Thai film “How to Make Millions Before Grandma Dies”, which was recently selected as the official submission of Thailand to Best International Film Oscar, is alternatively humorous and poignant in its gentle mix of human comedy and drama. While you can clearly see through where it is heading from the beginning, the story turns out to be more sincere and thoughtful along with a droll sense of humor to amuse us, and it surely earns all the emotions of its expectedly sentimental finale.

At first, we get to know about the rather distant relationship between an old lady named Mengju (Usha “Taew” Seamkhum) and many of her family members including her grandson M (Putthipong “Billkin” Assaratanakul). Although they gather together for a little family meeting at the beginning of the film, none of Mengju’s three children is not particularly close to their mother, and neither is M, your average young slacker who is simply bored while not much paying attention to his grandmother.

However, M later gets quite interested in being with his grandmother for a very selfish reason. One of young female cousins in his dead father’s family comes to receive a considerable amount of asset after taking care of her ailing grandfather for a while, so M decides to try something similar on his grandmother, who subsequently turns out to have a little time to live due to her terminal illness. Although she is much less affluent in comparison, her old residence happens to have some value as a piece of real estate, and he certainly wants to inherit that from her in exchange of taking care of her before her death. 

Of course, living with his grandmother turns out to be a bit more challenging than M expected. Even after she comes to learn of her terminal illness, Mengju is not daunted by this bad news at all while keeping going as usual, and M has no choice but to get accustomed to her daily routines including waking up and then preparing for her little porridge business early in the morning. In addition, he has also to hide more of his selfish intention as his mother and two uncles come to pay a lot more attention to Mengju than before for each own reason. 

Needless to say, our selfish hero slowly comes to care much more about his grandmother later in the story, but the screenplay by director Pat Boonnitipat and his co-writer Thodsapon Thiptinnakorn takes its time in building up the story and characters with more details to observe. While the Chinese heritage of the family characters in the story brings some specific cultural elements to the story, its supposedly broad main characters are illustrated with enough sense of life and personality, and it even shows a bit of compassion and understanding to one of Mengju’s two sons, a pathetic bum who has always brought nothing but money troubles to the family.

Above all, we get to know Mengju more bit by bit along with her grandson. As reflected by a brief but crucial scene between her and her estranged family member who heartlessly disregards her simple request, her life has been frequently ridden with one difficulty after another, but she does not lose her feisty spirit at all while also still capable of loving and caring about her family members around her. Although the movie is actually her debut film, Usha “Taew” Seamkhum’s gently soulful performance effortlessly swings back and forth between humor and pathos while ably embodying her character’s life history, and we come to like and care more about her character as Mengju is eventually approaching to the inevitable closing time later in the story.

 On the opposite, Putthipong “Billkin” Assaratanakul, who also made a debut here in this film, complements Seamkhum well, and he did a convincing job on his character’s gradual transformation along the story. While becoming much less selfish than he was at the beginning, M surprises even himself as sincerely wanting to be loved and appreciated by his grandmother, and he also comes to grow up a bit more as helping his grandmother reconnect with his mother, who has always loved Mengju despite having usually felt like being put behind her two brothers for many years.

 In the end, everything in the story culminates to the melodramatic finale as expected, but the movie wisely does not overplay at all while calmly but sensitively delivering the swelling emotions surrounding the finale. The result is certainly weepy enough to make many of you shed some tears, but it is genuinely touching nonetheless as we observe how the story comes to make a sort of full narrative circle with the very last scene.   

In conclusion, “How to Make Millions Before Grandma Dies”, whose original Thai title is just “Grandma’s Grandson”, is a familiar but undeniably moving family drama to be cherished for several good reasons including Boonnitipat’s skillful handling of story and characters and his two lead performers’ memorable performances. To be frank with you, the movie actually made me reflect more on how I have been quite distant to my aging grandmother since my childhood years, and, considering that she is over 90 at present, now I feel the need to show a bit more affection and respect to her than before, even though she was the least likable figure in her village or her family. I guess that says a lot about how good the movie is, right?