It's A Medical Miracle Movie Review:
It's A Medical Miracle is a ‘concept film’ about a protagonist with extraordinary hearing. Ruben has been declared brain-dead for over two years, with his family even contemplating the idea of euthanasia when a freak accident wakes him up rather dramatically. Once awake, the young man is all ears. Quite literally. He can now hear every little sound around him with unusual clarity. It extends from something as minute as a fly's flapping wings to the arrival of raindrops to a lying person's pounding heartbeat. It's something like a superpower, and with superpowers you are more often than not dealing with a lot of trouble.
Director Shyamin Gireesh and his wife, writer Nileen Sandra, lay solid groundwork for this fantastical idea to sprout. A montage sequence with extensive visual effects and sound effects works beautifully in transporting us into Ruben's psyche as he struggles to cope with his strange new medical condition. As the narrative progresses, we see him embrace this new ability and use it to his advantage. With this superpower, he is like a reluctant superhe(a)ro.
Love takes Ruben to a new city where a masked criminal is already on the loose, harming people in unusual ways. The screenplay takes these two stories simultaneously before the expected overlap happens.
Director: Shyamin Gireesh
Cast: Sangeeth Prathap, Sharaf U Dheen, Akhila Bhargavan, Nileen Sandra, Parvathy Krishna
As with most 'concept films', the best part of It's A Medical Miracle is its intriguing premise. However, after a point, the makers run out of ideas, resulting in a generic last hour. By the time the film reaches its important point of unraveling the mystery through sound, it has already milked the maximum out of Ruben's sound-sensing ability. So we already know how and where the investigation is heading. What gives the film a distinctive identity later becomes a burden. The writing also gets too convenient at various junctures, often depending on coincidences to take the narrative forward.
On a positive note, the film has an interesting antagonist whose actions grow increasingly threatening. Even when the film explains the origins of his antisocial behaviour, it never sides with him or wants us to empathise with him. In fact, the violence inflicted upon Ruben and his girlfriend in a horrifying scene set in a washroom leaves a disturbing impact. The film also captures their trauma effectively, with both Sangeeth and Akhila doing particularly well in an emotionally charged sequence. For a change here, it is the girl who takes the effort to comfort the severely violated man.
But apart from that, the women are either reduced to romantic interests or subjects of violation. Parvathy Krishna appears as a tough, no-nonsense cop, but hardly has anything to contribute apart from being frequently put down by a politician. As a writer, Nileen shows promise in exploring Ruben's medical condition and how his world collides with the masked man, but the film demanded more consistently engaging writing.
It's A Medical Miracle is technically slick, to the extent that it feels like the makers were trying to cover up the shallowness with visual gimmicks. With sound being such a prominent part of the film, Nixon George's sound design does a lot of heavy lifting. The sounds overlap, cut abruptly, go completely silent, sometimes arrive all at once, but they all add to the chaos in the protagonist's head.
While superpowers are often seen as something to be envied, this film vaguely touches upon the other side of it. What's the cost of it? Also, should all superpower stories come with vigilantism?
However, the makers seem more interested in pursuing a regular revenge angle that allows them to neatly wrap up the story and tie a bow around it. All we get then is a film whose real potential remains untapped or, say... unheard.