Fri, May 2 2025

Four murders. In four different places. The victims: a minister’s daughter (Palak Jaiswal), a young adult; a private cab driver (Hakkim Shahjahan); his passenger, a senior police officer (Tigmanshu Dhulia) with temporary blindness caused by a welding burn; a random kid who’d shot a video of the alleged killer pulling the body of the cop. The killer, a young 20-something (Mayur More) whose name is kept gray, perhaps in an attempt to make the limited series not seem an apologetic thriller that makes one community come across as victims of a prejudiced system. The son of the politician’s driver, he’s soon dubbed a serial killer and has been on the run for two years.

Continue reading …

Fri, May 2 2025

The six-episode series is an inventive subversion of true-crime storytelling

Rich Girl meets Poor Boy. An affair brews. She is a powerful politician’s daughter; he is her driver’s son. They elope. A fleeting romance mutates into star-crossed love. Her family is not impressed. The sinister search begins. You know this young couple is doomed, because the trauma of watching the first segment of Dibakar Banerjee’s Love Sex Aur Dhokha (2010) and Nagraj Manjule’s Sairat (2016) is still fresh. It’s a tragedy as old as time.

Continue reading …

Fri, May 2 2025

In a cinema dominated by loud guns and mushy romances, ‘Tourist Family’ comes as a breath of fresh air

A family is trying to flee Sri Lanka and lands up in Rameshwaram, only to get noticed by the cops. They are picked up in a police van. The mood is sombre. But what follows is a really funny five-minute sequence that sets the tone for the entire film. It can be argued that Dharmadas (Sasikumar) is this movie’s hero, but the script does not have a single protagonist; rather, it’s this entire family of four that forms the fulcrum of the script. Director Abishan Jeevinth’s Tourist Family is all about boundaries and ways to break them. A Sri Lankan family with fake documentation has arrived in a Chennai colony, which has, among other people, a grumpy man who rarely socialises, a drunkard who keeps getting yelled at, and a girl wanting to move abroad but changing her mind. That all these characters live together and are close-knit makes things interesting. Remember director Radha Mohan’s Mozhi? The first half of Tourist Family reminds one of that 2007 Tamil film, just in terms of feeling and flavour.

Continue reading …

Fri, May 2 2025

There’s a scene well into Abishan Jeevinth’s Tourist Family when the reticent Gunasekhar (Ilango Kumaravel) who shies away from speaking to anyone decides to open up to Vasanthi (an utterly lovely Simran) about how he met his Mangayarkarasi (Sreeja Ravi, who is a puddle of warmth) and why they are all alone. He mentions love, and eloping, and you sense him blushing, despite the age. Elsewhere, a teacher who does not smile easily hides a ready-to-bloom smile at school thinking of the student Mulli (firecracker Kamalesh) who got him to drop him off with absolute nonchalance. At home, tensions rise over a father and son sparring. And then, Nithushan (Mithun Jai Shankar aces this part) shows his folks something and the family struggles to control their laughter. The way this scene plays out is gold.

Continue reading …

Thu, May 1 2025

The Sasikumar-Simran starrer scores heavily on the humour front, and these moments also make you think of how willing audiences are just to forget everything and laugh with a film that also makes them think a lot.

Our world is very cynical. Everything around us screams cynicism, especially in the social media era where everyone is judged, and everything is scrutinised. Probably why our minds love to forget all of that and watch good things happen to good people on the big screen. Even if it might seem ‘cringe’ or ‘boomer-ish’, these films still put a smile on our faces simply because for those couple of hours, we want to feel everything is right and good in this world. It is on this belief that filmmakers like Rajkumar Hirani and Radha Mohan plied their wares over the past two decades. Now, in director Abishan Jeevinth’s debut film, Tourist Family, we find enough evidence to believe that he is a worthy addition to this list of optimists who make the world go round when the cynics believe the world has stopped.

Continue reading …

Fri, May 2 2025

There is a fundamental but very important difference in how we consume food and films. You go in for the same mutton biryani from the same outlet every time because you like how it tastes. If, one day, the taste differs, you will be sorely disappointed, perhaps even making a note to never order from the same restaurant again. How we react to the cinema we like, however, is just the opposite. If you like a film but are presented with almost the same film in its follow-up/sequel, you will reject it. You can look for the same flavour (and perhaps even some familiarity), but you will not appreciate a CtrlC+CtrlV exercise. Raid 2 suffers from this affliction. It is not only a retread into Raid territory, it also doesn’t serve its audience anything that we hadn’t watched in the first film. Seven years ago, director Rajkumar Gupta gave us Amay Patnaik, a sharp-thinking, quick-on-his-feet income tax officer. Honest to a fault and armed with dry humour, Patnaik’s run-in with powerful politician Tauji (a deliciously evil Saurabh Shukla) in what was billed as ’the longest income-tax raid in history’, made for some immensely watchable moments, besides delivering the kind of subtle social commentary that Gupta is known for.

Continue reading …

Fri, May 2 2025

Thu, May 1 2025

कोई फिल्म आकर दिल-दिमाग में जगह बना ले तो मन करता है कि इस जैसी और कहानियां भी आएं ताकि सिनेमा दर्शकों को न सिर्फ मनोरंजन देता रहे बल्कि उन्हें मसालों में लिपटे पलायनवादी सिनेमा से परे ऐसी कहानियां भी परोसे जो हमें खुद से मिलवाती हैं। सात साल पहले जब राजकुमार गुप्ता के निर्देशन में अजय देवगन वाली ‘रेड’ आई थी तो यही उम्मीद जगी थी कि अपने देश में तो इन्कम टैक्स वालों के हैरतअंगेज़ छापों की ढेरों मिसालें हैं सो बहुत जल्द किसी न किसी रेड की कहानी पर्दे पर आ ही जाएगी। लेकिन ऐसा नहीं हुआ। अब सात साल बाद ‘रेड 2’ आई तो मन में अरमान जगे कि ज़रूर इन लोगों के हाथ फिर कोई ज़बर्दस्त कहानी लगी होगी वरना ये लोग इतनी देर नहीं लगाते। मगर क्या ‘रेड 2’ उन अरमानों को पूरा कर पाती है? आइए जानते हैं कि क्या इस फिल्म में वह बात है जो ‘रेड’ में थी, जिसे देख कर मैंने लिखा था कि ऐसी ‘रेड’ ज़रूर पड़े, बार-बार पड़े।

Continue reading …

Fri, May 2 2025

MCU film turns second-string characters into flawed, fun heroes

The latest superhero offering from the Marvel Cinematic Universe might be its most audacious. Thunderbolts introduces a team of assassins and mercenaries who are all wrestling with troubled pasts. Though Bucky Barnes (Sebastian Stan), the Winter Soldier, is the most familiar character, the film centres on Yelena Belova (Florence Pugh), along with Red Guardian (David Harbour), Ghost (Hannah John-Kamen), Taskmaster (Olga Kurylenko) and John Walker (Wyatt Russell)—a low-budget Captain America. Fans will recognise each of them from the MCU, predominantly from Black Widow. What writers Eric Pearson and Joanna Calo, along with director Jake Schreier and producer Kevin Feige, do so well in the 36th MCU film is turn second-string characters—antiheroes, even—into flawed but fun heroes. Thunderbolts* is a bold tonal shift in the MCU, trading flashy heroics for emotional scars and moral ambiguity. There are shades of Suicide Squad here, but this is a more inward-looking movie.

Continue reading …

Thu, May 1 2025

Thunderbolts is aware of the weight of fatigue that it carries, but turns the Avengers sub-plot on its head and delivers a refreshing take on the superhero world post the exit of the Marvel stalwarts.

I have to admit I’ve had the Marvel Superhero fatigue for a while now and have even avoided watching some of the studio’s recent offerings. There are too many now, and everything seems to be having an Avengers hangover. Just when I was about to write off Marvel Cinematic Universe, the studio has sprung a surprise with Thunderbolts- a film that is aware of the weight of fatigue that it carries but turns the Avengers sub plot on its head and delivers a refreshing take on the super hero world post the exit of the Marvel stalwarts. The film, directed by Jack Shreier and featuring Sebastian Stan, Florence Pugh and others, also tackles mental health in the most effective way possible in a story of reluctant, has-been superheroes.

Continue reading …

Thu, May 1 2025

Fri, May 2 2025

Tue, April 29 2025

Thudarum is a new Malayalam action thriller that starts off innocently enough, almost as a family dramedy, but soon becomes much, much darker. The film is a wild ride and throws surprises every now and then. Let’s explore in detail the plot of Thudarum, its ending, which is explained here, its cast, and more. The film features Malayalam superstar Mohanlal in the main role of Shanmugham, who is better known as Benz. The reason? It’s his car, and no, it’s not a Mercedes. In fact, it is a vintage Mark-I Ambassador that he loves more than anyone. Well, not really, as he also has a wife and two children, but you get the point. Until close to halfway mark, Thudarum remains the family movie that the director promised. After that… well, let’s leave for that later. This Malayalam thriller movie also features Shobhna as Shanmugham’s wife Lalitha. The plot kicks off when the said car is seized by the cops. It was at a mechanic’s workshop after being crashed by the friend of Shanmugham and Lalitha’s son, Pavi (Thomas Mathew). The mechanic was charged with possession of marijuana.

Continue reading …

Sat, April 26 2025

Thudarum returns to fans of the actor in all his myriad shades, from the playful to the emotional, in a role which is closer in spirit to the “Mohanlal of the past”

Like a beast taking its time in revealing its true nature, Thudarum almost lulls us into a comfortable space with everyday happenings and innocuous humour in its opening passages. When it shifts shape, it does it ever so slightly, over the course of ‘Benz’ Shanmugham (Mohanlal)‘s pursuit to get back his beloved old car, unfairly seized by the police, and during a night journey up the hills, as one feels the tension ramping up. The film then coasts along on this path, while throwing in Shanmugham’s emotional roots at regular intervals, with the car, with a former stunt master and with his family. With Operation Java and Saudi Vellakka, Tharun Moorthy proved himself as a filmmaker to look forward to, but there was always the apprehension of how he would adapt his approach to a big star. He gets the balance almost right, giving the fans stuff to cheer for without compromising much on what he wants to say, in the way he wants it to be said. Buoyed by a solid story by K.R.Sunil, Tharun gets the right pulse for a mainstream drama. Intelligently woven into the plot is a natural disaster, which turns out to be one of the key elements in a revelation.

Continue reading …

Fri, May 2 2025

Retro is Karthik Subbaraj failing to recreate the magic of Jigarthanda Double X, despite having a solid Suriya at helm.

Retro is Karthik Subbaraj’s intent to make a campy film that aims to bring back a unique flavour of Indian cinema, which was heavily influenced by the likes of Enter The Dragon. It is particularly amusing how Karthik has attempted to use the tropes of the Blaxploitation genre in an Indian setting that hits out at colonialism. He first did it with Jigarthanda Double X, which is Karthick’s tryst with Westerns. He has done it again with Retro, which is his tryst with the 90s martial arts film. Like how Hollywood westerns had an influence on Indian films, the likes of such martial arts action films also made an impression on our filmmakers. However, the former style is more pronounced in our pop culture than the latter. It could be the reason that Retro doesn’t make the same impact as Jigarthanda Double X. Here, Karthik is lost in finding the distinct texture which is elusive for him.

Continue reading …

Fri, May 2 2025

Director Karthik Subbaraj's 'Retro' might not work on all levels, but it’s a film that ends up earning your respect for the wild swings it takes, and for the wilder ways in which it wants to say them.

Has there ever been another Tamil filmmaker as obsessed with the idea of irony as Karthik Subbaraj? You find this obsession in his earlier works too, including the very concept of making a feminist film by giving us the stories of three flawed men. Or the way in which the government’s indifference towards workers who suffered mercury poisoning was addressed in a silent film. Most recently, he also gave us a schoolteacher named Gandhi who goes on to become the biggest bootlegger in Tamil Nadu. But in his latest Retro, irony isn’t just in the details that make up the subtext; it is very much a part of the text as well. This includes something one of the character calls “beautiful irony,” like how a laughter therapy clinic is set up in the same spot that once housed the gallows. Or the cheeky fun Subbaraj is having when Santosh Narayanan plays a tune that resembles a lullaby, as Suriya’s character Paari schools a bunch of bad guys while they call him Doctor Chaplin. You find the same irony coming to the fore when he decides to write a love story about a violent, relentless fighter like Paari, who falls for Pooja Hegde’s Rukmini, a doctor, a healer, who is against violence in any form.

Continue reading …

Thu, May 1 2025

Suriya and Pooja Hegde are compelling in Karthik Subbaraj's entertaining star vehicle that is made to serve a higher purpose, even if it goes around in circles.

How does one know their purpose in life? Who tells them? What makes them realise? Does everyone realise their purpose? And why are some happier being the conduit in someone else’s story rather than being the hero of their own? But isn’t that purpose even bigger than the purpose of the ‘hero’? Retro is director Karthik Subbaraj talking about a political issue that is closest to his heart. Armed with immense filmmaking knowledge, supported by a strong technical team that understands the assignment, Karthik asks himself an important question through the actions of his protagonist, Paarivel Kannan, played by a terrific Suriya.

Continue reading …

Fri, May 2 2025

When Uday Shirurkar, an assistant municipal commissioner at the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), calls a few class IV workers to meet him, the workers are stressed that he is going to fire them. On the contrary, they are pushed on a path of growth when Shirurkar directs them to enroll in a night school and complete their class X.

When waste collection by sanitation workers was briefly paused during the COVID-19 pandemic, it took just a couple of days to show us how important a role they play in society today. Be it choked drainages, burst water lines or piled up garbage heaps, the municipal safai karmacharis are the first responders that get to work. Unfortunately, they’re also the first ones to bear the brunt of citizens’ wrath in such cases. Often it is the educated person that doesn’t think twice before covering their nose and making derogatory remarks about these workers. That lack of empathy and abundance the entitled behaviour also highlights the difference between education and literacy. In multiple scenes of his debut directorial, Shivraj Waichal sheds light on this. At its heart, Ata Thambaycha Naay is an ode to the BMC’s sanitation workers whose life is a paradox – they simultaneously form the backbone of the city and are among the most neglected lot. The film is based on the real story of class IV BMC workers going back to school at the behest of Uday Shirurkar, the erstwhile assistant municipal commissioner of BMC’s ward B.

Continue reading …

Thu, May 1 2025

Revolving around a haunted tree, this messy, inchoate film aims for low-hanging fruits

What’s the deal with Sunny Singh? The actor, in his fairly long career, has been a curious nonentity in Hindi cinema, turning up in any and every film that will have him. He was a mildly amusing presence in the Luv Ranjan Cinematic Universe. But his recent output has been especially bleak. It does not seem to matter if he is playing Lakshmana in Adipurush or a boozy beefcake in Wild Wild Punjab. Whatever the assignment, Singh gives the impression of an amiable jock who’s wandered in from the nearest Hakim’s Aalim. In The Bhootnii, a new horror-comedy, Singh plays Santanu, a student of ‘St. Vincent’s College of Arts and Culture’, a true cradle of learning. Its students occupy themselves with the pursuit of sachi mohabbat (true love), which is understandably hard to come by. Each year, on Valentine’s Day, they hang trinkets and pictures on a wishing tree called the ‘Virgin Tree’. It is worshipped as a bringer of romantic good luck, but it also bodes ill: a tree nymph, played by Mouni Roy, haunts the campus, and has apparently precipitated a string of recent suicides.

Continue reading …

Thu, May 1 2025

'The Bhootnii' is a spirit-breaking addition to a genre that’s past its sell-by date

As a genre, the horror comedy has reached a stage in its afterlife cycle where its ghoulish spirit is haunting theatres and vowing revenge against empty seats. The latest distorted entity is called The Bhootnii, an anti-film posing as a campus comedy set in a university that merges shots of Mumbai’s St. Xavier’s College with the abandoned studio lot of Om Shanti Om (2007) and the miscellaneous cultural energy of Rok Sako To Rok Lo (2004). It stars Mouni Roy as a jilted ghost named Mohabbat who yearns for the love of the student who accidentally summons her after a bad breakup by yelling “Where is my mohabbat?” in front of a tree haunted by her. He wanted to scream at the Virgin Tree (don’t ask), but drunkenly reached the wrong yard on a rainy night. Sometimes I wonder if I’m actually typing these lines in 2025.

Continue reading …

Thu, May 1 2025

Sidhaant Sachdev's film throws you off the cliff where, beyond the worlds of Stree and Khauf, lies a ditch. The Bhootnii can be found there, awaiting its victims: the film critics.

Once in a while, a film comes that breaks even the toughest of the tough. That, when watching, you do not question your existence but the fact that you are still alive. That scoffs at a regular cinephile and vows to teach them a lesson for still wanting to watch Hindi films. Once in a while, a film makes sitting through it an art form and filmmaking into a joke. This year, it is Sidhaant Sachdev’s The Bhootnii. The ’the’ in the title is the only, and the last, semblance of respect the filmmaker offers to anybody associated with the film – actors and audience alike. Everything beyond this unfolds as an assault to the senses and disrespect to the fact of living and the art of surviving. Rage should have made me more coherent, but Sachdev’s film has broken me. If it were a living entity, it would be sitting across and, seeing my lifeless stare into the laptop, celebrating my defeat.

Continue reading …

Thu, May 1 2025

While Sailesh Kolanu succeeds in presenting Nani in a violent action drama, the film itself is a partially satisfying mix of crime thriller and high stakes action entertainer

In a scene from HIT: The Third Case, a character describes Arjun Sarkaar’s (Nani) actions as “classy”. Arjun retorts that this time, he intends to show his true self — stepping away from the image of refinement often associated with him. In another moment, when someone warns him that he “cannot survive here”, he responds, “I’ve been hearing that since the beginning of my career.” These meta-cinematic lines feel less like commentary on the character and more like nods to the actor himself. In HIT 3, director Sailesh Kolanu leans into fan service, casting Nani — long embraced by family audiences — in a darker, bloodier setup. The film carries an ‘A’ certificate, and Nani effectively sheds his man-next-door image to become a ruthless cop whose methods, unsurprisingly, come under scrutiny. Departing from the slow-burn whodunit tone of the earlier films, this third instalment in the HIT universe trades mystery for carnage. It is not about who, how, or even why — the perpetrators are beyond reasoning. The real question is whether the film successfully marries crime thriller elements with full-throttle action to offer a gripping cinematic experience. Some segments land powerfully; others feel stretched or overly engineered.

Continue reading …

Thu, May 1 2025

Bhaskhar Maurya’s debut feature is an ode to ordinary people with extraordinary dreams

Watching director Bhaskhar Maurya’s Telugu film Muthayya, now streaming on ETV Win, feels like shedding the trappings of urban life and settling into an unhurried rural setting, surrounded by affable characters. The story centres on a 70-year-old man from a village in Telangana, who dreams of becoming a film actor and seeing himself on the big screen — just once in his lifetime. Age may not be on his side, but his zest for life remains undiminished. Humour weaves gently through the narrative. In an early scene, two men climb a water tank to unveil a banner. Someone remarks, in the Telangana dialect, “Yem peekindu?” (What did he achieve?). We soon find out. At the heart of the story is Muthayya (played by Sudhakar Reddy of Balagamfame), who owns a modest plot of land that overlooks open fields and distant hills. Each evening, he retreats to his simple dwelling on the land, sharing a drink or two with his much younger friend Malli (Arun Kumar), who runs a cycle repair shop in the village.

Continue reading …

Thu, May 1 2025

The Nawazuddin Siddiqui-starrer expands our reading of heroism, but runs out of steam.

All things considered, Costao is not your cookie-cutter Bollywood biopic. It stars Nawazuddin Siddiqui as Costao Fernandes, the plucky Goa customs officer who killed the brother of a powerful minister in self-defense while trying to bust a gold-smuggling operation in 1991. This incident happens around 30 minutes into the two-hour-long film. At this point, he goes on the run; the Goa police as well as the politician’s goons search for him. The CBI soon puts him on trial for murder, and the gangster plans cold-blooded revenge. He is even attacked in a medical room by henchmen disguised as doctors. Most stories would stage his fight for innocence as an extension of this moment — as a tense battle for survival. One can almost imagine a high-pitched climax where he uncovers proof, exposes the smugglers, wins the case and clears his own name.

Continue reading …

Thu, May 1 2025

Sejal Shah’s flatly-narrated timeline would probably serve better as a documentary

Nawazuddin Siddiqui’s gift to embody individuals committed to their ideology is frequent fodder for cinema. After playing the unwavering Dashrath Manjhi in Manjhi: The Mountain Man, illustrious author Saadat Hasan Manto in Manto, blunt politician and Shiv Sena founder Bal Thackeray in Thackeray and psychotic serial killer Raman Raghav in Raman Raghav 2.0, the actor plays a 1990s Goan hero in the eponymous Costao. Customs officer Costao Fernandes rose to fame for standing his ground against an influential smuggling kingpin when the latter dragged him to court for the murder of his younger brother.

Continue reading …

Thu, May 1 2025

Tue, April 29 2025

Does take a bit too far in places

Another Simple Favour directed by Paul Feig is a sequel to A Simple Favor released in 2018. Both films are based on a book of the same name by Darcey Bell. The sequel is based on the characters written by Darcey Bell but does not explore the same tone or plotline as the previous film. We do get to see many characters return but the twists take wilder turns as the story moves forward. The 2018 film was known for take a deep dive into the thriller genre and exploring the stereotypes in it with two female characters but the sequels drops it all to explore something different. The film begins with Anna Kendrick’s Stephanie Smothers, who has turned into a celebrity and an author. While she is preparing to release her book based on Blake Lively’s Emily aka the allusive blonde in her life, Stephanie is also suffering from PTSD about her crime solving days. She decided to leave it behind after a man shot himself for being accused of sexual harassment and possibly abuse. However, as Miles’ mother she decides to move on with her life. But Emily isn’t done with her yet.

Continue reading …

Tue, April 29 2025

Director Paul Feig's sequel in the Italian countryside is a diverting laugh until it takes a very dark turn.

Based on the characters by author Darcey Bell, the sequel to A Simple Favor (2018) returns with double the craziness and twists of the first film. Several familiar faces are back in Another Simple Favor, directed once again by Paul Feig. But it’s the weird bond between frenemies Stephanie Smothers (Anna Kendrick) and Emily Nelson (Blake Lively) that elevates this fun and freaky sequel. The Italian setting and the wedding venue lead to wild storytelling, which is only saved by the stars’ chemistry and banter. Emily, who is out of prison on appeal, invites her old bestie Stephanie to be her maid of honour at her Italian wedding to a wealthy Italian man, Dante Versano (Michele Morrone), who may or may not be in the mob. As the wedding festivities take off, the bodies begin to drop like flies, and unsurprisingly, mommy vlogger Stephanie is one of the suspects. Is this one of Emily’s tricky traps again?

Continue reading …