Sachin Chatte

There is no gentle way to say this—Anubhav Sinha’s Assi hits you hard. It is, at times, an uneasy watch—and therefore, a very good film. To be clear, the unease does not come from graphic visuals; it comes from statistics read aloud by a lawyer, from stark statements that linger long after they are spoken. If merely listening to these details causes discomfort, one can only imagine the horrors endured by the victims. Sinha not only stabs us in the heart; he twists the knife—quietly, deliberately.

Inspired by Ping Lumpraploeng’s Thai film The Pool (2018), Tu Yaa Main shifts between Mumbai and a 20-foot-deep swimming pool somewhere along the Goa–Mumbai highway. The story of a couple trapped in an empty pool with a crocodile for company offers a solid premise for a survival thriller.

Vishal Bhardwaj returns to the big screen after Patakha (2018), although his last outing, Khufiya (2023), was released on Netflix. O Romeo has ambition and style, but at nearly three hours, it lacks the substance required to sustain that runtime and offers little that feels new.

Vadh (2022) came without much fanfare, yet the narrative of a couple battling their circumstances gradually gained recognition as a thriller. Vadh 2 serves as a spiritual sequel to the original film, featuring the same characters, although the storyline is entirely independent of its predecessor. With a runtime of just over 2 hours, the film’s length is reasonable; but even that becomes an uphill task because of the bland screenplay that relies heavily on the final ‘twist’.

A third installment of a franchise headlined by a female police officer is an unusual and somewhat unexpected occurrence in Bollywood. Male-led cop films are far more common and commercially encouraged, with Singham being a prime example—boasting three standalone films and multiple crossover appearances. Shivani Shivaji Roy, in contrast, does not enjoy the same level of mass appeal or pop-culture visibility. However, the comparison between the two characters is inevitable, as they are built on similar foundations.

A well-crafted war film operates on multiple levels - it provides historical context and details about the progression of specific events, incorporates the human aspects of bravery and sacrifice, and ultimately conveys the message that war is pointless. Regrettably, Border 2, the spiritual successor to Border (1997), fails to meet any of these criteria.

Comedy is serious business – and not everybody can get that right. The gags could be physical (think of ‘thoda khao thoda pheko’, in Jaane Bhi Do Yaaron, (1983) or any Bustor Keaton, Charlie Chaplin film), situational like Chupke Chupke (1975) or a Golmaal (1979) that got everything right. Then we had the Kadar Khan Shakti Kapoor comedy in the 80s & 90s and Aamir Khan Productions own Delhi Belly (2011) had some funny situations.

28 Years Later: The Bone Temple comes within a year of its predecessor’s release, with both films being shot back-to-back. Directed commendably by Nia DaCosta, this is the fourth film in the 28 Days Later franchise that started back in 2003 with Danny Boyle at the helm as the director with a script conceptualized by Alex Garland who has also written the last two 28 Years Later films.