Priyanka Roy

A fundamental problem of Kanika Dhillon’s writing — and that is particularly evident in the case of the films in which there is a raging female protagonist — is that the ideas burst with immense possibilities, but the execution (and that stems from the root of its weak writing itself) is far from effective. Dhillon focuses on flawed, unapologetic women thrust into circumstances which often place them in a do-or-die decision-making pivot, but the result is more of an unhinged chaotic mess than a carefully-built complex quagmire. This is especially true of Kangana Ranaut’s Judgementall Hai Kya, in which Dhillon explored gaslighting, but the film’s convoluted look at mental health came in for much criticism. Or for that matter, Do Patti, with Kriti Sanon featuring in a double role, that felt like a superficial, glossy take on domestic abuse.

Nimisha Sajayan in Babita Singh ReportingIn 2021, The Great Indian Kitchen — a genre-defying, gender dynamic-defining Malayalam film — brought patriarchy to the forefront in ways both casual and conscious, with its scathing social commentary highlighting the invisible, exhausting and unacknowledged labour in the domestic space that most women in our kitchens, and outside it, are still subjected to. Nimisha Sajayan walked away with the spotlight in the film — symbolised by that triumphant walkout at the end — with her character, who is simply credited as “The Wife”, reclaiming autonomy and rejecting the status quo. In many ways, The Great Indian Kitchen, directed by Jeo Baby, feels like a companion piece to Babita Singh Reporting, the new Prime Video film, that stars Sajayan as its protagonist.

Before debating on the yays and nays of Awarapan 2, an undeniable fact has to be acknowledged: Awarapan is a case study. A box-office bomb on release a year short of two decades ago, the film ended up last in a three-way clash at the box office in end-June 2007, lagging behind even Himesh Reshammiya’s Aap Kaa Surroor. At a time when Emraan Hashmi was bolstered/ burdened by the ‘Serial Kisser’ tag, thanks to his lip-scapades on screen, the Mohit Suri film gave us a brooding, silent leading man, a gangster lamenting the loss of his love and seeking redemption by rescuing a damsel in distress. My review, written on release day, had even mentioned how a non-kissing Emraan Hashmi was no fun, words that I have learnt to regret in retrospect. The film, despite its moments and its music, didn’t work.

At the end of Operation Safed Sagar, the following words light up the screen: “Operation Safed Sagar remains the highest aerial offensive operation in history. The Indian Air Force flew a total of 7,631 sorties during the Kargil War across its helicopter, transport and fighter squadrons…. (It is) an operation without parallel in the history of aerial warfare”. Operation Safed Sagar is also a series with little or no parallel in the history of Indian storytelling. Across six episodes, the Netflix show not only talks about facts and figures, numbers and nuances, but also underlines the emotional depth of an operation driven by both patriotic fervour and personal payback.

Through comics and cinema, the cornerstone of the story of men (and women) in spandex is common — it is no cakewalk being a superhero. For decades, our superheroes — even as they have fought fierily and rescued humankind over and over again — have wrestled with self-doubt, isolation, guilt and the pitfalls of leading a double life. All of these feelings explode in the latest Spider-Man outing, with Brand New Day being a crowd-pleasing as well as cerebral film, directed by Destin Daniel Cretton and written by Chris McKenna and Erik Sommers (drawn, of course, from characters originally created by Stan Lee and Steve Ditko).

In Interstellar, a mission to save humanity encompasses the universe, but the emotional core is a deeply moving father and daughter bond. In Inception, the grand, gravity-defying action may be a high-stakes blockbuster spectacle, but it is the deeply personal trauma of the protagonist that drives the narrative. A gritty beach evacuation in Dunkirk is held together by his silent, brooding moments. The backdrop of atomic fission in Oppenheimer is balanced with the psychological turmoil that plays within the man who catalyses it. In The Dark Knight, Gotham is refashioned as a sprawling, worldly canvas overrun with mobsters, corrupt law enforcers and vigilantes.

A lot is at stake in Ikka, and we are aren’t just talking about the receding hairlines of its main men. Almost three decades after they came together on screen for Border, Sunny Deol and Akshaye Khanna feature in this commercial Bollywood-style courtroom thriller that cranks up melodrama to the max, but is nostalgically old-school enough to make for some guilty-pleasure viewing. Unlike Border, where they batted for the same team, Sunny and Akshaye are at loggerheads in this Siddharth P. Malhotra-directorial, though they do join forces — unwillingly for the former — for a large part of this film that throws in enough twisty plot points but isn’t particularly smart or sleek.

In the deadline-driven world of film review writing, I find time hanging, every Friday afternoon, like the proverbial Sword of Damocles over my head. I write most of what I absorb; in hindsight, I feel I have invariably left out some observations. But that holds true for almost everything in life. With Satluj, there was so much to take in, feel, assimilate and ponder, that I allowed the film to stay and grow within me for a day before I put my emotions into words. But Satluj wasn’t allowed to breathe for more than 48 hours. Dropped silently on Friday evening, it was pulled off Zee 5, without a doubt the most courageous streaming platform out there, within Sunday night. The platform — whose triptych of bold storytelling (Berlin, Kennedy) was crowned by Satluj — put out a statement saying that the film would be “unavailable in India until further notice” owing to “current developments”. It also vowed to bring back Satluj, as well as continue its endeavour to promote creators with artistic integrity and conviction. We hope the platform will come through with its promise and purpose every time.