Shalini Langer

It doesn’t do to go around dressed in a loincloth, wielding a shiny sword and declaring oneself “He-Man” these days – at least not in a big-bucks Hollywood film that is hoping not to cause any affront, to he, she, they, them, or it. So how do you tap into a character that was born as a Mattel toy and largely remembered only by an audience who first encountered him as an animated TV series in the 1980s, and is now into their middle age? Director Travis Knight and screenwriters Chris Butler and Adam and Aaron Nee (who have several award nominations between them) settle on a tone that is constantly mocking the whole concept while trying to kick off a successful franchise with it It is surprising how well they are able to do this when they do it well. It is as surprising how the film still manages to feel and look like a frenetic video game being played by a bunch of compulsive teenagers.

Boy likes girl. What next? A lot of possible romances end right here. But what happens when the shy boy gets one miracle wish that can turn romance into a love story. A YouTuber on the road to fame after Obsession wowed audiences at Toronto International Film Festival, and got horror impresario Jason Blum onboard as executive producer, director Curry Barker is all of 26. He is also the writer of this tragi-comic horror film, with Cooper Tomlinson who plays one of the key characters, his long-time collaborator. Barker taps right into Gen Z’s au courant crisis and places Obsession in the irresolute territory where love is an all-consuming but never-consummate emotion. Relationships are situationships, and situations are at the mercy of just too many things. Commitment is a word – and world – too long.

The wise woman Diane (Melissa Leo) who knows all about the things that can go wrong on the road advises Maddie (Lou Llobell) seriously: “People don’t take trips. Trips take people.” That’s just her way of saying that please avoid lonely, dark roads at night, and should you have to, never, ever stop. But by then, the road trip of Maddie and Tyler (Jacob Scipio) has put them in the path of a demonic being that is mythically known as Passenger (Joseph Lopez). Once he has latched on to you, for whatever reason, he travels with you, so to speak.

Paraphrasing Billy Joel’s Piano Man, if you’all in the mood for a melody, this film has got you feelin’ alright. Seemingly discordant storylines are strung together into a pleasing whole by director-co-writer Daniel Roher (who won an Oscar for his Navalny documentary), largely due to the effortless charm of its cast. Leo Woodall is Niki, a piano prodigy who now tunes pianos for a living, having developed a hearing condition that has left him allergic to loud sounds. Two years of therapy, of being kept in a dark room, means he can just about get around the world of noise via ear plugs and noise-cutting headphones. Dustin Hoffman is Harry, a piano player of some repute and a friend of Niki’s late dad, who runs the piano tuning and fixing company where Niki works. The film begins with their effortless banter as Harry trades his wisdom and tricks with his beloved Niki, and tries to evade the sharp eyes of his wife Marla (the unmissable Tovah Feldshuh) who is worried for his failing health.

Romance, they say, dies in the first chapter of marriage. In what passes for an “adult romance” in Chand Mera Dil, marriage dies in the first chapter of marriage. Or, does it? You can’t be sure. Never mind their previous productions, director/co-writer Vivek Soni (Meenakshi Sundareshwar) and writers Tushar Paranjape (Killa), Akshat Ghildial (Badhaai Do) don’t seem to know where or whether they are coming or going in this one. Their lead pair, untested in the adulting department, just don’t have it in them to steer through this mess. Aarav (Lakshya) and Chandni (Ananya Panday) meet at an aesthete engineering college in Hyderabad. To attract her, he “twins”, that is, wears the same colours as her, every single day. When he doesn’t go further than that, she takes the initiative, and soon enough they are a couple.

Jon Favreau has a knack for lending a certain levity to the most grave of things. In the Star Wars universe that is largely unencumbered by gravity, Favreau’s vision (he has also co-written the film) is unwaveringly and dourly solemn. But, rescued just in time by the effervescence of being that is Grogu. You can say there is a Star Wars link because the title says so, and the two main characters, the Mandalorian (Pedro Pascal) and Grogu (who is Baby Yoda), trace their origins back to that mammoth franchise. However, after dispensing with the topic of the Empire in the first few minutes, and the Rebellion in the next few, The Mandalorian and Grogu, which began life as a TV series, settles down to its own pace and narrative.