Anuj Kumar

Rajkummar Rao is going through a purple patch. Taking a break from his comic capers, this week, the actor dons the cape of an outlaw, a product of social injustice who ends up becoming the mirror image of what he sets out to wipe off. Maalik sounds like a spiritual cousin of Manoj Bajpayee’s Bhaiyya Ji, which was released last year. Both films posit masters of understatement who revel in realistic space in a bombastic, mainstream atmosphere. While Bhaiyya Ji went completely off-key after setting up the conflict, Maalik has its moments as writer-director Pulkit manages to create the mood that we associate with Tigmanshu Dhulia’s kind of cinema. The film is set in the feudal Allahabad of the late 1980s, where Deepak (Rajkummar), the son of a farm worker (a solid Rajendra Gupta), rebels against the landlords to become a ganglord and assumes the title of ‘Maalik.’ The police stations of Uttar Pradesh and Bihar are full of case files of history sheeters like Deepak, who picked up a gun because of caste or class struggle, and were adopted by politicians to maintain the balance of power. Raj lends the flawed character flesh and blood, and adds sparks to the predictable character arc.

Early in Metro… In Dino, a middle-aged, middle-of-the-road Monty Sisodia (Pankaj Tripathi), desperate to press the refresh button in his married life, blurts out infertility, infidelity, and morality in one sentence to his nagging wife, Kajol (Konkona Sen Sharma), who seems caught between the ideals of today and the values of the past. In one comic flourish, director Anurag Basu reveals what his kaleidoscope holds, keeping us invested for almost three hours. A child born when Life in a Metro hit the theaters must be 18 now. Not much has changed in relationships, apart from the fact that now we have a teenager in the film who is grappling with her sexuality, and she is in no hurry. Meanwhile, technology and therapy have alleviated the issues faced by the individualistic generation and the concerns of people who missed the bus because they prioritised their family over themselves. Our films often tilt one way or the other. Critics bracket them as progressive, regressive, or somewhere in between. Anurag and his co-writers once again break the brackets and jettison algorithmic screenplays to craft a heart-warming tale of people falling in and out of love. There are echoes of the original, but Metro…in Dino has its own heart.

After every few years, we have a female star taking on the role of a doting mother who morphs into a saviour of her child and family. It is a time-tested Bollywood formula for the heroine who is losing her space under the spotlight to play her age and yet remain central to the story. The template remains the same, but the public sentiment associated with the mother figure is such that the melodrama keeps getting recycled. From Jaya Prada in Maa to Sridevi in Mom and Raveena Tandon in Maatr, the mother magic has worked for several actors. This week, it is Kajol’s turn to take the mantle and remind the public that, given the opportunity, she can drive a narrative. While her male contemporaries are still romancing young girls, she has already played a couple of compelling mummy variants in Helicopter Eela and Salaam Venky.

In a bid to cash in on the goodwill around the frat-boy comedy, writer-producer Sajid Nadiadwala, this time, lines his boisterous drollery with a layer of mystery in the vacation season. Set on a luxury cruise ship, where a billionaire (Ranjeet) dies and a doctor is silenced, it literally spirals into a search for the Jolly on the high seas. By the end, we encounter multiple claimants, but none pass muster. Sajid has once again put together a galaxy of stars of different wattage, but in the absence of a supple string of wisecracks, the flash of wit loses its lustre. He draws from Todd Phillips’s The Hangover, where temporary memory loss generates unintended chaos, but the way it plays out, Housefull 5 remains a hollow play of words. The gags outlive their welcome, and the political incorrectness and situational humour that are the hallmarks of the franchise no longer organically fit into the narrative.

In the story of Satyanarayan, an important multi-stranded tale in religious storytelling in Indian homes, the protagonists tend to forget the noble deed they promise when they seek a blessing or a favour from the Almighty. But God has His ways to remind the faithful of the unkept vows. Cutting through a web of rituals, writer-director Karan Sharma brings the message of this timeless katha to theatres with a modern-day parable. A rollicking social commentary laced with a layer of magic realism, Bhool Chuk Maaf makes a sharp comment on the growing schism in society where goodness and compassion are often measured on a scale of religious identity, where the goal corrupts our action even when the Bhagavad Gita is invoked on a daily basis.

Same hero, new villain, bigger scale is a formula that often works for a new Bond enterprise or a fresh leap that our Tiger takes. This week, director Raj Kumar Gupta applies the rules of larger-than-life heroes to the new chapter of the unsung Income Tax officer that he created seven years ago. As the honest public servant in slippers took on the might of a feudal lord in the skin of a Member of Parliament, the first film impressed with its compelling premise, watertight screenwriting, and strong performances. Ajay Devgn developed the rugged skin of the intense Amay Patnaik, unperturbed by transfers and threats, but it was Saurabh Shukla who brought the house down with his wicked ways and witty repartees as the relatable villain of the piece.

Bollywood seldom tells stories of Dalit assertion. It mostly sees the marginalised as victims who need the compassion and cover of an upper caste saviour. Perhaps, that’s why the inspirational story of Jyotirao (Pratik Gandhi) and Savitribai Phule (Patralekhaa) remained off the radar of commercial filmmakers. Known to pick up challenging subjects, this week, writer-director Ananth Mahadevan turns his lens on the intrepid Maharashtrian couple that challenged the prevailing social order and the upper caste hegemony in the 19th century through education and progressive values, and started a mission against caste and gender discrimination. Unlike last week, when Kesari fictionalised the story of C. Sankaran Nair beyond recognition to cash on some chest-thumping moments, Mahadevan is sedate, largely sticks to the recorded history, and doesn’t lend his work an overtly agitative tone.

With the OTT platforms investing more energy and intensity into the long form, feature films are languishing like one-day cricket. Rehan (Saif Ali Khan), a rakish thief, is hired by Rajan Aulakh (Jaideep Ahlawat), a criminal in the garb of an art collector, to steal Red Sun, the African equivalent of Kohinoor. The title ‘Jewel Thief’ unnecessarily draws comparisons with Goldie’s iconic crime caper. The makers even drop the name of Vijay Anand in one sequence, but could mine precious little out of flattery. Saif and Jaideep have cut down on flab and look fab in crisp suits. It is hard to decipher who has a better drawl or could chew the scenery and the vowels better. While the boys jostle to steal the scene, an elegant Nikita Dutta sparkles in a glam avatar. However, the visual aspect fails to liven up the flat writing and insipid music.