Sun, July 27 2025

Fri, July 25 2025

Not a single person in Bollywood would've had the patience or the palate for the extended epilogue in writer-director Shahi Kabir's Ronth, starring Dileesh Pothan and Roshan Mathew.

In a recent interview, Arshad Warsi — the star of Dhamaal, Krazzy 4, and Golmaal: Fun Unlimited — ate a bunch of yakitori and decided that he must take pot-shots at Satyajit Ray. Mocking the sort of movies in which characters spend 15 minutes walking up a staircase, Warsi joked that they could simply announce the characters’ arrival at his or her destination, and save precious time. He’d probably hate the new Malayalam-language film Ronth, a slow-burn thriller if there ever was one. The movie understands a key aspect of storytelling: sometimes, it’s not about the destination, it’s about the 15-minute journey up a flight of stairs.

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Sat, June 14 2025

Shahi Kabir's 'Ronth' is a film that stands on its own for the complexity of its inter-personal relationships and the achingly depressing take on what it’s like to be a young police officer today.

During certain passages in Shahi Kabir’s Ronth , we do not feel like we’re watching the story of two separate police officers, played by Roshan Mathew and Dilesh Pothan. Instead, the sparks in Shahi Kabir’s writing give us the feeling that we’re watching one person on two opposite ends of a character arc with each character representing a before and an after scenario of what serving in the police force can do to you. On one end of this arc is Roshan’s Dinnath, a junior officer at the Dharamshala police station in Idukki, still naive and open-eyed about the kind of upright police officer he wants to be. On the other is his senior Yohannan (Dileesh Pothan), decades into his service and closer in form to the pot-bellied police officer we’re used to seeing in real life. ohannan appears to be far more practical and real, almost to a fault. At one point, we see him taking money from a priest after an accident. Yohannan figures by going close to the priest that the latter’s had a glass of wine, but instead of letting him go easy, Yohannan asks the priest to cough up a certain an amount of money. Yohannan is quick to clarify that this amount is not a bribe. He explains to Dinnath about the money he needs to pay the garage for fixing up their police jeep and how difficult it is to be able to get a refund from the police department. When Yohannan ends up giving us his side of the story, we needn’t fully agree with his point, but we understand where he’s coming from.

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Sun, July 27 2025

It’s not just the film’s dated making and clunky dialogues that give you the feeling of watching a 30-year-old movie. It’s by design that it wants to take you back to a time when Suresh Gopi was a legit superstar

Five minutes into Pravin Narayanan’s controversial Janaki V Vs State Of Kerala and there’s no escaping the strong feeling of déjà vu the film wants you to experience. It begins with the shot of a bishop entering the office of a hot-shot lawyer named David Abel Donovan (Suresh Gopi) and you’re thinking of a character from Lelam. A scene later, we’re drawn into a protest sequence and the sight of an old man getting crushed by the mob and immediately, Kuthiravattom Pappu from The King comes to mind. The sequence and the phone call that sets off the mob is something we’ve seen in several films before, but The Commissioner comes close, and strangely, the film’s ending gets you to recall The Truth. All of these films belong in the ’90s and so does most of Janaki V Vs State Of Kerala. But it’s not just the dated making and clunky dialogues that give you the feeling of watching a 30-year-old movie. It’s almost by design that the film wants to take you back to a time when Suresh Gopi was a legit superstar (the movie begins with a title card stating the same). Just like how the makers of Gopi’s Kaaval tried to milk the ’90s nostalgia by even setting the film in that particular period, Janaki V Vs State Of Kerala too wants you to dig deep and go back to a phase when a bombastic dialogue delivered in affected English was enough to deliver the big goosebumps moment.

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Sat, July 19 2025

Fails to deliver shock value and drama. Suresh Gopi's larger-than-life persona clashes with the realistic setting, resulting in a convoluted screenplay.

Abel Donovan (Suresh Gopi) asks the victim of a brutal sexual assault, Janaki V (Anupama Parameswaran), “Do you watch porn?" Almost everyone in the court and in the theatre is supposed to be shocked by that question, which seems to be the point of it. The idea here is to invoke a similar dramatic intrigue as in a scene from Pink, where Deepak Sehgal (Amitabh Bachchan) asks Minal Arora, “Are you a virgin?" The question in Pink is justified, as Deepak intends to bring about the irrelevance of it in the context of consent. However, here the scene is exactly for all the wrong reasons. Debutant director Pravin Narayanath, who has also written the film, has intended to create an enigmatic protagonist and a sense of shock value by having a protagonist saving the wrong person in Janaki V Vs State Of Kerala. To put it more precisely, David Abel Donovan is the Devil’s advocate, literally! While it sounds like a brilliant idea, the film fails to bring it to fruition.

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Fri, July 18 2025

The Suresh Gopi starrer, ‘Janaki V Vs State of Kerala, is caught between the need to tell a sensitive story and projecting the superhero aura of its lead actor, who plays an advocate

Nothing enlivens courtroom dramas than fiery arguments, which open new pathways into our understanding of a case. In Janaki V Vs State of Kerala, celebrated advocate David Abel Donovan (Suresh Gopi)‘s arguments are full of fire. Still, a significant portion of them are so irrelevant that they would fit more in a loud television debate than in a courtroom. He is the kind of person who would talk about cheese when he is supposed to argue about chalk. So, it is no wonder that he would go on a long diatribe against the State’s developmental projects when he is arguing in court in a case related to sexual assault, or that he would ask a rape victim whether she watches porn and how often. The opening credit sequences of the film hint at this behaviour with news clippings of his various press statements on a host of issues, all of which reveal a lawyer who is more active outside the court than inside. Janaki V Vs State of Kerala, which arrives in theatres with an extra ‘V’ thanks to the diktats of the censors, is caught between the need to tell a sensitive story and projecting the superhero aura of the actor playing the advocate. Debutant director Praveen Narayanan, who has also written the film, struggles on both counts.

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Sun, July 27 2025

Officer Rea Thomas and a former cop, Vikram Singh, investigate gruesome ritualistic killings marked by mandala symbols. The narrative connects to the 1950s, where a widowed scientist, Nandini, creates a wish-granting device upon a sinister warning from Rukmini. Ultimately, Vikram’s kidnapping for a sacrifice to revive the deity Yast forces Rea to confront her grandmother’s history to stop the deadly ritual. It feels like Vani Kapoor has built a wall around herself while playing Rea; the portrayal is too ordinary, and the character lacks a strong identity to make any impact. Gullak-fame Vaibhav Raj Gupta is decent as Vikram, but there’s nothing remarkable about the role. In an extended cameo, Shriya Pilgaonkar is the show’s most effective performer, who embraces her greys with immense conviction.

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Sat, July 26 2025

Mood, mystery, and message take a long time to align in this tiresome series, featuring an unsure Vaani Kapoor and a tenacious Surveen Chawla

While the tastemakers of Bollywood have shifted their focus to love and romance in the darkness of theatres, they continue to serve slices of the dark ages in the brightness of living rooms. What started as an avenue for experimentation, OTT content is increasingly becoming predictable and phoney. With self-censorship limiting the options for subversion, long-form content with decorative layers is becoming tiresome to watch. The latest is Yash Raj Entertainment’s largely incoherent iteration of a cult’s commitment to recreate its god out of the flesh and blood of a select group of residents in the quaint area. Someone’s murder is someone’s sacrifice. Someone’s god is someone’s demon. We get the gist, but the mood, mystery, and message take a long time to align. Created by Gopi Puthran, who, having made the chilling Mardani universe, knows more than a thing or two about telling stories of women surviving a violent, patriarchal world. Here, he puts them at the centre of conflict, but the chill feels cosmetic.

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Sat, July 26 2025

The eight-episode series, starring Vaani Kapoor and Vaibhav Raj Gupta, is original to a fault

Like Khauf, Black White & Grey — Love Kills, and Black Warrant earlier this year, Mandala Murders is the kind of Hindi fiction that wouldn’t exist if not for streaming platforms. It isn’t short of ambition or scale; it’s original; it’s conceived with the rules, reach, world-building and timelines of a fantasy novel. The template of two haunted cops investigating a pattern of ritualistic murders in a mysterious town becomes a generational saga of a secret female-led cult, black magic, the fusion of science and divinity, a machine that ingests human thumbs to grant miracles, comatose girlfriends, shadow worshippers, a political rivalry, a ninja-styled and mythical killer, a Frankenstein’s-Monster-coded mission, and a lot more. In fact, 8 episodes later, I’d be hard-pressed to distil the premise into a coherent logline. When one character tells another late in the show that “the answers you seek are beyond your understanding,” I could only nod in vehement agreement. To be fair, it does this without making us feel thick.

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Sun, July 27 2025

Adarsh, a journalist and the founder of a struggling newspaper, is shocked to discover his wife Naina’s sex tape with a male escort Sunny. In a vain bid for revenge, Adarsh resorts to Sunny’s help to turn a gigolo himself. While Adarsh surprisingly finds himself at home in an alien territory, at the cost of his professional career, Sunny’s life falls apart gradually. Vineet Kumar Singh, embracing newer challenges at every given opportunity, shines yet again in Rangeen, continuing his dream run in 2025 after impressive performances in Superboys of Malegoan and Jaat. As an average man, unaware of his casual misogyny and learns of his problems with time, the actor charts Adarsh’s evolution in the show with depth and confidence.

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Sat, July 26 2025

The absent-minded nine-episode series, starring the likes of Vineet Kumar Singh and Rajshri Deshpande, revolves around a journalist who becomes a gigolo

Imagine a group of strangers launching a Sunday book club. They begin enthusiastically — discovering each other’s tastes, comfort levels, sense of humour, personality and general vibe. Sometimes, they do drinks later and tease each other’s choices (“Sally Rooney? You’re such a hipster”). The possibilities are endless. Then one of them misses a Sunday; the balance is off. Two more drop out the next week. The plan-maker is gone soon. The energy fades. The discussions morph into dull rambles; sometimes, sentences and thoughts start only to get lost along the way. Finally, two members remain; one of them quotes J.K. Rowling. They sit in silence and scroll through their phones until their cabs arrive. They search for a “books to hold performatively in public spaces” list. Rangeen is this book club — united by passion, dismantled by time. The nine-episode series starts with hope. A talented crew, led by Vineet Kumar Singh (in pre-Chhaava mode) and Rajshri Deshpande (Trial by Fire); even Mismatched star Taaruk Raina isn’t miscast like he was in The Waking of A Nation. A solid setup: a self-righteous Hindi scribe named Adarsh (Singh) catches his wife Naina (Deshpande) with a young gigolo (Raina, as Sunny), and their marriage breaks down. The series more or less opens with this incident, so one is left to trace the language of their companionship through their conflict — no happy flashbacks, no spoon-feeding, just resentment and bad decisions and silence.

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Sun, July 27 2025

Of the many films that affect both the heart and the head, 'Bun Butter Jam' is a cringe classic that affects your tummy, the same way you feel when you take a sip of milk that went stale over two months ago

Can watching a film ever make you nauseous? Director Raghav Mirdath’s Bun Butter Jam seems to be a philosophical exploration of this one question. Why else would the director of a light rom-com want to zoom in so closely on the shot of a man clipping his nails? Or the reason why so many scenes are set in the toilet, including one that has the hero talk to a friend while holding a used toilet brush? Or the strange ways in which the film keeps trying to crack the same double-meaning joke by using unending shots of a tissue box and what the hero needs it for at night? or a film titled Bun Butter Jam, it’s impossible to explain just how unappetising all of this can be. It’s a seemingly simple plot about two old friends who decide to live next to each other with the hope of getting both their kids to fall for each other. Hence the caption, “An arranged love marriage” in the film’s title. Yet the performances, the jokes and the plot points are so stale and predictable that you can write down exactly what’s going to happen on a piece of tissue, i.e if the film’s hero decides to spare one.

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Sun, July 27 2025

In director Pandiraj's latest, we finally get to see Vijay Sethupathi being matched in performance by an equal in Nithya Menen

After making films that were all about loving your family (Kadaikutty Singham, 2018) and loving your siblings (Namma Veetu Pillai, 2019), Pandiraj returns to home territory with a film that’s all about one family loving another family. It’s interestingly structured, with an inventive narrative tool that adds freshness to the same Visu-movie template. And when we meet Arasi (Nithya Menen) and Akasaveeran (Vijay Sethupathi) for the first time, they’re already married, and they also have a daughter. This gives it the feeling of reading a novel by starting somewhere in the middle, and as we run through the pages, flipping back and forth. We meet new people; we understand their interpersonal dynamics and the love-hate relationship that brought Arasi and Akasam to a point in their story where divorce is one signature away.

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Fri, July 25 2025

Director Pandiraaj's 'Thalaivan Thalaivii', starring Vijay Sethupathi and Nithya Menen, is a noisy family drama that promotes and glorifies regressive ideas. The film ridicules divorce and people who opt for it.

Almost half an hour into director Pandiraaj’s ‘Thalaivan Thalaivii’, Nithya Menen’s Perarasi receives a phone call from her husband Aagasaveeran (Vijay Sethupathi). Her phone displays his name as ‘Kirukku Payya’, which loosely translates to ‘mad or crazy man’. This name is not just perfect for Aagasveeran, but for every single person in the world of director Pandiraaj’s ‘Thalaivan Thalaivii’. Set in Madurai, ‘Thalaivan Thalaivii’ begins with Perarasi, along with her parents, performing a tonsuring ritual at a temple for her daughter, but without her husband Aagasaveeran. The couple has been living separately for three months, and we soon learn that Perarasi is seeking a divorce. As their families get involved, and after hundreds of ear-splitting arguments, it becomes clear that Aagasveeran and Perarasi are two crazy, indecisive people who are stuck with each other.

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Fri, July 25 2025

Pawan Kalyan plays an outlaw in this uneven historical fantasy that struggles with weak writing, patchy visuals and forced gravitas

Hari Hara Veera Mallu – Part 1: Sword Vs Spirit, with the tagline ‘battle for dharma’, was in the making for over five years. The delay was partly due to the pandemic, and later, the lead actor Pawan Kalyan taking on his role as Deputy Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh. The film, originally directed by Krish Jagarlamudi, changed hands midway, with A M Jyothi Krishna stepping in to see it through. The shift is visible on screen. This period drama, blending fact and fiction, often loses its way and feels stretched. Pawan Kalyan plays Veera Mallu, a rebel who steals from the rich and helps the poor. The film takes creative liberties to build a fictional story, leaning into the actor’s public image and his alignment with sanatana dharma.

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Wed, July 23 2025

There are true-crime documentaries — and then there is Amy Bradley is Missing. The three-episode watch chronicles a missing person story which is equal parts horrific and heartbreaking, appalling and astounding. Most users on Netflix, where the documentary series is trending in the Top 10 in many countries, have used a standout term to describe it: ‘gobsmacking’. Which is what it exactly is, and then some more. This is a ‘missing person’ case which has lasted 27 years, and with no closure for Amy’s parents and her brother. Still, they have decided to never give up hope, and more importantly, never cease trying. Bringing into focus the ephemeral nature of life and the fact that anything can go south any moment, Amy Bradley is Missing is about a family torn asunder when what was meant to be a fun-filled luxury vacation on a cruise goes completely wrong. On board, with roughly a few thousand other vacationers, was Amy, a vivacious 23-year-old just days away from a new job, along with her parents and younger brother Brad.

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Tue, July 22 2025

A man goes on a transformative journey in a safely placid film

In films about laughter and forgetting, flashbacks become a distraction. A sweetly awkward interlude toward the end of Kaalidhar Laapataresolves a minor mystery: why Kalidhar, a middle-aged man with early-stage dementia played by Abhishek Bachchan, loves eating biriyani so much. What links his plate to heart is memory. Let’s call it a meat-cute. This passage (featuring younger versions of characters and scored with the generically sweet ‘Haseen Pareshaniyaan’) returns to conventionality a narrative that celebrates the art of letting go. In the 2019 Tamil original, KD, the moment is handled briskly, with minimum sentimentality. But a Hindi film without a discernible ’love track’ and a cameo is perhaps too much to ask.

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Mon, July 7 2025

Sat, July 5 2025

Mon, July 21 2025

Sat, July 19 2025

At a tech summit, AI scientist Dr Piyush Bhargav is kidnapped, and a RAW officer, Vinod Shekhawat, is killed. Months from his retirement, Himmat Singh is entrusted with the task of bringing Bhargav back. Meanwhile, his former superior, Subramanyam, who has lost his wife to a terminal illness, threatens dire consequences if bank defaulter Jignesh Dholakia isn’t put behind bars. Kay Kay Menon, much like his character, leads from the front with the right composure and level-headedness, scoring big in the tense, crucial moments, without missing out on the tenderness in the seemingly insignificant segments. A flamboyant Karan Tacker, a chiselled Muzammul Ibrahim, a no-nonsense Saiyami Kher, and an enthusiastic Shikha Talsania make for a solid team, contributing their bit to the show, doing what’s expected of them.

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Sat, July 19 2025

Given its length, there definitely are spots where things slacken, but on the whole, this buzzy spy-saga stays mostly on-point, always entertaining

I’m just done binge-watching seven episodes of Special Ops 2, each lasting about 50-57 minutes, and I’m here to tell you that this one is a banger. Most sequels flatten and disappoint. Special Ops came in 2020, when we were in the midst of the pandemic; five years later, where much has changed in the media landscape, and part twos are where creativity goes to die, I’m most pleasantly surprised that this sequel, again co-directed by Neeraj Pandey and Shivam Nair, and written by creator Pandey, Deepak Kingrani, Benazir Ali Fida, has exceeded my expectations. We have finally got ourselves a spy franchise that is globally ambitious in the way it goes about laying out its wares, dropping in and out of political hot-spots casually, bunging in enough lol moments: what’s the point of a spymeister who can’t just say, ‘hamare pass CIA waalon ke liye kuchch hai,’ and his faithful dogsbody coming up with just a teeny detail that has the Langley HQ in Virginia salivating.

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Mon, July 21 2025

Sat, July 19 2025

Sat, July 19 2025

Delivers emotional highs but falters in depth, relying on sentiment over nuance in its portrayal of neurodivergent experiences

n the cinematic world, autism is often depicted in one of two familiar forms: either the misunderstood genius with miraculous mental powers, or the socially awkward yet irresistibly charming soul who gently reminds everyone how to live more meaningful lives. Tanvi The Great chooses the latter. Like many of its predecessors, it simplifies a complex neurodevelopmental condition into a digestible, inspirational narrative that leans heavily on sentiment, often at the expense of authenticity. Directed by Anupam Kher and produced by Anupam Kher Studio in association with the NFDC, Tanvi The Great tells the story of Tanvi (Shubhangi Dutt), a 21-year-old woman on the autism spectrum. Raised by her mother Vidya (Pallavi Joshi) and grandfather Colonel Pratap Raina (Anupam Kher), Tanvi is determined to honour the memory of her late father, Captain Samar Raina (Karan Tacker), by joining the Indian Army and saluting the national flag at Siachen Glacier—a dream he never lived to fulfil.

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Sat, July 19 2025

Nimrat Khaira and Ammy Virk steal the show in this hilarious multi-starrer that despite a few hiccups, is a laugh riot.

Punjabis are perhaps most associated with their loud, fun weddings and the multi-starrer featuring Gippy Grewal, Sargun Mehta, Ammy Virk, Nimrat Khaira, Sarbala Ji (2025), makes this the perfect setting for a complete entertainer. Directed by Mandeep Kumar, the film weaves together comedy, drama and romance in a pre-Partition setting. Cousins Sucha Singh (Gippy Grewal) and Gajjan Singh (Ammy Virk) are like chalk and cheese. Sucha Singh is the life of every wedding while Gajjan shies away from marriage, being more interested in embroidery stitches and crochet. When flirtation with Rajjo (Sargun Mehta) leads Sucha to a pronouncement that he is never to marry, he is utterly dismayed. Meanwhile, Gajjan is all set to marry Pyaaro (Nimrat Khaira) who is far from being the docile, embroidery-loving woman that he dreams of. Content with working at the farm, and shunning housework, Pyaaro is completely smitten and transformed in love, eager to marry her beau. However, there are few twists and turns to be navigated.

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