Bandish Bandits S02
Family, Drama (Hindi)
A classical singer Radhe falls in love with pop singer Tamanna and embarks on a path that forces him to compromise his classical roots. With time, both the singers try to get out of their comfort zone while trying (more…)
Citadel: Honey Bunny
Action & Adventure, Drama, Sci-Fi & Fantasy (English)
When stuntman Bunny recruits struggling actress Honey for a side gig, they are hurled into a high-stakes world of action, espionage and betrayal. Years later, as their dangerous past catches up, the estranged Honey and Bunny must reunite and fight (more…)
Singham Again
Action, Drama, Thriller, Crime (Hindi)
The cop universe expands with newer additions while the old ones return led by Bajirao Singham. Singham Again interweaves the mythological epic Ramayana's good vs evil narrative when his wife Avni Kamath gets abducted by Danger Lanka setting Bajirao and (more…)
Guild Reviews
The Teacher
Drama (Arabic)
A Palestinian school teacher struggles to reconcile his life-threatening commitment to political resistance with his emotional support for one of his students and the chance of a new romantic relationship with a British volunteer worker.
Cast:
Saleh Bakri, Imogen Poots, Muhammad Abed Elrahman, Stanley Townsend, Paul Herzberg, Mahmood Bakri, Andrea Irvine, Asmaa Azaizeh, Ruba Blal, Muayyad Abd Elsamad
Director:
Farah Nabulsi
Writer:
Farah Nabulsi
Tue, December 17 2024
A house, lived in for years, bulldozed by the Israeli military in front of its inhabitants, leaving behind a pile of tangible memories under the rubble. A youth resisting the burning down of an Olive orchard shot down by a settler with practised ease and nonchalance, just as if it were the most normal thing to do. Soldiers violently barging into every single home in a village in search of an Israeli military man who was abducted.
Young Hearts
Drama, Romance (Dutch)
14-year-old Elias increasingly feels like an outsider in his village. When he meets his new neighbour of the same age, Alexander, Elias is confronted with his burgeoning sexuality.
Cast:
Lou Goossens, Marius De Saeger, Geert Van Rampelberg, Emilie De Roo, Dirk van Dijck, Jul Goossens, Ezra van Dongen, Olivier Englebert, Olga De Saeger, Wim Opbrouck
Director:
Anthony Schatteman
Writer:
Anthony Schatteman
Tue, December 17 2024
Sometimes, the most gentle turns in a film can create a considerable emotional impact on the viewer. The filmmaker need not necessarily move a mountain to achieve that. Belgian filmmaker Anthony Schatteman’s Young Hearts, with its fresh take on teenage gay romance, is filled with several such moments that flow organically one after the other. Being screened in the World Cinema section at the 29th International Film Festival of Kerala (IFFK), this rather small film about young people has gained appreciation amid a flurry of bigger films boasting wider festival play.
Pierce
Drama, Mystery, Thriller (Mandarin)
Shy and sweet-natured Zijie spends his time learning the art of fencing and listening to his widowed mother, Ai Ling, sing at a local nightclub. When Zijie’s older brother Zihan – a three-time national fencing champion – is released from juvenile prison, Zijie remains intent upon seeing him, despite his mother’s wishes. As Zihan starts mentoring his younger brother, their bond strengthens. But as Zijie develops newfound skills as a fencer and a romance with his teammate blossoms, Zihan’s innocence becomes more questionable.
Cast:
Tsao Yu-ning, Hsiu-Fu Liu, Ding Ning, Rosen Tsai, Benjamin Tsang
Director:
Nelicia Low
Writer:
Nelicia Low
Tue, December 17 2024
While watching Pierce, the debut feature of former Singapore national fencer Nelicia Low, one would assume that the sport inspired the film, for fencing is at the very centre of the narrative which deals with brotherly affection and psychopathic tendencies. The trademark moves in the sport, which one character defines as chess played with swords, also parallels the behaviour of the characters in the film, screened in the world cinema section at the 29th International Film Festival of Kerala (IFFK) on Saturday (December 14, 2024).
Body
Drama (Hindi)
In the post covid world, Manoj, a young, struggling actor, is trying to cope with his personal trauma. On a village trip with his theatre peers he gets brutally bullied in the name of drunken fun. His friends leave him. He tries to find his way out of the village, battling shame and fear, without a stitch on. He comes back to Mumbai and starts stripping in public spaces. His life starts fragmenting to pieces. In his almost dysfunctional state he makes friends with a little boy living in the opposite apartment and finds that he is regularly abused by his father. This discovery sets him off on a complex journey of uncertainty and intrigue.
Cast:
Amol Deshmukh, Khushboo Upadhyay, Sandeep Shridhar Dhabale, Shivam Parekh, Jatin Negi, Manoj Sharmaa, Kritika Pande
Director:
Abhijit Mazumdar
Writer:
Abhijit Mazumdar
Tue, December 17 2024
Once adulthood sets in, and once we’ve accumulated enough years, most of us have two types of recurring dreams (and nightmares). One revolves around the terror of remembering that the exam is tomorrow and we haven’t touched the school syllabus. The other is shaped by the horror of finding ourselves naked in routine situations, while being totally helpless about it. Both of these are trauma responses to our fraught relationship with society. Both feature a link between social conditioning and shame, but Abhijit Muzumdar’s Body confronts the steeper task of exploring the second dream. It’s a testing watch, but ultimately quite a rewarding one.
Pushpa 2
Action, Drama, Thriller, Crime (Telugu)
As his smuggling empire grows, a brazen Pushpa longs for power and respect on his vengeful journey, while facing old rivals and new.
Cast:
Allu Arjun, Rashmika Mandanna, Fahadh Faasil, Jagadeesh Bandari, Rao Ramesh, Sunil Varma, Anasuya Bharadwaj, Ajay, Kalpalatha, Pavani Karanam
Director:
Sukumar
Tue, December 17 2024
Why do we like Pushparaj? He doesn’t care to look conventionally attractive. His shoulders are lop-sided, his hair unkempt, his speech brimming with contempt. His work? Smuggling red sanders. His retribution? A fierce defiance of systematic oppression, making him a figure of political utility. And his manner of retribution? Ruthless. As he says, he kills “without mercy.” In this sequel, Pushpa seems almost possessed, his machete slicing through limbs as though they were branches from a tree.
Sun, December 8 2024
“Pushpa naam nahi hain, Pushpa matlab brand hain”, (Pushpa is not just a name; it signifies a brand) states Srivalli, portrayed by Rashmika Mandanna, in this sequel anticipated to shatter all box office records. This statement prompts reflection on whether it is the character speaking or if the filmmakers are conveying their confidence through her words. Following the success of Pushpa (2021), the sequel is grander in every aspect, running an exhausting 200 minutes, though it does not necessarily surpass its predecessor. The filmmakers have amplified every successful element from the first installment, leaving no stone unturned in terms of scale and ambition. However, the narrative, or lack of it, remains unchanged—if the first part emphasised “Pushpa flower nahin, fire hai main”, the second part shifts to portraying him as a wildfire, whatever that may imply.
Sun, December 8 2024
Despatch
Drama, Thriller (Hindi)
Determined to break the next big story and refashion his complicated personal life, Joy embarks on a relentless odyssey through the heart and gut of Mumbai.
Cast:
Manoj Bajpayee, Shahana Goswami, Archita Agarwal, Anand Alkunte, Mamik Singh, Riju Bajaj, Veena Mehta, Rii Sen, Kabir Sadanand
Director:
Kanu Behl
Writer:
Ishani Banerjee, Kanu Behl
Tue, December 17 2024
इस फिल्म का बेहद कसा हुआ, तेज़ रफ्तार ट्रेलर दिखाता है कि मुंबई के एक अखबार ‘डिस्पैच’ का क्राइम रिर्पोटर जॉय बाग एक ऐसे मामले की तह तक जाने की कोशिशों में लगा है जिसमें हजारों करोड़ का घपला है और बड़े-बड़े लोग शामिल हैं। ज़ाहिर है कि इतना सब है तो खतरे भी बड़े हैं। जॉय बाग कर पाएगा इस काम को? कैसे करेगा वह इसे?
Mon, December 16 2024
Sat, December 14 2024
Those who have experienced Titli and Agra would vouch that Kanu Behl’s cinema is not easy to watch. Always reflecting dark shades of everyday reality, the filmmaker has this knack for scratching the soul of his desperate characters struggling to cling to their little power structures and, in the process, leaves impressions on the conscience of the audience.
Agni
Action, Adventure (Hindi)
In a city plagued by a strange rise in fires, fireman Vithal and his policeman brother-in-law Samit reluctantly team up to solve the escalating crisis. Battling personal conflicts, they race against time to crack the case and save Mumbai.
Cast:
Pratik Gandhi, Divyendu Sharma, Jitendra Joshi, Sai Tamhankar, Saiyami Kher, Udit Arora, Kabir Shah, Pramod Pathak, Kundan Roy, Sakhi Gokhale
Director:
Rahul Dholakia
Writer:
Rahul Dholakia
Sat, December 14 2024
In Indian tradition, fire alludes to love and conflict, devotion and anger, eternality and death. The ever-youthful element that demands sacrifice plays the central character in director Rahul Dholakia’s ode to the unstinting spirit of the firefighters. Capturing a daze’s multiple faces and colours, Dholakia removes the smokescreen that covers the firefighters’ work and opens a window into the lives of those who keep us out of its fury but whose services are not duly acknowledged by the system and society. The action takes us into the heart of the evacuation process, the drama unravels the sacrifices firefighters make and the thriller elements seek to find the answer to the source of the firestorm.
Fri, December 13 2024
Hindi movies have played with fire several times before. Those with long memories will remember such films as the 1980 adventure ‘The Burning Train’, which may have picked up inspiration from an earlier Hollywood blockbuster ‘The Towering Inferno’, but those who fight the flames at the risk of their own lives, have never been in the limelight.
Wed, December 11 2024
I couldn’t help but be left with the feeling that there’s an enjoyable disaster film somewhere within Rahul Dholakia’s Agni, which surely owes a debt to The Burning Train (1980). There is more than one echo of the Ravi Chopra-directorial, where the spectacle is foregrounded by professional rivalry – Danny Denzongpa and Vinod Khanna’s in the 1980 film; emulated by Pratik Gandhi and Divyenndu’s characters in Dholakia’s directorial. The innate Bollywood melodrama after an unexpected death, the high-voltage social commentary and righteous anger fuel both spectacles. Both Chopra and Dholakia’s film balance a strong ensemble, offering everyone their moment, and yet Dholakia’s film fails to stick its landing. It might have to do with what Hindi films have become in 2024 – too self-conscious, cautious, and reverential towards any uniform.
Bandish Bandits S02
Family, Drama (Hindi)
A classical singer Radhe falls in love with pop singer Tamanna and embarks on a path that forces him to compromise his classical roots. With time, both the singers try to get out of their comfort zone while trying to protect their stardom. This series tests their resolve for their passion and love.
Cast:
Ritwik Bhowmik, Shreya Chaudhary, Atul Kulkarni, Sheeba Chaddha, Rajesh Tailang, Kunaal Roy Kapur, Divya Dutta, Yashaswini Dayama, Saurabh Nayyar, Rohan Gurbaxani
Director:
Anand Tiwari
Writer:
Atmika Didwania, Karan Singh Tyagi, Lara Chandni, Anand Tiwari
Sat, December 14 2024
When ‘Bandish Bandits’ streamed on Prime Video in 2020, it was a breath of fresh air wrapped in melody and a master class in classical music. As it enters the second season, there is good news and a bit of bad news. First the downside: what it did not succumb to in the first season, it has done so in the second outing and turned into an ‘Indian Idol’ of sorts. Here, the major part of the series is devoted to the India Band Championship. Of course, on the sunny side, it is still an ode to music, now of various hues, and the master class continues. You will still learn more than a thing or two about ragas. Only, this time, we get to hear and see the exponents of contemporary music too.
Fri, December 13 2024
In our autograph books way back in school, a favourite verse was, “East is East, West is West. When they meet, it’s the best.” Bandish Bandits makes the same point, embellishing it with blended, mood-elevating music. There’s usually an ambience-fatigue when a fresh premise goes into a second season and struggles to say something new. Kota Factory, Mirzapur, Undekhi and Aarya are prime examples of ambience-fatigue.
Fri, December 13 2024
The second season of the Prime Video series Bandish Bandits opens in Jodhpur, three months after Radhe (Ritwik Bhowmik) has been crowned Sangeet Samrat. In the previous season, battle lines were drawn between rival gharanas represented by Radhe and his grandfather Radhemohan (Naseeruddin Shah) on the one side and Radhemohan’s estranged son Digvijay (Atul Kulkarni) on the other. With the passing of the patriarch, the responsibility for the Rathod gharana rests on Radhe’s shoulders. Radhe is also contending with new and confusing feelings after Tammana (Shreya Chaudhry) walks away from their fusion band Bandish Bandits, and her relationship with him, to find her own voice.
Yeh Kaali Kaali Ankhein S02
Crime, Drama, Mystery (Hindi)
Relentlessly pursued by a powerful politician’s daughter who will do anything to make him hers, a man slips down a dark, risky path to reclaim his life.
Cast:
Tahir Raj Bhasin, Shweta Tripathi Sharma, Anchal Singh, Saurabh Shukla, Brijendra Kala, Anant Joshi, Arunoday Singh, Gurmeet Choudhary, Varun Badola
Director:
Siddharth Sengupta
Writer:
Umesh Padalkar, Siddharth Sengupta
Fri, December 13 2024
The first season of ‘Yeh Kaali Kaali Aankhein’ became an addictive watch in the way it bent one of the oldest genres in the book: being an obsessive lover is not just a male prerogative; women can do it just as well, if not better. It made up for all its nods to hoary Hindi movie heavies who lived in palaces overrun by armed goons, governed by old-style off-with-their-heads villainy.
Sat, November 30 2024
In January 2022, the Netflix series Yeh Kaali Kaali Ankhein introduced us to an unusual drama. The show, set in a small town, revolved around Vikrant (Tahir Raj Bhasin), who uncomfortably finds himself to be the object of affection for a gangster politician’s daughter Purva (Aanchal Singh). Instead of marrying his college sweetheart Shikha (Shweta Tripathi), he finds himself tied by matrimony to someone he doesn’t love. Sidharth Sengupta’s series took Vikrant to his limit as he found himself hiring a hitman to get rid of Purva. Now, nearly three years later, the series returns to pick up where it left off.
Sun, November 24 2024
A recap of Season 1: Purva (Anchal Singh), daughter of ruthless neta Akheraj Awasthi (Saurav Shukla), a don-like figure with the authorities at his beck and call and an army of goons, has always obsessed over and been a thorn in the flesh of good boy Vikrant Singh Chauhan (Tahir Raj Bhasin). To add to his misery, Vikrant’s father (Brijendra Kala) has always been a servile, loyal employee of the Awasthis, afraid to go against Akheraj even if it means pushing his son towards Purva. Vikrant had instinctively and steadfastly spurned Purna’s friendship even in school and could heave a sigh of relief only when she was packed off to the UK. He had a dream future planned with Shikha (Shweta Tripathi), the love of his life, when Purva returned as an adult, obsession intact and ready to claim him as hers once again. With Akheraj willing to go to any lengths to get her what she desires, getting rid of Purva was Vikrant’s only way out of a marriage he dreaded. It was, unwittingly, Vikrant’s first step towards turning himself into an unrecognisably dark person, no different from the Awasthis.
Singham Again
Action, Drama, Thriller, Crime (Hindi)
The cop universe expands with newer additions while the old ones return led by Bajirao Singham. Singham Again interweaves the mythological epic Ramayana's good vs evil narrative when his wife Avni Kamath gets abducted by Danger Lanka setting Bajirao and his gang of Sangram Bhalerao and Veer Sooryavanshi along with Satya and Shakti Shetty on a mission to rescue her.
Cast:
Ajay Devgn, Kareena Kapoor Khan, Arjun Kapoor, Ranveer Singh, Tiger Shroff, Deepika Padukone, Akshay Kumar, Jackie Shroff, Shweta Tiwari, Dayanand Shetty
Director:
Rohit Shetty
Wed, December 11 2024
There is an early scene in Singham Again where Ajay Devgn’s titular super-cop barges into his teenage son’s party along with a couple of cronies, embarrasses him in public, and hauls him back home. He does it, it seems, only to give director Rohit Shetty another opportunity to shoot him in stylised slow-motion. At home, Singham and his wife, Avni (Kareena Kapoor Khan) lecture their son about how out of touch he is with Indian values. It’s a deeply melodramatic moment; you can almost imagine them turning into Amitabh Bachchan and Hema Malini from Baghban in a couple of decades. But one thing is made absolutely clear by this early domestic drama: Shetty and Devgn don’t think too highly of the nation’s youth. This became a recurring theme even in their pre-release press interviews. They would both proudly declare that they barely resonate with the kids these days, and how, back in their day, they were roughing it out in the real world. This is a bizarre stance to take, for multiple reasons. For one, it’s always a good idea to understand younger generations. You might just learn something; just ask Javed Akhtar. But second, Singham Again is aimed at the very demographic that Shetty and Devgn have decided to infantilise.
Tue, December 10 2024
Rohit Shetty is probably the biggest showman in Bollywood right now. With Singham Again and the idea of a cop universe, he has pulled off the biggest mainstream casting in the last 25 years. With at least five top commercially viable actors—Ajay, Akshay, Ranveer, Deepika and Kareena—he has made the canvas of Singham Again so big that it is most likely to become the ‘go to’ movie of this year.
Sun, December 8 2024
Citadel: Honey Bunny
Action & Adventure, Drama, Sci-Fi & Fantasy (English)
When stuntman Bunny recruits struggling actress Honey for a side gig, they are hurled into a high-stakes world of action, espionage and betrayal. Years later, as their dangerous past catches up, the estranged Honey and Bunny must reunite and fight to protect their young daughter Nadia.
Cast:
Samantha Ruth Prabhu, Varun Dhawan, Kay Kay Menon, Kashvi Majmundar, Simran, Saqib Saleem, Sikandar Kher, Shivankit Singh Parihar, Soham Majumdar
Tue, December 10 2024
The Indian spin-off of Prime Video’s American show Citadel, titled Honey Bunny, tracks the making of super-agent Nadia Sinh (Priyanka Chopra). Though Priyanka is not in the series, it’s about her parents Honey (Samantha) and Bunny (Varun Dhawan) and they become Citadel agents. The little Nadia (Kashvi) is very much present throughout the series and shows early inclinations of being a tough girl. While Honey is a struggling actor, Bunny is a stuntman who lives a double life of an agent under Baba (Kay Kay Menon). The time period is somewhere around 1992 and the play areas are Mumbai, Belgrade, Nainital and Bucharest. As expected, Baba and his ace killer KD (Saqib Saleem) are after Honey’s life even after eight years in 2000, but as the sentiments would go, Bunny returns to be the wall between death and life.
Sun, December 8 2024
Mon, November 18 2024
Citadel: Honey Bunny is the third series in the Citadel universe. Arriving on the heels of the Italian series Citadel: Diana, the Indian version is a prequel story that links into the main Amazon Prime Video series. Developed by Sita Menon and directed by Raj Nidimoru and Krishna DK (Raj & DK), Citadel: Honey Bunny has a sluggish start introducing the characters and the Indian connection. However, over six episodes, the series builds on the characters’ connections for a solid finish.
Don't Move
Horror, Thriller (English)
A grieving woman in a secluded forest encounters a killer who injects her with a paralytic drug. As her body shuts down, her fight for survival begins.
Cast:
Kelsey Asbille, Finn Wittrock, Daniel Francis, Moray Treadwell, Dylan Beam, Kate Nichols, Skye Little Wing Dimova-Saw, Denis Kostadinov, Zainab Azizi
Director:
Adam Schindler, Brian Netto
Writer:
T.J. Cimfel, David White
Tue, December 10 2024
For psychological thrillers, it’s a given that we live in a broken world, a place with predators lurking around. Usually isolated from civilisation, literally and metaphorically, such a space evokes fear, horror and then survivalist tendencies. A new Netflix film Don’t Move portrays a similar canvas where a 30-something Iris (Kelsey), grieving the accidental death of her child, has lost the will to live, but she surprises herself with the fightback she still has in her when a family man-cum-ruthless kidnapper Richard (Finn) enters the scene.
Sun, December 8 2024
A young woman grieving the death of her child treks to the cliffside spot where he died. She intends to jump herself. Played by Kelsey Asbille, the woman is approached by a mysterious stranger, played by Finn Wittrock. He recognises immediately that she’s one step away from falling to her death. The stranger doesn’t attempt to talk her down from the ledge, but he makes enough of an impression for her to reconsider. They walk back together to the parking lot, where things take a sudden turn. The man injects her with some kind of paralytic substance, revealing that he isn’t a good samaritan after all. Thus begins Don’t Move, a high-concept thriller that producer Sam Raimi probably thought was going to turn out like his knockout 2016 film Don’t Breathe. It didn’t. These movies have nothing in common beyond Raimi’s involvement, and that gentle nudge of a title. In terms of quality, they couldn’t be further apart from each other. Don’t Move appears to be so pleased with its premise — it’s a survival thriller featuring an immobile protagonist! — that it forgets it needs to sustain this early momentum. The movie succeeds in drawing your sympathies for its heroine, Iris, but struggles to put her in interesting scenarios after this pre-credits sequence.