Bunty Aur Babli 2 is a harmless film. It offends no one. It makes some jokes – some land, some do not. It has a zany lead couple. It talks about politics, education, inflation, and unemployment in the sanest of ways. It is not boring, not even during its awful […]
Read Time : 6 Minutes
‘Meenakshi Sundareshwar’ review – a bizarre romance spun around offensive cultural stereotyping
Meenakshi Sundareshwar poses a tough nut for Bollywood to crack. On one hand, there is the industry’s decades-old misconception about how people live in India’s southern states. On the other, there is the Tamil community’s reservation against the Hindi language and the possibility of what might be cultural appropriation. While the […]
Read Time : 6 Minutes
‘Hum Do Hamare Do’ review – a striking lead cast elevates a film on familial bonds
Director Abhishek Jain’s Hum Do Hamare Do instigates an interesting thought. What is family? Is it a way to define a group of people who are biologically related and are co-habiting in order to follow what is a societal norm? Have we, especially in an Indian context, tried to deconstruct […]
Read Time : 6 Minutes
‘Sardar Udham’ review – Shoojit Sircar’s film sets a golden benchmark for Bollywood historicals
The process of exploring Shoojit Sircar’s cinema in several ways is meditative, irrespective of their quality. It feels like watching a flavorful bowl of soup – simmer and boil into perfection – with the minor ingredients immersing into the sumptuous base to turn into a thick, nutritious blend. Sircar’s latest […]
Read Time : 6 Minutes
‘Shershaah’ review – Sidharth Malhotra headlines an utterly generic war drama
One of the reasons why mainstream Bollywood is losing the foothold it once enjoyed is easily the genericness of its content. It is no flash news that contemporary Hindi cinema churns out films as if they are generated out of a stencil and director Vishnuvardhan’s hugely hyped war drama Shershaah […]
Read Time : 4 Minutes
Locarno Review: ‘Shankar’s Fairies’ is a reflective journey to 1960s India
There is nothing that equates to the tenderness of childhood. Our growing-up years are filled with endless questions, dollops of curiosity, and many mesmerizing stories. Director Irfana Majumdar’s Hindi language film Shankar’s Fairies set in 1962 portrays a network where a bright little girl Anjana (Shreeja Mishra) forges a bond […]
Read Time : 5 Minutes
‘Mimi’ review – Kriti Sanon packs a punch in an overlong surrogacy drama
In a tiny Rajasthani town called Shekhavati lives a beautiful dancer called Mimi (Kriti Sanon). She sways like a mermaid, smiles like a fairy. Mimi talks to cutouts of Bollywood starlets in her ultra-kitschy bedroom while harbouring dreams to dethrone them one day. However, like Vimmi of Bunty Aur Babli, […]
Read Time : 7 Minutes
‘Haseen Dillruba’ review – Vinil Mathew’s pulp thriller is devoid of layers and logic
An awkward husband, a seductive wife, and a handsome relative who comes visiting – say hello to the pillars of Haseen Dillruba helmed by Vinil Mathew who, back in 2014, gave us the charming Hasee Toh Phasee. With a premise that has been filling love triangle templates in fiction for […]
Read Time : 6 Minutes
‘Sherni’ review – About bureaucracy, patriarchy, and a tigress on the prowl
“The only thing that saves us from the bureaucracy is inefficiency. An efficient bureaucracy is the greatest threat to liberty,” reads a famous quote by Eugene McCarthy. Unarguably true in every format, tribe, level, and circumstance, the decades-old statement’s authenticity is proven in director Amit Masurkar’s set up in Sherni. […]
Read Time : 8 Minutes
Tribeca Review: ‘India Sweets and Spices’ is a charming family film peppered with warmth and sarcasm
Time is the biggest narrative changer. In Geeta Malik’s fascinating coming-of-age drama India Sweets And Spices, UCLA freshman Alia Kapur (Sophia Ali) is at her life’s transformational ridge. Not particularly thrilled to meet her family for the summer vacations, Alia is decidedly different from the Indian fraternity that forms her […]