“I think people are perverts. It’s the foundation of my career.” I'm quoting filmmaker David Fincher. Every film of his has been an exploration of the innermost recesses of the human mind, the extent of depravity, and the fantasies that lie on different ends of the emotional spectrum. Voyeurism, in fact, has been the foundation of every filmmaker’s career, hasn’t it?
After all, we all peek into the “realities” of different “flesh and blood” human beings that exist in a whole different realm made completely out of film grain, digits and pixels. Or they exist in the cells of their creator itself, sometimes failing to materialise on paper or screen. Filmmakers like Fincher (“Se7en”, “Mindhunter”) only brought attention to human beings’ capacity for acting out their unhealthy impulses, holding a mirror just long enough to make them squirm in their seats.
With his new film, “Masthishka Maranam: The Frankenbiting of Simon’s Memories”, Krishand is doing the same thing. The only difference is, unlike Fincher, he’ll make you laugh non-stop while making you uncomfortable. By “uncomfortable”, I don’t apply a negative connotation. I mean, if your sexual fantasies aren’t harmful enough, and provided you aren’t acting them out — and don’t ever intend to in the future — this film isn’t going to catapult your blood pressure to stratospheric levels. Don’t worry. One of the funniest films I’ve seen this year, “Masthishka Maranam,” shows that you can make an international-level science fiction film in India with a limited budget if you’re smart enough to use your resources.
Of course, I bet this is Krishand’s most expensive film yet — the vibrant colours, convincing and immersive vfx and production design are all evidence of it — but when compared to the biggies, this is still an indie-level effort, but one that looks like a big-scale epic thanks to, well, the aforementioned reasons.
The concept is not new, of course. James Cameron first explored the idea of tapping into other people's memories in his story treatment in the disturbing 1995 thriller "Strange Days", directed by Kathryn Bigelow. In Krishand's cyberpunk satire, characters living in 2046 Kochi (Kerala) are trying to plug into a virtual reality machine to escape their traumatic memories. For convenience, I’ll refer to the actors’ names instead of the characters. So, there’s Niranj Maniyanpilla Raju as the protagonist who happens to be a grieving father.
But since this is a Krishand film, scenes of brooding characters are virtually nil. This is not “Minority Report” — you know, that excellent Tom Cruise-Steven Spielberg sci-fi film where the former keeps playing digital files of his dead child. No, the protagonist of Krishand’s film, despite trying to access what are basically stolen memories of dead people — basically, what they saw right before their deaths — to distract himself from grief.
Long story short, Niranj ends up talking to somebody who leads him to somebody else who then leads him to this… exciting… virtual reality device that’s meant to give him kicks of the sexual variety. However, there’s a problem: this fantasy involves the mind-intruding “clip,” modelled after a real individual, a "most desirable" celebrity played by Rajisha Vijayan. He went in for one thing, now he’s dealing with a couple of murders. But since they happen inside this “alternate” reality, does he really have to worry? Or, wait a minute, is he really in the memory of one person, or somebody else’s? Or, is it actually a shared memory?
Basically, everyone, including one or two women (if memory serves me right), is simping for Rajisha.
Well, there’s more, but it’s better to experience everything on the screen instead of reading about it. Yeah, this is the kind of film which packs in a lot of things, but in a manner accessible to all age groups. I would say “Masthishka Maranam” came out at the right time. I mean, in this age where some people are already saying that they get more excitement out of AI-generated images than porn, Krishand’s film tackles a more extreme version of this idea in such a way that you begin to believe that this… what he is showing in the film… could very well be the actual reality twenty years later.
Krishand explores a multitude of topics and humour drawn from Indian pop culture, ranging from ridiculous celebrity worship — for instance, an actress with a temple named after her, with an idol modelled after her; an idol that literally starts breaking, piece by piece, the minute someone's idealised illusion of her is shattered — to greedy streaming platforms that want to live-stream a court case involving her, and cinematic influences that include 1980s Priyadarshan comedies, Japanese anime ("Ghost in the Shell")... well, the list is endless.
There’s a reason why I chose this headline. What if James Cameron and Priyadarshan went to a bar in Trivandrum? Because Krishand’s imagination works this way. Let me give you an example without ruining the jokes.
We get a courtroom drama in the third act that feels so fresh and genuine. It looks like a beautifully shot Daft Punk music video where the people sound like characters from a 1980s Priyadarshan classic. The judge prefers everyone to address him by his first name — no “sir” or “objection sustained" or any of the other courtroom jargon we’ve heard before in the so-called “cinematic-realistic” legal dramas.
This situation, for instance, is a perfect showcase for the strengths of not just Rajisha Vijayan (“Bison”, “Anuraga Karikkin Vellam”) but also Divya Prabha (“All We Imagine as Light”, “Ariyippu”). They are required to be a little over-the-top, and there’s a damn good reason for this, which is revealed in the climax. This film provides these two women opportunities to demonstrate a side they haven’t before.
But it’s not just the women; there’s a truckload of talented actors — beginning with the under-utilised Niranj, whose comic timing eerily recalls his dad in the early Priyadarshan movies — who would be familiar to those who have seen all of Krishand’s work so far.
Rahul Rajagopal, for instance, who was the lead in Krishand's National award-winning "Aavasavyuham", surprises once again with another peculiar character who contributes to the laughs. (You can find the names of the principal cast below.) All the songs and promos you’ve seen of this film until now… that’s not what the actual film is. And there’s also a damn good reason for the lyrics and music of the songs to sound that way. Krishand has evidently taken a lot of things into consideration to arrive at every creative choice — from the background colours and props to the editing, aside from the costumes and musical choices.
There's an alternate version of this movie playing in my head that features Nikhila Vimal, considering how she has a certain image among men and the constant pestering she has to deal with from cheap online channels named after certain birds. (It's one of the real-world situations that Krishand takes a dig at in this film. I think she would've done great in this role, too.)
“Masthishka Maranam” is the fastest of Krishand’s films so far. It’s edited in such a way that it mimics the mindspace of someone tormented by fragmented memories. And, of course, the glitchy, distorted images that are occasionally embellished with comic book-style text and art, all evoking the manner in which we consume media on Instagram and other social media apps. There’s so much happening on the screen at times that it might seem overwhelming for some; however, these details are also peppered throughout in a way that makes the hardcore sci-fi, comic book or movie lover in us want to relish every detail.
“Masthishka Maranam” is one of those films that, despite not being difficult to follow, warrants multiple revisits because one viewing isn't enough to grasp every detail. That is, of course, if you have a taste for the kind of absurd humour it has to offer. It should appeal to fans of Lijo Jose Pellissery’s “Double Barrel” (I count myself among them) — however, this one doesn’t go to the same extreme length. Hopefully, that should be a relief. I cannot guarantee that this would work for all.
But then, which film that has been made so far in the entire world can claim to please every single Tom, Dick, and Harry? In my book, Krishand has not disappointed even once. “Masthishka Maranam” is the first GREAT film of 2026 for me — yet another testament to the exquisitely wild imagination of one of Malayalam cinema’s most promising filmmakers right now. I hope he continues to get more and bigger opportunities regardless of the box office reception.
The film left me with an interesting thought. If there were a law that forbade everyone on this planet from having sexual fantasies, even the enforcers of this law would be in (horny) jail.
Film: Masthishka Maranam: The Frankenbiting of Simon’s Memories
Director: Krishand
Cast: Rajisha Vijayan, Niranj Maniyanpilla Raju, Jagadish, Zhinz Shan, Nandhu, Suresh Krishna, Divya Prabha, Ann Salim, Jagadish, Shambu, Vishnu Agasthya, Rahul Rajagopal, Manoj Kana, Sreenath Babu, Anoop Mohandas, Santhy Balachandran, Jain Andrews, Sachin Joseph, Sanju Sivram
Rating: 4.5/5
