Fri, September 11 2026

Staggeringly foolish notions make for unintended comedy

Last week Gandhari, this week Haiwaan, Bollywood needs to exploit a new handicap to traumatise moviegoers. Priyadarshan’s remake of his Mohanlal starrer Oppam revolves around a blind man. One fourth of Haiwaan is spent drilling this over and over again. Those who can see are hardly better off.Watching Haiwaan is such a tormenting exercise, I wonder whether everyone associated with this monstrosity made a secret pact to remain blindfolded at the time of script reading. Having skipped the Malayalam original, nothing could have prepared me for the stupidity in store. For a change, the tendency among Hindi remakes to become glossed-up avatars of their source material, swapping substance for style, is the least of its crimes.

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Fri, September 11 2026

Priyadarshan’s irredeemable Hindi remake of his Malayalam thriller stars Saif Ali Khan as a blind caretaker and Akshay Kumar as a vengeful killer

If there were a world in which simply “Why?” could pass off as a professional film review, I’d happily live in it. But here I am instead, wondering how to do my job, after 164 minutes of precisely the kind of movie that makes Bollywood everyone’s favourite punching bag. Priyadarshan’s Haiwaan, a remake of Priyadarshan’s Oppam, is inane in so many ways that one is spoiled for choice. I had vowed to be kinder and calmer to bad thrillers; it’s easy to be entertaining when the only motive is to surprise the audience. But this kindness and calmness disappeared two scenes in, when the blind protagonist sings a happy-go-lucky song and dances optimistically on a ferry to Mumbai like a 1980s hero striving in the wrong decade; this is moments after he is introduced as a part-time wrestler, guitarist and all-round truster who has just fixed his sister’s marriage. It’s hard not to be defeated by the delusionally dated tone before the premise even begins.

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Fri, September 11 2026

With a runtime of 2 hours and 44 minutes, the film ultimately stretches a thin premise far beyond its limits leaving little impact by the time it ends.

After the death of a retired judge (Boman Irani), his loyal aide, visually impaired maintenance worker Shyam Rane (Saif Ali Khan), senses foul play. Without actually seeing him, he detects the presence of a killer, Parshuram (Akshay Kumar), in the room. Can Shyam track down the murderer, who is himself on the prowl? Driven by rage and revenge, Parshuram stalks Shyam like a shadow as he attempts to get to the judge’s daughter. He has scores to settle with her father and will stop at nothing. Can Shyam save her from the clutches of this haiwaan? A Hindi remake of Priyadarshan’s own Malayalam thriller Oppam (2016), the film makes you wonder why the director felt the need to revisit the story, especially when the material feels this dramatically thin. Devoid of a compelling mystery or sustained tension, the narrative quickly turns flat and monotonous. The writing fails to create intriguing characters or situations that keep you invested, let alone on the edge of your seat.

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Fri, September 11 2026

Never draws you into its world nor explains the mind and motivation of its heroes or even the mood within a nation they're going through so much trouble for,

The idea of The Revolutionaries came about with filmmaker Nikkhil Advani’s desire to bring a young generation’s underground movement to focus. Though committed to India’s fight for freedom, these headstrong men and women employed methods in complete contrast to Mahatma Gandhi’s pacifist philosophy. Expressing disappointment at the latter’s criticism of their ways, it’s the armed side of India’s independence struggle, inspiring the likes of Bhagat Singh and Udham Singh in the future, that finds favour in the eight-part series. Series like Freedom at Midnight and Rocket Boys render Advani a perfect fit to adapt Sanjeev Sanyal’s Revolutionaries: The Other Story of How India Won Its Freedom. The filmmaker proved himself to be solid at the long format, period drama gig but there are just too many things going on and going wrong to invest in the events leading to its goals of Ghadar. Set in the 1910s, The Revolutionaries picks its key figures in Rash Behari Bose (Bhuvan Shome), Sachindra Nath Sanyal (Rohit Saraf), Bagha Jatin (Gurfateh Pirzad) and Pratibha Lahiri (Pratibha Ranta) as the plot skims to and fro between Benares, Dehradun, Delhi and Kolkata.

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Fri, September 11 2026

PS Mithran's sequel to 'Sardar' loses momentum in the second half, sinking into generic territory with its overblown plotline

The first half of Sardar 2 may seem familiar, but at least it commits to the kind of spy thriller it wants to be. There’s a lofty idea in there about a Japanese-made bioweapon that’s being kept secret by the Indian Research and Analysis Wing (RAW), and there’s a thrilling flashback that gives you the origins of how this weapon got to India in the first place. Set predominantly in the 1980s, the film sees Bose (Karthi), or Sardar, navigating the complexities of this international mission, and we also get a series of Mission: Impossible-style action set pieces that cover everything from the back of an airplane to the front of a Japanese bullet train.

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Fri, September 11 2026

Director PS Mithran's Sardar 2, starring Karthi, SJ Suryah and Malavika Mohanan, is a predictable sequel that is engaging in parts. However, the overstretched climax drags down the film.

Sardar, directed by PS Mithran, gave Tamil cinema a rooted spy character in 2022, well before Dhurandhar made the genre fashionable. Four years later, Sardar (Karthi) — who swears by the line, “Once a spy, always a spy” — returns with a shot at correcting a mistake that cost thousands of lives. The first film ended with Bose, aka Sardar, accepting his fate as a branded terrorist despite never committing espionage. His son Viji, inducted into RAW, has since been sidelined into a dummy unit handling no cases of consequence. Sardar 2 hands him a chance to prove himself — just as a bigger threat surfaces. What brings Sardar out of exile? Can father and son join forces against Black Dagger, a mercenary outfit endangering 140 crore people? The film spends a patient three hours answering these questions.

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Fri, September 11 2026

The poignant drama stars Manoj Bajpayee as a stubborn Mumbai resident resisting the redevelopment of his modest housing colony

Based on Aravind Adiga’s novel of the same name, Ben Rekhi’s Last Man In Tower is defined by its curious relationship with storytelling. It starts out like a vintage Bombay movie with ‘characters’ and designs of a scrappy fairytale about the old guard holding down the brick fort in the face of rampant gentrification. There’s a sense of community and colour. It’s 2010, the setting is a crumbling colony called Vishram (“Rest”) in Mumbai’s suburb of Vakola, and the residents are diverse: the touchy Punjabi lady with a neurodivergent son, the generous old Catholic couple, the fiery single mom accused of ‘communism,’ the mild-mannered building secretary, the lone Muslim family, the street-smart hustler, and the single working girl who becomes the subject of gossip for having a sex life. Retired teacher Yogesh Mishra (Manoj Bajpayee) is the fair and level-headed patriarch of this unofficial family; he tutors the kids and schools the adults.

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Fri, September 11 2026

The film explores our inherent tussle between preserving simpler times, community and culture, and embracing the promise of a better tomorrow.

Based on Aravind Adiga’s bestselling novel and adapted for the screen by Sooni Taraporevala, Ben Rekhi’s poignant drama centres on Masterji (Manoj Bajpayee), the lone resident of an ageing Mumbai housing society who resists redevelopment, determined to preserve the home and community he holds dear. His refusal to bow to the demands of his fellow residents and the builder (Boman Irani) soon makes him a thorn in their side. Ironically, his fight to save their community leaves him increasingly lonely and isolated. Viewed as someone depriving them of a better life, the people he once considered friends ostracise him, dismissing his principles as outdated. In a world where everyone is racing to own bigger homes and lead more luxurious lives, our threshold for tolerance, empathy and togetherness has drastically diminished. We crave privacy and space while secretly watching those viral AI videos of families travelling together in cozy vans. We have time to argue with strangers on social media, but barely bother to know our next-door neighbours. The safety net and community culture of Mumbai’s chawls and old buildings are fast disappearing, and Masterji finds himself fighting a losing battle to preserve a way of life that is slowly becoming extinct.

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Fri, September 11 2026

इस अनंत ब्रह्मांड में तिनके जितनी बड़ी मुंबई। उसमें तिनके से भी छोटी विश्राम सोसायटी। उस सोसायटी का एक ज़र्रा योगेश मिश्रा। लेकिन इस एक ज़र्रे की ज़िद के चलते इस सोसायटी की दुनिया थम-सी गई है। दरअसल एक बिल्डर इस सोसायटी के टॉवर गिरा कर वहां नई बिल्डिंग बनाना चाहता है। वह सबको मार्केट रेट से ज़्यादा पैसे दे रहा है। एक-एक करके सब लोग फ्लैट बेचने को राज़ी हो जाते हैं, सिवाय रिटायर्ड टीचर योगेश मिश्रा के। अब कैसे बनेगी यहां नई बिल्डिंग? मास्टरजी राज़ी होंगे या नहीं? कौन मनाएगा उन्हें और कैसे? क्या वह मान जाएंगे…? भारतीय मूल के ऑस्ट्रेलियाई लेखक-पत्रकार अरविंद अडिगा के चर्चित उपन्यास ‘द व्हाइट टाइगर’ पर इसी नाम से प्रियंका चोपड़ा और राजकुमार राव वाली फिल्म 2021 में आ चुकी है। अब आई यह फिल्म ‘लास्ट मैन इन टॉवर’ (Last Man in Tower) अरविंद के इसी नाम के उपन्यास पर आधारित है।

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Fri, September 11 2026

Tigmanshu Dhulia’s return to form stars Arshad Warsi as a dreaded dacoit and Pratik Gandhi as the honest officer in pursuit

You can tell when a film-maker returns to their comfort zone. There’s something dry and unfussy about the storytelling, as if to say: No big deal, I know what I’m doing. There’s a conventional template and familiar tropes, but the padding is full of little observations, themes, subplots and set-pieces that don’t call for attention. The treatment is casual, confident. It’s almost like watching a tennis player competing on their favourite court after a while: all muscle memory and twitches. That’s director Tigmanshu Dhulia’s relationship with the hinterland crime drama. More than a decade after Paan Singh Tomar, his latest, Ghamasaan, tells a cop-and-dacoit tale in Bundelkhand of the mid-2000s. It’s soothing to see how relaxed the movie is. The prolific Arshad Warsi plays Maharaj (based on Dadua, the actual ‘Veerappan of Bundelkhand’), a god-fearing jungle king who terrorises villages and slaughters traitors; Warsi has been enjoying quite a second wind lately, and regardless of the tone he occupies — whether sullen cop, comedic gangster or serious don — he always brings something new to the table. The reliable Pratik Gandhi plays IPS Aditya Singh, the all-business outsider tasked with capturing Maharaj and his trigger-happy gang.

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Fri, September 11 2026

Co-created by Greg Daniels and Michael Koman, the mockmentary-style spinoff proves that it's here to stay.

The 2001 British series The Office launched the mockumentary sitcom which many have tried to replicate. Its American remake was the most successful one; last year, it officially got a spinoff, The Paper, set in Toledo, Ohio. The first season, which introduced the characters, took some time to set up, but the second season is finally settling into its identity. Led by About Time’s Domhnall Gleeson and The White Lotus’ Sabrina Impacciatore, the comedy fully embraces its cringe storylines that find its characters at their most outrageous. The Paper is also about the dying field of print journalism; however, those B-plots are either a hit or a miss.

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Fri, September 11 2026

Director Mathimaran Pugazhendhi's Mandaadi, starring Soori, Suhas and Mahima Nambiar, is an interesting film centred on a sailboat race. The film tackles themes of friendship, mentorship, betrayal and second chances in life.

Actor Soori’s transformation from a comedian to a protagonist is a testament to his hard work, perseverance and resilience. If there’s one thing that deserves appreciation in this renewed journey, it’s his script choices. With Mandaadi, Soori has picked a story centred on a sailboat race, a sport rarely seen in films. The unusual setting gives the film a distinct identity from the outset. A young Maari (Mithun Jai Sankar), in the opening sequence of Mandaadi, almost kills antagonist Saatapuli (Suhas) and his son. A commotion at a local temple festival stops Maari from completing the murders. Saatapuli, an influential man who controls the sailboat business and racing team, is now hunting Maari. He escapes to Chennai and seeks help from Muthukaali (Soori), who works at a theme park in the city.

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Thu, September 10 2026

காவல் அதிகாரியாக இருக்கும் பபிதா சிங் (நிமிஷா சஜயன்) பணியிடத்தில் தன் நலனைப் பார்க்காமல், பிறருக்காகவே ஒவ்வொன்றையும் யோசிக்கிறார். இரண்டு வாரம் விடுமுறை கிடைத்தால், தன் கணவரின் சகோதரியின் வளைகாப்பு நிகழ்வுக்குச் சென்றுவிடலாம் எனத் திட்டமிடுகிறார். ஆனால், விடுப்பு கிடைப்பதிலும் சில சிக்கல்கள் எழுகின்றன. மற்றொரு காவல் அதிகாரி செய்த தவற்றைத் தன்னுடைய தவறென ஒப்புக்கொண்டு இரண்டு வாரம் சஸ்பெண்ட் ஆகிறார் பபிதா சிங். இந்த இடைவெளியில் கணவரின் சகோதரி வளைகாப்புக்காக ஊருக்குச் செல்கிறார் பபிதா சிங். ஆனால், அங்கு பபிதாவின் பள்ளிக்கால நெருங்கிய நண்பர் மர்மமான முறையில் மரணமடைகிறார். அவருடைய மரணத்துக்குப் பின்னிருக்கும் காரணங்களை பபிதா சிங் அலசுவதே இந்த பிரைம் வீடியோ படத்தின் கதை.

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Wed, September 2 2026

Unrest begins at home in Ambiecka Pandit's small-town crime film that doubles as a bleak social drama

A young woman is visiting her in-laws for the first time. She’s eager to impress them. She cooks, cleans, runs the house. She’s hurt by their jibes but tries not to show it. Her husband is mild-mannered but thin-skinned; she has to apologise for pulling his leg. Their lovemaking is awkward. She puts her interests on hold, but it isn’t enough. Slowly, she comes to a boil. She’s played by Nimisha Sajayan. The film is The Great Indian Kitchen. Or is it Babita Singh Reporting? It’s a little strange to watch Sajayan, one of the best actors in India today, undergo similar trials and humiliations to ones she endured five years ago, in her most celebrated role. Ambiecka Pandit’s Hindi film is a world removed from Jeo Baby’s Malayalam drama. But Sajayan’s Babita is a close cousin to her unnamed wife in that film, a silent sufferer until all the silence is wrung out of her.

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Mon, August 31 2026

Director Ambiecka Pandit mounts a small-town murder mystery which functions far more effectively as a breakdown of hypocrisy than as an unconventional procedural.

At a time when the diary of police procedurals is cluttered with gravity-defying cops and preachy social commentaries masquerading as investigative dramas, Babita Singh reports with a quiet yet telling subversion. The biting social critique tells us how our society tolerates a woman’s professional ambition only on the condition of absolute domestic continuity. Her career must remain invisible to the men of the house; it cannot cost them their hot meals or their sense of absolute supremacy. It captures how this cycle is policed not just by men, but by the matriarchs of the family, the mothers and sisters-in-law. Of course, there is a murder investigation as well, but it works as a narrative camouflage. The mystery lies in decoding the pervasive patriarchy.

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Wed, September 9 2026

Divyenndu's Munna makes a comeback to hog the limelight as Puneet Krishna's dialogues retain potential for yet again inspiring many a meme

If there was one show that was asking for a big screen treatment, it was Mirzapur. The desi hinterland iteration of The Godfather, with politics, violence, foul language, turf wars and dialogues that spread like wildfire on social media, drew an instant following. Season three was the weakest of the lot, so the makers knew what needed to be done to lure fans back. Cue: bring back Munna (Divyenndu). Set in 2018, in what would still be the first season, a chunk of Mirzapur: The Movie is devoted to establishing the characters and indulging in some world building for those unfamiliar with dirty politicking in Purvanchal Uttar Pradesh. But the movie invariably is a reminder as to how Munna is the lynchpin, with much of the limited winning, funny moments all belonging to Divyenndu.

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Tue, September 8 2026

Examining its ambitious leap from streaming to cinema, Pankaj Tripathi’s commanding performance, Rajasthan’s striking visual scale, and whether the franchise deserves a lasting theatrical future.

Few commodities have proved as bankable on celluloid as crime, and the enduring appetite for bloodshed, betrayal and underworld intrigue shows little sign of abating. It is perhaps no great surprise, then, that after three seasons of mayhem and moral disintegration on Prime Video, Mirzapur should make the leap from the streaming screen to the big screen. Mirzapur: The Movie reaches back to the world established in the first season in 2018, when Akhandanand Tripathi, better known as Kaleen Bhaiya (Pankaj Tripathi), presides over Mirzapur like its self-appointed monarch, controlling an intricate empire built on the twin pillars of drugs and firearms. Yet his seemingly impregnable dominion is already beginning to show fissures, as challenges emerge from within his family as well as from increasingly formidable adversaries beyond it.

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Mon, September 7 2026

‘Mirzapur: The Movie’ is both cinema and marketing, designed to reward those who love the show, but also a feature film with a story to tell

Mirzapur: The Movie has the peculiar challenge of starting in the middle of a story, a set of relationships and a world that its audience already knows intimately. There are no introductions, no explanations, no time wasted telling us who these people are, what they want and what they mean to each other. They arrive on the big screen with histories, grudges, loyalties and complicated equations that audiences have watched unfold over three seasons of Mirzapur. During the movie’s 197-minute running time, writer Puneet Krishna’s screenplay begins to introduce a new plot and new players, and what initially seems like an elaborate exercise in fan service gradually finds a life of its own.

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Tue, September 8 2026

Instead of a gritty, remorseful gangster saga, Toxic is an exhausting 194-minute ego trip for its lead star, Yash. We discuss the clash of visions between director Geetu Mohandas’s attempt at an emotional father-son remorse drama and Yash’s demand for high-octane KGF-style star worship. Naturally, the film collapses under the weight of its conflicting ambitions. We also talk about the baffling visual language, its performative gender dynamics, and the claustrophobic close-ups that make a ₹500 crore budget look like cheap AI slop.

Mon, August 31 2026

What might happen when a woman filmmaker gets the opportunity to make a film about violence and sex? What might happen when she gets access to all the familiar toys of the male-star vehicle: the punch dialogues, the star, the swagger, the slow-motion sequences, the sex, the violence… What might she bring to this cinema that we don’t generally get? As it turns out… quite a lot. First, she refuses to see the protagonist, Raya, as a ‘hero’. Quite the opposite, in fact. The film isn’t interested in hero-villain demarcations, right-wrong judgments. Raya (Yash) himself says as much at one point. When you are in pain, morality stops seeming important. The film, in fact, has a lot to say about the nature of pain, about what happens when you live with it for so long that you begin to fall in love with it, when it begins to feel more like home than any real home ever could, ever did. There’s a fantastic song in the Tamil version, ‘Vittupogaadha Yen Vali’, that speaks of this dichotomy. “Vittupoiduma en vali, poi vidaadhe en vali…”

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Sun, August 30 2026

Three years after being announced, Toxic has reached theatres with its gangster world intact, but its women viewed largely through Raya. The central disappointment is that the promised female gaze never meaningfully shapes the film's perspective.

Three years after Yash and Geetu Mohandas announced Toxic, the film is finally in theatres. And after all the waiting, the anticipation and the speculation, one question remains stubbornly unanswered: where is the female gaze Geetu promised? In a throwback interview, Geetu described Toxic as a “gangster film”. She said, “It’s a gangster genre with a female gaze. How about that?” When the teaser dropped in July, that was the question everyone asked. Now, after three hours of Toxic, a more pointed one takes its place: does the film ever really see its women at all? Rewind to 2023. When Yash and Geetu Mohandas announced their collaboration, eyebrows went up. Here was a star coming off the monumental success of the KGF franchise, joining forces with a filmmaker known for her distinct, uncompromising voice. Would these two very different cinematic worlds click, or would the pairing end up a spectacular miss? There seemed to be little room for anything in between.

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Mon, September 7 2026

If the first half is a wildly original re-imagination of a film like 'Idle Hands', the second half is a cop-out based around broader aspects of SS Rajamouli’s 'Eega'.

Nahas Hidhayath, both writer and director of I’m Game, does something clever by setting his second film in Hyderabad. When looked at purely as a business proposition, it makes sense given the stardom Dulquer Salmaan enjoys in the two Telugu-speaking states. From a narrative lens, the Hyderabad setting complements the film’s larger-than-life aspirations and the audacity with which it navigates a particularly improbable plotline. But instead of settling for this alien setting alone, it adds Tamil characters to its core. The film doesn’t even make a big deal of this, choosing instead to play this lack of specificity as something very natural to the film’s urban setting. What these choices do is prepare us for a film that feels like it was not made in Malayalam. But there are advantages to this too. Instead of looking for realism or the crutch of logic to enter its crazy world, we’re already there about 10 minutes into the film. This creates a distance, as though this story is happening somewhere else, but it also sets the stage for the film to take a wild swing at almost anything, as long as it entertains.

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Sun, September 6 2026

Nahas Hidhayath and Dulquer Salmaan aim big, but beyond its rich production values, the film remains stuck between a peculiar body-horror thriller and a template revenge drama

I’m Game is essentially the story of two men. On one hand (pun intended), we have Dan John (Dulquer Salmaan), a compulsive gambler, and on the other, Vicky (Antony Varghese Pepe), a passionate cricketer. It so happens that their lives get ‘accidentally’ intertwined by a sheer twist of fate, leading to plenty of confusion, drama, realisation and eventually, resolution. Nahas Hidhayath’s story may not be entirely fresh, with many films in the past, including in Malayalam, exploring similar territories, but the material is still pulpy enough for a commercial potboiler. If you think of it, the director’s debut, RDX, a smashing hit, also had a generic storyline, but the execution was right on the money for an action-heavy entertainer. With I’m Game, the young filmmaker aims really big. Bigger stars, better production values, broader themes, but the ambitious vision is spoilt by some mediocre writing and shoddy execution, resulting in a mishmash of a genre hybrid film that’s stuck somewhere between a promising body-horror thriller and a template revenge drama.

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Sat, September 5 2026

Nahas Hidhayath's film, starring Dulquer Salmaan, has some flair but extends a neat hook beyond its elasticity

It’s quite easy to describe I’m Game, Nahas Hidhayath’s follow up to his wildly entertaining debut, RDX (2023). Imagine if SP Muthuraman’s Enakkul Oruvan (1984) and Madonne Ashwin’s Maaveeran (2023) had a baby. The older film is a kooky reincarnation saga played with melodramatic earnestness while the latter maintains an irony-tipped sharpness through its serious action-oriented storytelling. I’m Game doesn’t always get the ratio of this mix right, but it hedges its bets on the handful of inventive ideas that keeps the proceedings engaging.

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Sun, September 6 2026

As much as it’s tightly acted, I got a sense that Furious is also a writer’s show

At the height of the #MeToo movement in 2018, something I read seared itself into my brain. “Men should be grateful that women are asking for equality. Not revenge.” For all the patronising tone at home, casual sexism at the workplace, catcalling on the street, groping in public transport, full-blown sexual assaults/attempts in most known/unknown corners of the city, the isolation and gaslighting that takes root after – I’ve often wondered why women still speak to men. In fact, why don’t they start their day by attacking the first man they meet? It’s an urge buried deep within Elizabeth Merriweather’s Furious – a first-rate serial killer mystery, which reveals itself as a reckoning of female rage at its most unvarnished, unbridled and intricate.

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