Suhani Singh

The Maddock Horror Comedy Universe (MHCU) had to stumble sooner or later. With Thamma, the universe—with its creatures and legends—has got its first weakling. This is a surprise because the creative brains of MHCU are the same. There’s chief writer Niren Bhatt, in Thamma teaming up with Suresh Mathew and Arun Falara; Aditya Sarpotdar of Munjya fame in the director’s chair; and Dinesh Vijan and Amar Kaushik (the latter is director of both Stree films and Bhediya) as producers, alongside Sachin-Jigar as composers. But this time around, the combo of scares and laughs struggles to register.

Filmmaker-actor Rishab Shetty had set himself a lofty task after the unprecedented blockbuster success of Kantara (2022), particularly in its Hindi-dubbed version. Much like Prashanth Neel (KGF, 2018-22) and Sukumar (Pushpa, 2021-24), Shetty, too, expanded the universe of his pan-India franchise. Only instead of going forward, he chose to go back in time to establish the origins.

There’s a moment of great wisdom in Sunny Sanskari ki Tulsi Kumaari (SSKTK) as a father tells his daughter, a teacher no less, of the great significance of self-respect in relationships as well as in life. The father then disappears, never to be seen. The daughter hearing the pep talk intently is Ananya (Janhvi Kapoor) who is on her way to attend the wedding of her ex Vikram’s (Rohit Saraf) in Udaipur. The next 100 minutes or so she spends entirely negating what her dad spoke about as she pretends to be in love with Sunny (Varun Dhawan) who is there to break-up Vikram’s wedding with his own ex Ananya (Sanya Malhotra). The jilted lovers hope their amorous antics would make their exes jealous and eventually return to them.

Chandan Kumar (Vishal Jethwa) and Mohammed Shoaib (Ishaan Khatter) are besties with dreams of becoming police constables. Clearing the police recruitment examination, though, is not simply about earning a livelihood and supporting their families but a way to garner respect in a society that trivialises them for their background and identity.

Trust Malayalam cinema to come up with a fairly ingenious multiverse rooted in Indian folktales and legends in Lokah Chapter 1, and trust the makers to have the protagonist as a kickass superheroine in Chandra (Kalyani Priyadarsan). Inspired by Yakshi, an enigmatic, powerful female figure from Kerala folklore, director and co-writer Dominic Arun turns her into a vampire with red tresses and on a mission to do the right thing. Survival is dependent on a regular supply of blood, living in the shadows and biting into baddies the world over for centuries. Once in Bengaluru, Chandra catches the wandering eye of Sunny (Naslen), who lives in a building opposite hers. Thankfully, love is not high on the cards of Lokah. Instead, the film impresses with its world and character-building as Arun focuses on a wonder woman with a tragic past and one whose mission—at least in her new home—is to smash the patriarchy.

In the popular teen romance series Summer I Turned Pretty, adapted from Jenny Han’s books by the same name, leading lady Belly speaks of how she just can’t imagine marrying someone who doesn’t give her the “fireworks”“you know, like electric jolts, every time I see them”. In Tushar Jalota’s Param Sundari, Kerala’s most eligible girl Sundari (Janhvi Kapoor) finds herself in a similar conundrum when Punjabi munda Param (Sidharth Malhotra) strolls into her life (read homestay) believing she is his soulmate. Only unlike Belly’s karmic connection to Conrad, to whom the observation is made, Param and Sundari hardly exude MFEO (made for each other) vibes. And this despite having Sonu Nigam sing a pretty good romantic number in Pardesiya.

It took two twenty-something newcomers to cause ripples at the box-office. The Ajay Devgn-led Son of Sardaar 2 pushed its release date. And those awaiting releases in August know they have a force to reckon with in Saiyaara. So, what’s about the intense musical romance that audiences cannot get enough of and are reacting to in a rather dramatic fashion? IV drip? Copious tears? All this despite a happy ending. Here are five reasons why director Mohit Suri and writer Sankalp Sadanah have crafter a winner. Saiyaara’s soundtrack has one earworm after another, with the title track particularly hitting all the right loving notes. Rendered by Kashmir’s indie artist Faheem Abdullah, this is Gen Z and Alpha’s “Tum Hi Ho” moment, a track which is likely to dominate the airwaves and streaming apps for a few years, like “Kesariya” did.

Seventeen years after he tugged heartstrings with Life in a… Metro, Anurag Basu and Pritam are back navigating love in the big city, or should we say cities. The stories this time shift between Bengaluru, New Delhi and Calcutta. For Metro… In Dino, Basu adopts a less-seen, interesting narrative device to lure viewers into the world: characters introducing themselves by way of sing-song dialogue delivery. There’s Sara Ali Khan’s Chumki professing she’s confused and unsure; there’s Konkona SenSharma’s Kajol discussing her insipid marital life; there’s Anupam Kher, playing a widower, opening up about losing his loved ones in an accident; there’s Ali Fazal’s aspiring singer sharing his struggles. And there’s Pritam, Papon and Raghav Chaitanya, the travelling troubadours in the backdrop. Offering a peek into a character’s current state of mind and establishing their world, the first half breezes past.