Vijay's rise to Tamil Nadu chief ministership has eclipsed all other news on cinema from public conversations this month. A pity, because this is also the month of the release of Patriot, starring Mammootty and Mohanlal, a team-up that rarely occurs these days. Writer-director-editor Mahesh Narayanan's Malayalam film deserves the spotlight for another reason too: its courage.Patriot's central themes are the globally resonant issues of surveillance and privacy, addressed through the story of a fictional Indian scientist, Daniel James, who finds that the government is using spyware on citizens, and worse, that control of a surveillance software has been transferred by a corrupt minister to his son's private corporation.Daniel is a government employee, and turns whistleblower on making these discoveries. At a time when questioning the establishment is dubbed as 'anti-national', the hero demands that dissidence in national interest be viewed as patriotism.Mammootty is cast as Daniel, and Mohanlal as the retired Col. Rahim Naik, who becomes his accomplice in a bid to expose the sarkar. It takes a person of Mahesh's standing to recruit Mohanlal for a supporting role - crucial as it is - in a film headlined by Mammootty, and top up that coup with an all-star ensemble that includes Nayanthara, Fahadh Faasil, Revathy, Kunchacko Boban, Darshana Rajendran, Rajiv Menon, and Zarin Shihab.It takes a Mahesh to also convince M&M to play their age, which has the effect of lending a heartwarming air to Daniel's and Rahim's friendship. The duo's seniority is even relevant to the script, since their past knowhow helps them bypass the modern tracking tools that they are up against.It would have done Patriot a world of good if the director had additionally denied the septuagenarian Mammootty an indulgence he gets in every film these days - a wife, girlfriend, or sister played by an actor young enough to be his child or grandchild. Nayanthara, a superstar in her own right who's in her 40s, plays Lathika, a lawyer assisting Daniel in India. Zarin, a bright rising star in her 30s, is Ayesha, Daniel's ally in another land.The story would have been fine if that was that. But with no benefit whatsoever to the plot, Lathika is written as Daniel's ex, while Ayesha, we learn through some decidedly awkward writing, is his present wife.This is an incongruous note in a film that gazes at Mammootty and Mohanlal through a lens of nostalgia, which makes watching them here an emotional experience, while adding a layer to their cool-dude demeanour during a car chase that elevates it to a whole different level of fun.Mahesh is one of Indian cinema's best talents. But this new release, despite its many charms, is the least of his works so far. When your output as director is Take Off, C U Soon, Ariyippu, and Malik, you have set the bar high for yourself. Patriot is no doubt brave, current, and often suspenseful. The cast is charismatic. The sub-plot featuring Darshana and Kunchacko is especially appealing.And I was blown away by the audacity of a song employing windows in architecture as a metaphor for the intrusiveness of technology that was meant to benefit humankind. But the film lacks the clarity, thoroughness, consistent pace and cultural rootedness that made Mahesh's earlier ventures beautiful.The high quality that Malayalam cinema continuously delivers grants viewers the luxury of being demanding and taking certain things for granted. Such as the guts it requires to tackle issues in Patriot that most other Indian film industries, barring Tamil, would not care or dare to touch.Or the routine normalised representation of Muslims and Christians, such that readers in Kerala are often surprised when those of us living outside the state point to elements like the minority religious identity of several dissident patriots in this film in an increasingly minority-phobic India. Lovely. But I wanted more.