Georgekutty, the protagonist of the Drishyam franchise, has the kind of baggage that perhaps few other onscreen criminals have carried. He is no natural criminal. Rather, his criminality is built upon his image of a complete family man, someone who goes to any lengths to protect his family. He does not revel in crime, though one can read some pride in him for always being a step ahead of the police.

In Drishyam 3, writer-director Jeethu Joseph firmly places him in family situations for much of the runtime. Georgekutty (Mohanlal) is busy arranging the marriage of his elder daughter, Anju (Ansiba Hassan). Brokers come and go, and promising proposals fall through, with the family’s dark past remaining as a barrier to many. Some anonymous souls in the neighbourhood are also trying to spoil the marriage plans. The marriage itself is integral to the plot development. So much so that the film could have come with the tagline - The Story of an Arranged Marriage.

Jeethu appears to be steering away from expectations associated with the Drishyam franchise, choosing to expand further on how a criminal act changes the lives of all those connected with it rather than serving the audience with mind-numbing twists, which he overdid in some of his recent outings. Georgekutty might have had the last laugh in the first part, but in both sequels, he is constantly worried about the price that his family will have to pay for the act, even though he is courageous enough to have produced a movie based on the real-life incident. The question of whether the police will reopen the cold case again is on the minds of all the principal players.

Drishyam 3 delves deep into Georgekutty’s character to see how life’s vicissitudes have taken a toll on him and those around him. One interesting tangent is that Georgekutty is unaware of the struggles of those who aided him in times of trouble. Missteps are galore, too. Especially how one popular antagonist resurfaces with a comical red eye, although the actor’s performance somehow makes up for it. A seemingly important journalist character (Veena Nandakumar) is introduced and forgotten halfway through. Much of the film is dragged down by the heavy-handed drama and dialogue. Adding to the problems is the dated visual style.

What could have turned into a complete disaster is saved by a few intriguing flourishes in the writing and by Mohanlal’s interpretation of Georgekutty’s mindscape. Drishyam 3, the least effective of the three films, does not feel like a page from a thriller series, but rather a peek into the personal diary of someone who has not had a peaceful day in years. But then, there is only so much excitement that can be built from a diary entry. May D3 be the last entry, although the makers teased the possibility of one more in the epilogue.