Rahul Desai

Don’t Be Shy revolves around 20-year-old Shyamili “Shy” Das: that fourth-wall-breaking and self-involved student with a foolproof life plan, a rich boyfriend she needs, a hunky childhood friend she disowns, a trendy college she attends, a first name she’s ashamed of, a middle-class Bengali upbringing she hides, and a family shop she resents. Shy (Aarushi Bajaj) parents her fun-loving parents at home and plays the popular-cool-mean girl on campus. She’d be an influencer in most worlds, but her folks are apparently too poor to buy her a BlackBerry, so social media is ruled out. You know she’s going to be humbled and come of age, learn the value of authenticity, and get all her missteps settled with the neatness of shiny wrapping paper and a bow on top. But the question a movie like Don’t Be Shy unwittingly leaves you with is: Why are kids so annoying?

A 17-year-old girl walks into a police station. Her name is Meenu Rawat, but anonymity is going to be her shield. Her anxious parents try to lodge her complaint. But the first hurdle is a sign of things to come. A devout officer going around distributing prasad to his colleagues puts a sticky ladoo in her hand. The girl is paralysed with fear. The sacred sweet not only reveals the permeation of blind faith in a law enforcement space; it also reminds her of a trust betrayed. By her elders, who admitted her into a god-fearing school run by a spiritual organisation. By the teachers and parents, who were too brainwashed to question their holy ways. By a middle-class culture that forces its citizens to seek refuge in the flowery proverbs of dodgy orators. And by the beloved godman, who preyed on her under the guise of a ‘purification ritual’. Meenu, a minor, breaks the gaze of the sweet, regains her numbness, and places herself in the sticky hands of a system that normalises poisoned apples. The family takes all night to file a sexual assault report against the cult leader, Sunil “Baapji” Chakosi. And it’s only the beginning.

I’ve reviewed thousands of Hindi films over the years, so I don’t say this lightly: The Vvaan: Force of the Forrest is one of the foremost painful experiences I’ve had in a cinema hall. There are times I looked around to confirm that this was indeed a legitimate screening, and I was indeed awake — and alive. The liberal desecration of language in the title (Vvaan, Forrest) for astrological reasons is a warning that the stars have forsaken us. Because The Vvaan is a 136-minute-long devotional video (composed with Windows 1997 tools) masquerading as a movie. It’s a K-serial on cheat day, a Zee Horror Show imposter on memory-loss medicines, a mythological fantasy on a fake witchcraft internship, and last of all, an insincere and soulless Bollywood production that becomes a ghastly parody of itself.

When I was little, my mother’s very North Indian family would clink glasses, raise voices and play card games on winter nights. As the only sober primate in the room (I wasn’t sure about the wayward dog), calling the adults’ bluff was a cinch, because their intoxicated minds and muscles kept failing them: they’d place the cards face-side up by mistake, coughed harder every time they tried to lie, or even forgot the name of the suits (“3 of Souls!”) before playing their hand. If they ever played poker, I thought, we’d end up homeless. Shaque: Trust No One is the cinematic equivalent of those nights: the harder it strives to be serious (or just convincing), the funnier it gets. Some might call that entertainment; I call it the comforting embrace of mediocrity. At times, I got excited at the prospect of those farcical, downright incompetent card games.

Given Hindi cinema’s obsession with hypermasculinity and patriotism, I’m surprised it took so long for a spy comedy to emerge. Actually, I’m not so surprised; imagine offending 99 percent of the country by cajoling them into joking about national security. Humour is such a risk. Irreverence can be such a crime (ask our standup comics). But it’s only fitting that a Kunal — an affable, witty, unpretentious and naturally unserious observer of Indian living — leads the charge. After giving Dil Chahta Hai the dysfunctional-buddy treatment in Madgaon Express, Kunal Kemmu directs himself in Vibe, a slacker comedy that’s shamed into an identity crisis. It’s the cinematic equivalent of watching two gloriously apolitical dudes accidentally pass a joint at a smoky house party to a proud WhatApp uncle; nobody is prepared for the night (and fight) that follows.

There was a time during the Covid-19 lockdowns when a new anthology of shorts would drop on a streaming platform every second week. While we understood the logistical challenges of producing full-length features, and the urgent need to keep churning out ‘content,’ the anthology fatigue was real. Bad habits crept into both sides. Box-of-chocolates storytelling became competitive film-making. Viewers and critics entered an endless loop of comparing segments; most anthologies were reduced to internal rankings. The format burned itself out and culminated in the release of the utterly forgettable Lust Stories 2 (2023), a limp post-pandemic sequel to a frisky pre-pandemic franchise.

Meghna Gulzar’s Talvar (2015) presents three perspectives on the 2008 Noida double murder case, but it makes no secret about what it really believes, lamenting a system for not doing its job. Gulzar’s Chhapaak (2020) is based on the courageous life of acid attack survivor Laxmi Agarwal, but exposes a system that makes little difference even if it does its job. Both films are shaped by the frustration of operating within the porous framework of law and order, in a patriarchal nation where nothing except headlines change. Gulzar’s latest, Daayra, completes this social-postmortem trilogy. The frustration has mutated into unbridled rage.

Termite, a 30-minute short, is documentary maker Shaunak Sen’s first fiction film. But it’s hard to tell the difference. He treats life as the introverted ally of storytelling; his nonfiction often designs the truth of an invisibilised India. It finds a controlled language to present what already exists. While Cities of Sleep traced the gloomy lyricism of Delhi’s insurgent sleeper communities, the Oscar-nominated All That Breathes shadowed two Muslim brothers who run a bird clinic in old Delhi. The camera — steady, studied, often static — reframes the people as characters, spaces as settings, and ecological relationships as cultural metaphors. Termite looks like it’s ‘following’ two men in the capital, too. A Tamil migrant, Ajith (Valavane Koumarane), shares a rooftop room with his Muslim friend, Saud (Faisal Malik); they spend tired evenings drinking tea and passively watching television.