Homebound

Watched at the 2025 Toronto International Film Festival.

Indian cinema is interesting because I'm not really a fan of the traditional Bollywood genre. But anytime when Indie Indian art house movies come to light, I'm very intrigued to check them out.

Neeraj Ghaywan captures a heartbreaking and warming tale about friendship, the struggles of the caste system and the ongoing conflicts between the culture and barriers the characters are established in. Ghaywan's previous movie Masaan was pretty good and with this new movie, he continues to capture the atmosphere, and the realistic nature of the societal environment of India and it's political working class setting perfectly. Ghaywan portray of the two main characters was interesting as the characters are well-written and engaging to observe. As if you are wanting to see what their struggles, goals and compassion they are wanting to succeed towards. To top it off, the performances are pretty good as the chemistry and charm between the two leads were emotional and engaging.

Alongside with the good camerawork, production, colors and the sound designs, the narrative offers some interesting concepts and moments throughout. While at times, some of the writing does feel a bit cliched and certain emotional aspects does lean a little too much towards some of the cheesy aspects about Indian cinema. The majority of its dialogue and emotional weight remains successful.

I do enjoy some of the social class themes and a good tale about friendship as it's always interesting to observe, when it's done right of course. Overall, it's a good story and emotional to observe.

The film opens like a bruise and never looks away, charting two friends split by how they wear identity-one hides caste, one holds faith-yet crushed by the same weight of injustice. It's humane, unsentimental, and quietly devastating.

The first half captures the social dilemma with granular realism.

Post-interval, the film turns into a metaphor made flesh-it's the weather of their lives, storming through choices, pride, and survival.

The actors are piercing without showiness. A mother's gasp, clutching sandals, freezes the room and etches grief in one breath.

The leads carry exhaustion in their shoulders, tenderness in brief embraces, and the ache of choices that never feel like choices.

Birds rising and dropping against a blank sky, bodies stalled on a bridge, faces caught between sirens and silence. Cuts linger just long enough to sting, the score steps back so the world's sounds can accuse, and the design moves from cramped rooms to transit limbo with unforced clarity.

In a nutshell, movie that leaves the eyes numb and the chest heavy, because it catalogs what happens around us, by us, to us-reality, witnessed without anesthesia, and rendered with aching, beautiful precision.

The authenticity this film exudes, despite some visible studio and censor meddling, makes it an incredible experience, even though you can see where it is going. The forced disclaimer at the beginning, despite this being based on a true story, really tells you how important this film is. It truly shows all the issues in India through the sweet friendship of two young men and their lives. Beyond the obvious bigotry, there are a lot of invisible ones that not only become a barrier for one, but also for the perception of what one can achieve. Even when films try to portray those things, it's not captured perfectly like this a lot of the time. These things also factor into why the system and those who enforce the rules act certain way.

The acting in the film has also been spectacular all around. The two leads were great, and they are getting the praise, but also got to note how good their family was. Especially the mother and sister of Chandan were fantastic. If I didn't know about the ending already because it's a true story, that ending would've totally broken me. Probably the best Indian film of the year so far for me.

I have always been against the idea of reservation. Coming from a place where equality is practiced and discrimination is rarely visible, I never truly understood why such policies existed. My mindset was shaped by an environment where everyone seemed equal, and so I felt reservations were unnecessary.

But after watching Homebound, my perspective changed completely. I have seen many films on this topic before, but somehow this one left a much deeper impact on me. It forced me to reflect on the long history of suffering and humiliation faced by lower-caste communities.

For the first time, I truly felt the weight of their struggles, and it made me realize how privileged I was to never experience such injustice. Thinking about the generations who endured discrimination fills me with shame, but also gratitude for the awareness this movie gave me.

Homebound is not just a film-it's an eye-opener. It has the power to change minds, as it did with mine.

Homebound is one of those films that instantly earns your respect for its sincerity. It deserves real credit for the performances and the way it's shot. Some moments linger - they feel authentic, lived-in, and beautifully written. The casting works well, and even the smallest characters seem to leave a trace behind. There's an honesty in how the actors carry their roles, and visually, the film captures the melancholy of its world with care.

But as I watched, I kept wishing for a stronger emotional curve - a sense of movement or transformation. The film stays locked in the same tone of sadness and struggle all the way through, without really building to a point of release or revelation. It's also unclear what Homebound finally wants to say. Is it a comment on caste disparity, religious tension, or the inefficiencies of our system? All of those ideas are there, but the film never truly commits to exploring any one of them deeply enough.

Structurally, it feels a bit montagy - more like a chain of poignant vignettes than a flowing narrative. Many individual sequences could stand alone as short films, together they never quite form a cohesive arc. If you were to map it on Blake Snyder's Save the Cat framework, the beats would feel missing - there's no clear midpoint or emotional escalation. It stays in one emotional register.

A film like this - especially one that aims for an indie, art-house sensibility - really has to do two things: invoke emotions and provoke thoughts. Homebound certainly invokes emotions; it's full of heartfelt montages that tug at you. But those feelings don't connect meaningfully to the climax, and the film rarely provokes any new thoughts. The issues it raises - caste, religion, poverty, systemic neglect - are things we already know all too well. It doesn't shed new light on them or challenge how we see them; it just circles familiar ground.

The look and performances remain the strongest parts. Every actor feels sincere, and the cinematography has that soft, observational quality that Neeraj Ghaywan does so well. But the script doesn't quite rise to the same level - it never delivers that emotional high or a strong narrative release. Even the ending, which returns to the COVID backdrop, feels more like a recall of a difficult time than a resolution.

One detail that really stood out to me - and not in a good way - was the language. People from the UP-Bihar-Jharkhand belt almost never say "Ma'am"; they say "Madam" or "Mai-dum." That kind of small authenticity is what grounded Masaan, and its absence here is noticeable. Just using "Hum" instead of "Main" isn't enough to root the characters in their social reality. It feels like somewhere along the way, Ghaywan lost a bit of the instinctive connect he once had with that world.

Homebound is made with heart and craft, no doubt about it. But it struggles to find direction. It does what all sincere films should - it invokes emotions - but it stops there. It doesn't provoke thoughts. You walk out respecting the intent and the effort, yet wishing there was something more to take back home.