Prithviraj Sukumaran shoulders the movie heroically. But the overblown nature of the event-filled narrative never lets us connect with the plight of the protagonist.
Seen one way, Aadujeevitham is already the stuff of cinema legend. Benyamin’s book showcased the horrifying story of a Malayali – named Najeeb – who went to Saudi Arabia for one kind of job, and was duped into becoming a goatherd – a slave – in the middle of the desert. It’s not just one man’s ordeal, it’s also an intimate chronicle of the dark side of the Gulf dream. And then came Blessy and his many, many years of trying to get this project off the ground. And then there was the shooting, over five years, off and on. And then there was the COVID lockdown, with the team stuck in Jordan, unable to return. Heck, Benyamin could write a sequel: a bestselling book about how his bestselling book was made into a movie. Any time anyone makes a listicle on long-gestating, troubled productions, Aadujeevitham will undoubtedly be somewhere near the top.
You can read the rest of the review here:
https://www.galatta.com/malayalam/movie/review/aadujeevitham-author-br/
You can watch the trailer / video review here:
Copyright ©2024 GALATTA.
Baradwaj Rangan 
ravenus1
April 1, 2024
My thoughts as well. Excerpting from my own review:
A great survival film is made by its little gestures and micro-moments. I can empathize with the character’s plight only if I find the character interesting to begin with. In TGL, writer-director Blessy‘s script is cringingly broad-strokes and pedestrian.
https://unkvltsite.blogspot.com/2024/04/aadujeevitham-aka-goat-life-dir-blessy.html
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Madan
April 1, 2024
What a name – unkvlt, ha! By any chance, do/did you listen to metal?
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ravenus1
April 1, 2024
I do. The name came about because prior to that I had been the main movie reviews guy for a friend’s site called Kvltsite/Kvltblog. When that went down, because reasons, I decided to have my own blog and call it the Un-kvlt Site. This was some 14 years back and so far my friend hasn’t threatened to sue :p
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MANK
April 1, 2024
Blessy has always been an average filmmaker, but due to his choice of offbeat subjects he is considered classy and important . In actuality, He is an exponent of the broad manipulative melodrama (just watch Kazhcha, Thanmathra, Palunku etc) and his films are a throwback to the early to mid ’80s Malayalam film aesthetic of ‘Kanneerpuzha (rivers of tears)’ dramas that has audience reaching for multiple hankies by the film’s end. It’s mainly Mammootty’s or Mohanlal’s very brilliant , authentic and psychologically dense performance in Kazhcha, Bramaram and Palunku that give these films their gravitas. Now a new cult has developed around Blessy , as he spend more than a decade on this film, any criticism of this film will be (or is) met by ‘ he spent 16 years on this film’ and so you shouldn’t or you are not worthy of criticizing this film, Hmmm..
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soorya N
April 1, 2024
My experience from Aadujeevitham
This is easily one of the Present 2020’s generation ‘Art’ movie behind the “Stalker, Sacrifice, Nostalgia”, Tarkovsky just came back and forth in the movie making.
They didn’t rush up anywhere in the movie.In General if I am remembering ‘In tarkovsky movies, we will not be having that much character connectivity, Rather it will be a poem written on the screen, The same was with this movie
it had multiple God references , Ibrahim coming as ‘god angel ‘ Atlast one man “Helping” nazeeb without any hesitation and Ibrahim going invisible in a fraction of scene.
Ibrahim telling, We need to walk until we die is symbolically remembering our real life and nazeed getting affection from goat is pure love added to this movie.
All are purely a Life destiny theme with anything can happen anytime in one life.
This movie can be easily register in preservation of cinema ‘ books history.
Tamil cinema tried to take Art film, But Malayalam film courageously took this Extremely hard hitten Artistic movie and won .
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vijay
April 1, 2024
Sounds like a laboured rehash of Maryaan ..how is Rahman’s soundtrack this time around?
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mvky
April 1, 2024
“We have to walk until we die.”
What a line!
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Jay Krishnan
April 2, 2024
Strange you left out thanmathra . I suspect that is deliberate.
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