Sardar 2
Action, Thriller (Tamil)
When the mysterious Black Dagger threatens national security, Inspector Vijay embarks on his most dangerous mission yet. As the battle unfolds, the extraordinary origin of legendary spy Sardar is finally revealed, uncovering the sacrifices that forged a legend and the (more…)
Guild Reviews by Film
Sardar 2
Action, Thriller (Tamil)
When the mysterious Black Dagger threatens national security, Inspector Vijay embarks on his most dangerous mission yet. As the battle unfolds, the extraordinary origin of legendary spy Sardar is finally revealed, uncovering the sacrifices that forged a legend and the secrets that could shape the future.
Cast:
Karthi, S. J. Suryah, Malavika Mohanan, Rajisha Vijayan, Achyuth Kumar, Ashika Ranganath, Balaji Sakthivel, Yogi Babu, Master Keshav, Chinni Jayanth
Director:
P. S. Mithran
Sun, September 20 2026
Fri, September 11 2026
PS Mithran's sequel to 'Sardar' loses momentum in the second half, sinking into generic territory with its overblown plotline
The first half of Sardar 2 may seem familiar, but at least it commits to the kind of spy thriller it wants to be. There’s a lofty idea in there about a Japanese-made bioweapon that’s being kept secret by the Indian Research and Analysis Wing (RAW), and there’s a thrilling flashback that gives you the origins of how this weapon got to India in the first place. Set predominantly in the 1980s, the film sees Bose (Karthi), or Sardar, navigating the complexities of this international mission, and we also get a series of Mission: Impossible-style action set pieces that cover everything from the back of an airplane to the front of a Japanese bullet train.
Fri, September 11 2026
Director PS Mithran's Sardar 2, starring Karthi, SJ Suryah and Malavika Mohanan, is a predictable sequel that is engaging in parts. However, the overstretched climax drags down the film.
Sardar, directed by PS Mithran, gave Tamil cinema a rooted spy character in 2022, well before Dhurandhar made the genre fashionable. Four years later, Sardar (Karthi) — who swears by the line, “Once a spy, always a spy” — returns with a shot at correcting a mistake that cost thousands of lives. The first film ended with Bose, aka Sardar, accepting his fate as a branded terrorist despite never committing espionage. His son Viji, inducted into RAW, has since been sidelined into a dummy unit handling no cases of consequence. Sardar 2 hands him a chance to prove himself — just as a bigger threat surfaces. What brings Sardar out of exile? Can father and son join forces against Black Dagger, a mercenary outfit endangering 140 crore people? The film spends a patient three hours answering these questions.
Yen Ennai Edho Seidhai
Drama, Romance (Tamil)
Broken young man trapped in emotional darkness finds unexpected healing when Madhu's love guides him from self destruction toward hope, purpose, and light.
Cast:
Dominic Rosario Raj Anthony, Madhumita Das, Jeeva Ravi, Regin Rose, Alam Shah, Navya Suji, Mathangi Sathish, Riya Manoj
Director:
Dominic Rosario Raj Anthony
Sun, September 20 2026
Angh
Drama (Konyak)
In 1960s Nagaland, a proud Konyak chief struggles to protect his dying traditions when an American missionary arrives with promises of aid that threaten his people’s identity. As his wife’s health deteriorates and famine looms, he and his mute son must make an impossible choice between survival and staying true to their ancestral ways.
Cast:
Douglas Henshall
Director:
Theja Rio
Writer:
Theja Rio
Sat, September 19 2026
TIFF 2026 | In 1960s Nagaland, a Konyak chief and his son grapple with the advent of Christianity.
Modernity arrives in several garbs all at once. It shifts between assimilation, a promise of progress and a threat of complete cultural loss. Development can wholly wash over a sharp sense of identity that once existed, chipping away at it one by one. Premiering in Platform competition at the Toronto International Film Festival 2026, Theja Rio’s brilliantly immersive debut, Angh, understands every shade of this complex negotiation. Rio, born in Nagaland’s Kohima, brings alive the state’s churning historical moment as Christianity burst in the 1960s. At the centre of the quiet, reflective drama is a tribal chief, Anghba (Anghlong Konyak). He’s a mournful witness to his community’s transformation under the sway of an American missionary (Douglas James Henshall). There’s a gentle ache in Angh that seeps under your skin, without a hint of rush.
Wed, September 16 2026
Theja Rio‘s film, set in 1960s Nagaland, patiently archives the feeling of dislocation without putting forth resolved arguments
Aiming for a boar on the other side of the river, the Anghbha (Anghlong Konyak), or tribal chief, sights a “white ghost” floating by—a flesh and blood American missionary (Douglas James Henshall) on a boat, with his jeep and some Nagas who have converted. The music is ominous. The ghost waves at him—does the Angbha understand this gesture? The ghost takes out a camera and captures him in film—does the Angbha understand this technology? All we see is his face, shaped by doom. He is hunting the boar with a gun, and not bow and arrows, nor spears, so technology has seeped even into his cloistered world from beyond. What else has slipped through the cracks? What has he resisted?
Termite
(Urdu)
Shaunak Sen’s follow-up to the Academy Award–nominated documentary All That Breathes is an evocative drama set in the vibrant neighbourhoods of Old Delhi, where the routined lives of two middle-aged termite exterminators are about to drastically change when one of them receives an unexpected marriage proposal.
Cast:
Faisal Malik, Vipin Sharma, Shilpa Shukla, Valavane Koumarane, Imran Khan
Director:
Shaunak Sen
Writer:
Shaunak Sen
Fri, September 18 2026
TIFF 2026 | The Oscar-nominated All That Breathes director mines the creeping loneliness of a termite exterminator in Old Delhi.
Once again, the alleys of Delhi hum their ache, regrets and yearnings in Shaunak Sen’s debut fiction outing, Termite. It’s a short film as if Sen is testing the ground before hoisting his flag on it. Like his Oscar-nominated 2022 breakout doc, All That Breathes, the fiction short is also alive and porous to an ecological world, the fellow non-inhuman inhabitants we share our lives with, marginality and the deep curl of thoughts and fears you swat away in recesses.
Sat, September 12 2026
In competition at the 2026 Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF), the Oscar-nominated documentarian’s short returns to the bylanes of old Delhi.
Termite, a 30-minute short, is documentary maker Shaunak Sen’s first fiction film. But it’s hard to tell the difference. He treats life as the introverted ally of storytelling; his nonfiction often designs the truth of an invisibilised India. It finds a controlled language to present what already exists. While Cities of Sleep traced the gloomy lyricism of Delhi’s insurgent sleeper communities, the Oscar-nominated All That Breathes shadowed two Muslim brothers who run a bird clinic in old Delhi. The camera — steady, studied, often static — reframes the people as characters, spaces as settings, and ecological relationships as cultural metaphors. Termite looks like it’s ‘following’ two men in the capital, too. A Tamil migrant, Ajith (Valavane Koumarane), shares a rooftop room with his Muslim friend, Saud (Faisal Malik); they spend tired evenings drinking tea and passively watching television.
Happy Journey
Family, Comedy, Adventure (Telugu)
A group of seven women across generations set off on a spontaneous European getaway, leaving their everyday lives behind. Amid the chaos, laughter and picturesque landscapes, the journey becomes an unexpected celebration of freedom and friendship.
Cast:
Aamani, Jhansi, Annapoorna, Vamshidhar Kosgi Goud, Paayal Radhakrishna, Jinisha Alishetty, Sunaina Badam, Roopa Srinivas, Ravi Shiva Teja, Prudhvi Dandamudi
Director:
Abhiramm Naidu
Writer:
Abhiramm Naidu
Fri, September 18 2026
Directed by Abhiramm Naidu, this European road trip Telugu film means well but struggles to shake off its old-fashioned undertones
The prospect of a bright, colourful Telugu film about women across age groups and walks of life bonding over a European holiday is like music to the ears. The sheer rarity of such a narrative in an industry that often functions like an all-boys club can make some of us root for it instantly. After all, an all-woman road film offers abundant room to unpack how these characters view the world while indulging in some mischief. Director Abhiramm Naidu’s film is packed with contrasting characters wanting to set themselves free and forget the voids in their lives, albeit temporarily.
Practical Magic 2
Romance, Fantasy, Comedy (English)
The Owens sisters must confront the dark curse that threatens to unravel their family once and for all.
Cast:
Sandra Bullock, Nicole Kidman, Joey King, Maisie Williams, Xolo Maridueña, Lee Pace, Dianne Wiest, Stockard Channing, Solly McLeod, Ema Cavolli
Director:
Susanne Bier
Fri, September 18 2026
The best part remains the sibling jousting between Nicole Kidman and Sandra Bullock, with Bullock again showing how underused she remains as a performer with great comic timing.
You can’t pull a rabbit out of a hat every time. Sometimes, all you can do is pull out hair. In 1998, Sandra Bullock was still awash in the success of the Speed films and gathering up more, while Nicole Kidman was already a big star. Besides, their joint film Practical Magic wasn’t even much of a critical or commercial hit – though it has had a better afterlife. However, clearly a lot of people, the two actors now lying on either side of 60 included, thought there was some power left in the old spell to rustle up a Part 2.
Modha Rathri
Romance, Comedy (Tamil)
Two strangers are brought together at an unusual wedding where, in one night, too many surprises unfold and several lies are told, spiraling into chaos that changes everything.
Cast:
Rishikanth, Anishma Anilkumar, Bagavathi Perumal, Chetan, Abdool Lee, A. Venkatesh, Sangeetha Balan, Shelly Kishore, Karthikeyan DK, Banupriya
Director:
Raja Karuppasamy
Writer:
Raja Karuppasamy
Fri, September 18 2026
In 'Modha Rathri', there is an excitement for the form of cinema—and what it is capable of saying, doing, and undoing — but there is such a chasm between the design and the delivery
I can understand why people warmed up to Modha Rathri (now out on Netflix). In a landscape ransacked by Anirudh’s BGM shoring up reluctant films and heroes whose heroism is leaning more towards parody than piety, here is a film and filmmaker—debutante Raja Karuppasamy—who dared to tell an intimate, many-splendoured story set over the course of a day. Based on events that director Karuppasamy has himself witnessed and endured, casting family members, there is a warmth here that filters through even the most devious observations of its heady, nauseating cast of characters, and a desire to tell a story that means something, where reformed characters are, in fact, part of the arc—but Karuppasamy does this without flat finger-wagging. A clutter-breaking miracle.
Fri, August 21 2026
It's a Medical Miracle
Fantasy, Thriller (Malayalam)
A young man declared brain-dead suddenly awakens with the ability to hear everything. Seeking the nurse whose voice saved him, he's drawn into a dark game of masks, memories, and revenge where every sound may be a clue or a trap.
Cast:
Sangeeth Prathap, Sharafudheen, Akhila Bhargavan, Anand Manmadhan, Kiran Peethambaran, Parvathy Krishna, Kottayam Nazeer, Nileen Sandra, Zhinz Shan, Hezzah Mehak
Director:
Shyamin Gireesh
Fri, September 18 2026
An intriguing premise about a man with extraordinary hearing ability lends It's A Medical Miracle a distinctive edge, before it gradually loses its way
It’s A Medical Miracle is a ‘concept film’ about a protagonist with extraordinary hearing. Ruben has been declared brain-dead for over two years, with his family even contemplating the idea of euthanasia when a freak accident wakes him up rather dramatically. Once awake, the young man is all ears. Quite literally. He can now hear every little sound around him with unusual clarity. It extends from something as minute as a fly’s flapping wings to the arrival of raindrops to a lying person’s pounding heartbeat. It’s something like a superpower, and with superpowers you are more often than not dealing with a lot of trouble.
Waiting Hai
Comedy, Drama, Crime (Hindi)
Sugam joins the RPF and investigates a Tatkal scam. Hamza and Mama turn booking software into a business, facing rivalry and betrayal. Sugam arrests the agents and tracks Hamza, ending the scam before his escape to Dubai.
Cast:
Divyendu Sharma, Bhuvan Arora, Kumud Mishra, Vijay Maurya, Harshita Shekhar Gaur, Sunita Rajwar, Dayashankar Pandey, Yashpal Sharma
Director:
Sameer Vidwans
Fri, September 18 2026
Sugam Mishra is a newly married railway cop who has just joined duty, juggling pressures at home and at work. He finds a mentor and a father figure in his senior. Afroz Hamza, a hacking enthusiast nursing a heartbreak in college, takes to crime for a living – joining hands with his uncle to do the dirty backend work for travel agents. While most films try to milk Divyendu Sharma’s Mirzapur image, a show like Waiting Hai actually showcases his range. As an earnest, newly-married man in his 20s starting a new job, he mirrors the character’s rebellion and idealism with honesty. Bhuvan Arora is decent as the invisible hacker wronged by the system. One of the more moving portrayals comes from Kumud Mishra as Sugam’s senior on the verge of retirement. The supporting cast – Vijay Maurya, Harshita Gaur, Sunita Rajwar and Dayashankar Pandey – deliver the goods.
Gandhari
Action, Drama, Thriller (Hindi)
When a mother loses her eyesight and her daughter in a kidnapping, she takes matters into her own hands to hunt down those responsible.
Cast:
Taapsee Pannu, Ishwak Singh, Mita Vashisht, Swastika Mukherjee, Chhaya Kadam, Jatin Sarna, Prashant Narayanan, Chandan Roy, Vishwanath Chatterjee, Priti Shroff
Director:
Devashish Makhija
Writer:
Kanika Dhillon
Fri, September 18 2026
பானிக்கு ஏற்படும் பார்வைக் குறைபாடு, அந்தச் சூழலிலும் குழந்தையைத் தேடி ஓடும் கதை சுவாரஸ்ய லைனில் செல்கிறது. குழந்தை கடத்தல் மாஃபியா பற்றிய விவரிப்பும் ஆராய்ச்சியும் படத்துக்கு ஆழமானதொரு நிறத்தைத் தருகின்றன.
பானியும் (டாப்ஸி) அவருடைய கணவரும் ரயிலில் சென்றுகொண்டிருக்கிறார்கள். திடீரென ஜாய்புரா என்ற ஊரில் அவர்களுடைய குழந்தையைக் கடத்திவிடுகிறார்கள். குழந்தையைக் காப்பாற்ற ஓடிச் செல்கையில் பானிக்குத் தலையில் அடிபட்டு கண்பார்வையில் பிரச்னை ஏற்படுகிறது. ஜாய்புராவில் இப்படியான குழந்தைக் கடத்தல் அதிகமாக நடப்பது பற்றியும், அதை நிகழ்த்தும் நெட்வொர்க் பற்றியும் பானி அறிந்துகொள்கிறார். அதன் பிறகு, பார்வைப் பிரச்னை சரியானாலும், பார்வைச் சவால்கொண்டவர் என்றே தனது அடையாளத்தை வைத்துக்கொண்டு ஜாய்புராவில் தங்கி, தன் குழந்தையைத் தீவிரமாகத் தேடுகிறார். இறுதியில் தன் குழந்தையைக் கண்டுபிடித்தாரா, இந்தக் கடத்தல் குழுவின் பின்னணி என்ன, ஜாய்புராவில் அவை எப்படி ஊடுருவியிருக்கின்றன என்கிற முடிச்சுகளை அவிழ்ப்பதே நெட்ஃப்ளிக்ஸ் தளத்தில் வந்திருக்கும் இந்த ‘காந்தாரி’யின் கதை. (தமிழ் டப்பிங் உண்டு).
Sat, September 12 2026
A land that worships the divine feminine yet treats its women poorly. This is a paradox that rings tragic and true both in reality and in the fictional world of Gandhari. The film is set in Joypurra, an unsettling place where the disappearance of young girls has been frighteningly normalized. The story opens by establishing a happy family of three. Taapsee Pannu and Ishwak Singh play a husband and wife and parents to a young girl Mishti. When Mishti suddenly goes missing the narrative dives straight into the conflict.
Sun, September 6 2026
Haiwaan
Crime, Thriller (Hindi)
A retired judge faces difficulty keeping his daughter safe from a convict he imprisoned. Later, when he gets murdered, a man with visual impairment who was loyal to him tries to defend his daughter.
Cast:
Akshay Kumar, Saif Ali Khan, Boman Irani, Shriya Pilgaonkar, Saiyami Kher, Rajpal Yadav, Sharib Hashmi, Rajesh Sharma, Manoj Joshi, Asrani
Director:
Priyadarshan
Wed, September 16 2026
An intriguing psychological thriller is overwhelmed by Akshay Kumar’s star persona, implausible action, and a screenplay that sacrifices restraint for spectacle.
Some thrillers are so absorbing that they persuade us to surrender logic at the door and simply follow the action wherever it takes us. A good mystery, particularly one built around a cat-and-mouse chase, can make even the most improbable turn feel plausible because the characters, the atmosphere, and the suspense are persuasive enough to keep disbelief suspended. Haiwaan begins with precisely that promise — a potentially engrossing tale of guilt, vengeance, betrayal, and retribution, populated by characters whose secrets could have sustained a gripping psychological thriller. Instead, Priyadarshan’s remake of his own 2016 Malayalam film Oppam gradually loses sight of the thriller it could have been, drowning a promising premise in star power, implausible action, and a screenplay that repeatedly mistakes excess for excitement.
Sat, September 12 2026
Priyadarshan’s Haiwaan is a remake of his own Malayalam film Oppam (2016), which was a big hit a decade ago. After watching Haiwaan, I spent some time wondering why Priyadarshan chose to remake a successful film of his own. What value addition could he possibly bring to it? Alas, I couldn’t think of a satisfactory answer - except that commercial considerations must have warranted it.
Sat, September 12 2026
This overlong psychological thriller starring Saif Ali Khan and Akshay Kumar struggles on pretty much every front
At the start of Haiwaan, Shyam (Saif Ali Khan) boards a ferry, teases a man who owes him money, sings and plays guitar. If it wasn’t for his dark glasses and cane, it would be hard to tell he’s blind—indeed, it’s a running conspiracy theory through Priyadarshan’s film that he’s only pretending he can’t see. Shyam has heightened senses of sound, touch, taste and smell, which provide him an uncanny mental picture of the world around him. But when his sister tearfully asks for his blessings, he responds after a few seconds and doesn’t realise that she’s left. He’s left patting the air around him while violins play sadly on the soundtrack.
Neagley
Drama, Mystery, Crime (English)
Frances Neagley is a private investigator in Chicago and former military colleague of Jack Reacher in the Army's 110th Special Investigations Unit. When she learns that a beloved friend from her past has been killed in a suspicious accident, she becomes hell-bent on justice.
Cast:
Maria Sten, Greyston Holt, Adeline Rudolph, Matthew Del Negro, Damon Herriman, Jasper Jones
Wed, September 16 2026
My loudly-declared soft spot for Reacher has always had room for Neagley, and when they are together, they rekindle old magic: maybe in the next Neagley outing, have more of Reacher? And maybe more Neagley, in the next Reacher?
At the outset, let me confess how keenly I was waiting for this Reacher spin-off, with his favourite team-mate Neagley at its centre: the fierce ex-Armywoman who went on to become a PI in Chicago, has been a staple in the best Reacher adventurers, and has livened up things everytime she shows up in the show. In her first solo outing, Maria Sten’s Neagley fills the screen with her presence, the creators Nick Santora and Nicholas Wootton wisely surrounding her with an interesting ensemble from the get-go: smart cop Hudson Riley (Greyston Hold), an equally smart secretary Renee Birdwhistle (Adeline Rudolph) and homeless orphan Keeno (Jasper Jones), who get enough to do together and on their own.