Recent blockbusters like Vikramadithyan (2014) and Unda (2019) explore the psychological cost of migration. The "Gulf nostalgia"—of air conditioners, cassette players, and foreign currency—is a recurring motif. Cinema captures the "Gulf wife" syndrome (loneliness and infidelity), the "remittance economy" that fuels Malayali weddings, and the tragicomic struggles of returning expats who can no longer fit into rural Kerala. The 2022 film Pada touches upon the environmental destruction caused by the returning Gulf money investing in granite quarries. The cinema is not just passive; it actively critiques the very culture of dependency on foreign labor.