Sukanya Verma

After holding back his heroic sentiments to a staggeringly subdued degree by his standards in The Diplomat, John Abraham flexes his patriotic chops in Tehran. This Arun Gopalan-directed geopolitical thriller, penned by Bindni Karia, Ritesh Shah and Ashish Prakash Verma plots a clash between personal revenge and political strategies using a true event – the 2012 Israel embassy car blast in New Delhi, Thailand and Georgia – as a trigger. Having turned the daredevil, deadpan government agent into his calling card, John comfortably takes on the role of an Indian special cells officer Rajeev Kumar determined to nab the perpetrators when an attack, prompted by Israel-Iran’s hostilities, results in the death of a street kid his daughter’s age on his own soil. As infuriating as this ‘collateral damage’ is, Tehran is never able to convincingly portray it as reason enough for his insubordination after his bosses withdraw their orders to nail the Iranian hand and pro-Palestine groups behind it.

To interest the audience in an occult thriller, the ensuing mumbo jumbo and its elaborate designs must suck its beholders into its specious air of intrigue and eerie. But the pillar-to-post energy of Mandala Murders translates to eight nonsensical episodes of crackpot mythology and jumbled plotting. Sitting through this uphill task, created by Gopi Puthran of Mardaani movies fame for YRF and inspired by Mahendra Jakhar’s novel The Butcher of Benares feels all the more daunting against its commitment to gloom, which leaves no room for thrill or wonder. A dour-faced series where supernatural, science and stern faced cops collide, Mandala Murders falls in the same space as previous occult-backdrop procedurals like Asur and Dahan. Except there’s little to hold on to in its puzzle-like pursuit of a body slicing serial killer, linked to an ancient, all-women religious cult calling themselves the Ayasti, wherein a pair of cops fight their inner demons in trying to get to the root of the ritualistic killings.

Strangers meeting on a train and falling in love has led to epic romances from Pakeezah to Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge. Never though the experience has felt as bogus and bizarre as Saba and Jahaan’s blind encounter in Aankhon Ki Gustaakhiyan. Directed by Santosh Singh for a script ‘created’ by Mansi Bagla, the farfetched premise inspired by Ruskin Bond’s short story The Eyes Have It, revolves around Saba (Shanaya Kapoor), a blindfolded theatre actress eyeing Bollywood stardom and Jahaan (Vikrant Massey), a sightless songwriter traveling from Delhi to Dehradun on a train with a VFX view. Whatever poetic allusions the makers want to build on what it means to see or feel through the eyes of one’s soul are lost in the sheer senselessness of the plot.

Ashok Kumar…hot? His tone smacks of surprise but there’s a glint of hope in it. Perhaps the sweet, sober fella too stands a chance with a lady who finds Dadamoni hot. His confidence grows as they test if their cute girl-meets-nerdy boy can be turned into a recipe for a rom-com whilst giving into the magic of the movies inside a cozy Kolkata theatre playing Chalti Ka Naam Gaadi. Director Vivek Soni’s charmingly crafted Aap Jaisa Koi wears its old-fashioned heart on its sleeve but is also quick to dismiss outdated relationship ideals thriving in the shadow of patriarchy. Even though Aap Jaisa Koi begins with a song from Kuch Kuch Hota Hai (and not the Qurbani banger of the same name), it draws inspiration from Karan Johar’s Rocky Aur Rani Ki Prem Kahani for its social commentary wrapped in a romcom.

When Anurag Basu made Life In A…Metro in 2007, Bollywood anthologies were still a novelty for moviegoers. Add to that, its musical roots by Pritam’s sutradhar in rock band mode lend the storytelling a refreshing momentum. By the time he created Ludo in late 2020, his maverick multi-narrative crime drama was another stylish addition in the genre that hit the overkill mark during the pandemic. Circa 2025, audiences have grown increasingly picky with a poor attention span flitting more towards streaming than screen. Metro…In Dino, Basu’s soul sequel to its mid-2000s predecessor, is a reflection of this fuzzy mind chronicling a dozen or so protagonists caught in a clutter of chaos and conflict. Slice-of-life, coming-of-age, rom-com, couples therapy, love triangle, teenage woes, mid-life crisis, Metro…In Dino’s mish-mash of themes across Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkata, Bengaluru and Pune is a hurricane in need of calmer hands. Instead, Basu’s trademark whimsy revels in sending his characters round and round in circles until they’ve spun long enough and collapsed in a tizzy.

Falling back on the done-to-death down Agatha Christie template of a rich man’s mansion, one murdered dude and multiple suspects opening the way for a maverick detective to solve the mystery, Detective Sherdil’s bag of twists and tricks have little intrigue and zero cunning. But the silliness it packs in the guise of humour not only trivialises a likeable star but squanders its ensemble cast into one-note distractions. Its stale and dull suspense, set in Budapest for visual novelty, kickstarts when a moneybags (Boman Irani) is brutally bumped off, setting the stage for Sherdil – a blend of Sherlock-meets-Karamchand-meets Byomkesh, strictly by his own standards – to crack the case concerning muddled inheritance and greedy claimants.

Ask me the plot of the last four Housefull movies and all I can recall are crowded frames filled with cringey, racist humour glorifying dumb blokes, dim-witted women, scowling fathers, random animals and rampant innuendoes designed to appease the lowest common denominator in the audience. Like or loathe, the shtick is raking in the moolah and now there’s a fifth film in the franchise keeping up its tradition of revelling in stupidity and birdbrain imagination. Only Housefull 5 is so rubbish, you’d think none of the actors, 17 or so of them, have any inkling as to where the script is heading and take the extempore challenge too far. Out of ideas for a while now and resorting to gimmicks like two endings – luring viewers into double viewings and ordeal – this Tarun Mansukhani directed fool fest, is the most idiotic thing I’ve watched this year so far.

In a country bursting at its seams, where dissatisfaction is a perennial feeling among the underclass and prospect is solely reserved for the privileged, sanity hangs by a thread. And when all hell does break loose, it’s not just those numb to the pain of being brushed off but even the blameless that will find themselves crushed under the aftermath of blind rage. There’s no justifying mob lynching. There’s no understanding it either. What triggers a large group of people to attack a single person, in most cases not guilty of the alleged crime, and unleash their dormant animal and defend it as justice?