Priyanka Roy

Any mention of the Kapoors elicits certain images — a twinkle-toed Raj Kapoor in Mera joota hai Japani, Shammi Kapoor’s ducktail hair having a life of its own as he brought every scene and song alive, a boyishly handsome Shashi Kapoor memorably declaring: “Mere paas maa hain” and Rishi Kapoor’s infectious smile, easy moves and enviable collection of pullovers…. What also comes to mind when we think of the Kapoors is the clan — across generations — gathering for their annual Christmas lunch, a tradition that the youngsters in the family have made a point to keep alive.

Blending humour with heart, marrying honesty with ingenuity and melding the geopolitical with the personal has been the trademark of The Family Man. It is a formula that has worked for the eyeball-grabbing, almost-cult series across two seasons. Except that none of it has ever felt like formula. That is primarily — if not solely, in many instances — been because of its Everyman protagonist. Manoj Bajpayee’s Srikant Tiwari aka “The Family Man” has never been a conventional secret agent. His looks are deceptive and his ticking time-bomb of a mind is masked by an otherwise imperceptible demeanour, but every time The Family Man has come perilously close to falling prey to convention, its unconventional hero has pulled it back. That also forms the bedrock of its latest season, one that has been feverishly anticipated ever since the curtains came down on its sophomore outing four years ago.

Bhooma is pursuing her Masters in literature at a college and staying in the hostel. A simple girl with solid values, Bhooma is lured — partly by circumstances, partly by other factors which are beyond her control (or not) — into a relationship with college jock Vikram. As the days go by, Bhooma — though doted on by Vikram on the surface (‘on the surface’ being the operative words here) — finds herself trapped in an increasingly toxic relationship that she sees no escape from. Till one day, driven against the wall (or, rather, door) she decides that enough is enough.

The law of diminishing marginal utility is perilously close to catching up with Delhi Crime. The Netflix series, widely regarded as the gold standard in storytelling, and not just in the OTT space, ups the ante in terms of scale — the new season travels from Silchar in Assam to Rohtak in Haryana, with Delhi as its epicentre — and players (Huma Qureshi features as the antagonist this time around), but doesn’t offer anything that is remotely novel. Why fix something that ain’t broke, you may ask. Truth be told, in this era of increasing competition for viewer eyeballs and decreasing levels of audience attention, bringing in something new, even within the limits of a tried-and-tested format, is #basic.

Horrors of the land, horrors of the mind and horrors of the past coalesce in Baramulla. The result is an intriguing concoction which may often feel unique, but also one that makes for an uneven ride. Set against the potent backdrop of Kashmir — as is evident from its unequivocal title — Baramulla explores the historically ravaged land where the terror of the present and the trauma of the past co-exist on an everyday basis, one often seeping into the other.

An individual’s right to dignity being sacrosanct forms the bedrock of Haq. This is especially resonant in the setup in which the film operates — a time and space where religion, laws, societal norms and gender bias are heavily stacked against its protagonist, but one who refuses to go down without fighting the good fight. That is the battle — both in court and outside it — that Shazia Bano (Yami Gautam Dhar) wages for more than a decade against her husband Abbas Khan (Emraan Hashmi). Her demand? That Abbas pay maintenance towards their three children even after he claims to have divorced her through the highly contentious ’triple talaq’ route after marrying a second time.

There is nothing wrong with an inconclusive ending. Many popular films — some even cult classics, without a shred of doubt — have ended on a note that invites speculation many decades later. Think The Shining. Think Donnie Darko. Think The Inception. But what about an ending which is not really an ending, ambiguous or otherwise? One which builds its tension to claustrophobic levels in the first hour and then allows it to inexplicably dissipate in the next? A House of Dynamite — Kathryn Bigelow’s latest look at how we could be seconds away from being wiped out of existence in this age of nuclear weaponry — is that kind of film. As one review aptly noted about this film — A House of Dynamite is good… until it isn’t.

Vash: Level 2 literally hits the ground running — pun fully intended. The sequel to the 2023 Gujarati film Vash (which found its Hindi remake in last year’s Shaitaan, starring Janki Bodiwala from the original, along with Ajay Devgn, R. Madhavan and Jyothika) retains the deeply unsettling psychological horror vibe of the first film, all the while expanding its canvas in terms of plot and players.