if it is a story that has happened and will happen to everyone. This plain and real power is moving.
"Grandma's Grandson" is now known as a "tear-jerking film", and some theaters will hand out tissue packs at the door. However, the tears shed by the audience watching this film are not "induced", but flow down naturally. The film is adapted from a true story, starting from a Thai Chinese family with three generations living together, telling the story of an unemployed young man, An (played by Ma Qunyao), who plays the role of a "full-time good grandson" to take care of his terminally ill grandmother (played by Usa Samekham) in order to obtain a million-dollar inheritance. But facing equally "hard-working" uncles and a picky and poisonous grandmother, An's road to "getting rich by relying on his grandmother" does not seem to be as smooth as he expected.
The film moved the audience with its delicate, gentle, warm and humorous style. After learning that she had cancer, the grandmother's reaction was very cute. She did not treat it as a serious enemy, but complained to her neighbors, "I was also infected."
While wiping her body, grandma suddenly took off her clothes and exposed her breasts, which caught An off guard. He said he was not mentally prepared, but grandma said, "She is an old lady, it doesn't matter."
In the face of her grandson's careful care, the grandmother never praised or affirmed him. When Ah An repeatedly asked, "What is my position in your heart?", the grandmother remained silent. It was not until they had spent a long time together that the grandmother finally said, "I am very happy. It is great to have you."
However, the grandson who had been around to take care of him had put the property up for sale online. When the grandmother learned the truth, she said nothing but silently that he would not need her to take care of him after he was cured. This silence made the audience even more distressed.
When chemotherapy was ineffective and she had to wait for death, grandma was calm in the hospital during the day, but in her dreams at night, she would whisper to her parents, "Please take me away quickly."
Grandma was the one who was harmed in the inheritance, but she continued the intergenerational inheritance of favoring sons over daughters. The only house was left to the second son who was in debt, and the only thing left to An's mother was "I hope you stay with me." So An's mother said, "The house is passed on to the son, and the cancer is passed on to the daughter."
This is a true portrayal of many women in the process of caring for their parents, who take on the most care work but receive very little financial compensation, and everything seems to be natural. This made many viewers empathize, as they either experienced it themselves or their mothers experienced it - it was clearly the daughters who took care of their parents in their old age, but in the end they got nothing, and all the property was left to the men.
However, the film does not include too much value judgment and chicken soup preaching. Faced with the distribution of inheritance, gender order and other customs that have been implemented for thousands of years, "Grandma's Grandson" gives a gentle knife and returns to the theme of family love. An, who did not get the property, still insisted on taking his grandmother with him to take care of her. Grandma is not stupid, she just hopes that every child can live a good life. In the end, An still got the 1 million deposit left by his grandmother, but he in turn replaced his grandmother's grave with a "big villa" to realize her wish to protect her descendants during her lifetime. At this time, love and money are no longer an equal exchange relationship. On the way to send the coffin to the spirit, An finally confessed to his grandmother, "You are number one in my heart."
The two leading actors in this film, Billkin Ma, who plays the male lead A'an, already has many fans in China. He and PP became a popular CP thanks to the Thai drama "Love in Your Heart". "Grandma's Grandson" is Billkin Ma's debut on the Chinese screen.
The actress who plays the grandma, Usa Samekam, is an amateur. She joined the crew through an audition. Ma Qunyao said that because the grandma had never acted before, there was no fixed performance mode, and she would perform according to her real life, "she created many highlights". Her performance was very quiet and kind, just like what the grandma should be like in the memory of every audience. Many viewers sighed after watching it, "Grandma, I miss you".
Pat Bonetti, the film's director, said, "We tried our best to incorporate things common to East Asian families into this film, to maximize the subtle relationships and interactions between people, and to ensure that each character has distinct characteristics."
(Reporter Liu Yuhan from Dazhong News•Qilu One Point)
