Neeraj Ghaywan’s film, which premiered at Cannes, is an elegy for the invisible India we all left behind in lockdown — a tribute to Dalit-Muslim friendship, loss and dignity of the marginalised
In May 2020, when the COVID crisis hit India and lockdowns began, millions of migrant workers started walking their way home — thousands of kilometers — to their villages in different states. Among the thousands of pictures shared online from this heartbreakingly cruel journey, one stood out and was shared millions of times. It showed a young man sitting on the dirt by the roadside, holding his friend, who seemed to have suffered a heat stroke, and trying to coax him awake.
A month or so later, Basharat Peer, a staff editor in the Opinion section of The New York Times wrote a widely read story called ‘Taking Amrit Home’, tracking the friend who survived and telling his story to the world. The friend who survived is Mohammad Saiyub and his deceased friend, Amrit Kumar, became one of the many faces of the mismanagement of the pandemic in India.
Five years later, India and the rest of the world have moved on from the crisis and the memories of those sufferings have all been erased from collective memory, sometimes willingly. Until now. Neeraj Ghaywan’s latest film, Homebound, which premiered in the Un Certain Regard sidebar section at the Cannes Film Festival, which concludes on May 24, is an attempt to memorialise the event, particularly through the lives of real-life friends Mohammad Saiyub and Amrit Kumar.
The film opened to a packed house and ended with a nearly ten-minute applause, unusual for a film in the sidebar section, leaving several teary-eyed spectators speechless. Ghaywan, who blamed his imposter syndrome on the ten-year gap between Masaan and Homebound, is well and truly back.
Examination of privilege, identity
Homebound takes Peer’s story and breathes extraordinary life into a friendship that ended too soon and explores the ties that kept it alive despite crushing discrimination and poverty imposed by various societal forces. The film, starring Ishaan Khatter, Janhvi Kapoor, and Vishal Jethwa, opens in a village in central India. Khatter’s Shoaib and Jethwa’s Chandan are rushing to a police recruitment drive in a nameless town. Chandan is reluctant — What’s the point of all this? he wonders — but Shoaib, a go-getter, urges his friend to drop the cynicism.
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The film unfolds against the backdrop of the friends waiting for their test results. It is revealed that the inseparable duo are Muslim and Dalit — both from severely marginalised and historically oppressed communities in India.
Homebound is intensely aware of the intersectionality at play, and Ghaywan layers the screenplay with themes of privilege, identity, bureaucratic apathy, and even patriarchy. It may sound like a lot, but Ghaywan has the touch of an expert whose game plan is social realism — the drama here is restrained, and nothing ever overwhelms you. Rather, all the while, the silent rage spills out of the screen. Ghaywan doesn’t point fingers at the system or anywhere else; he remains a detached observer, keeping the focus watertight on the plight of Shoaib and Chandan.
A gem in a mound of moral decay
Khatter and Jethwa, who play Shoaib and Chandan, waste no time in weaseling their way into our hearts. The trauma of growing up dirt poor and yet still facing intense discrimination despite belonging to the majority community brims in Jethwa’s marble eyes. For Shoaib, it’s a different ballgame: he needs additional documentation just to receive an employment offer as an office help.
These sensory details are nothing new for the Indian viewer, but at a time when the lived realities of ordinary Indians are no longer Bollywood’s concern, Homebound shines as a rare gem in a festering mound of moral decay.
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In what is undoubtedly Khatter’s career-best performance, he is at once endearing and heartbreaking. He captures Shoaib’s brutally internal struggles quite convincingly, leaving no dry eyes in the final scene. It’s hard to pick who deserves the crown for acting in Homebound, because the casting is pitch-perfect.
A soulful tribute
There are no emotional sleights of hand, and all the while Homebound strips bare the hypocrisy that has taken deep roots in Indian society. While unflinchingly showing us how entrenched discrimination is, the film remains dispassionate in its approach. In moments that risk veering into melodrama, it shows remarkable restraint — in typical Ghaywan fashion — while bristling with quiet fury that occasionally boils over.
“This film taught me humility, empathy, and patience,” Ghaywan said at the festival earlier. “Casting showed me that actors need to be more than just talented; they need to be morally connected to their characters.” It’s hard not to agree after watching the film. What makes Homebound soulful is how morally rooted Ghaywan is to its vision, and how the cast marches in lockstep with him.
Rural poverty, unemployment, discrimination against Muslims and Dalits — some might say Ghaywan is biting off more than he can chew. But in a country where none of these themes are often allowed to be fully realised on screen — due to reasons ranging from censorship to commercial pressures — the integrity with which Homebound commits to its vision is something that demands serious recognition.
With Homebound, Neeraj Ghaywan reaffirms his place as Indian cinema’s most empathetic chronicler of the silenced. Like Masaan and his Geeli Pucchi segment in Ajeeb Daastaans, the film remembers what we’re taught to forget. It locates heroism in the silent integrity of those who walk barefoot in a country where identity is destiny. By excavating the story of Amrit Kumar and Mohammad Saiyub, Ghaywan gives us a cinematic gravestone in a country that refused to mark its dead at a time when its people were dropping ‘like flies.’
