Director Rojin Thomas’s Malayalam film #Home is an impressive case study. One that tells the story of a slightly dysfunctional family, the film cleverly masquerades as a neglected father’s tale while slyly guilt-tripping his children. In the early 2000s, Sheela-Jayaram starrer Manasinakkare managed a similar feat but the Sathyan Anthikad […]
Read Time : 12 Minutes
‘Malik’ review – An immersive chronicle of survival & rise amid religious polarisation
In a stirring scene in Mahesh Narayanan’s Malik, the leading man Sulaiman alias Ali Ikka (Fahadh Faasil) engages in a quarrel around his father’s burial spot which is now a wasteyard. Badly assaulted by cops, a group of people later dumps him in the very same pile of waste. There […]
Read Time : 4 Minutes
‘Cold Case’ review – Prithviraj-starrer mixes horror and police procedural genres to uneven results
There are bona fide horror films that you watch with a conclusive belief that supernatural entities are real. Then there are police procedurals that unravel a mystery entirely based on science and evidence. In director Tanu Balak’s Cold Case, we witness both scenarios. A single case of a missing woman […]
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 : 9 Minutes
‘Aarkkariyam’ review – a mercurial Malayalam drama around a dirty family secret
Nostalgia is a word that contains volumes of drama. It can be twisted to generate gazillion quotes with the finest of metaphors. A favourite would be, “Nostalgia is a beautiful lie dressed up in sepia.” Director Sanu John Varughese’s Aarkkariyam is not necessarily a film that thrives on that emotion. […]
Read Time : 8 Minutes
‘Joji’ review – Dileesh Pothan’s take on Macbeth is a bona fide masterpiece
“Society is a fucker,” declares the title character of Dileesh Pothan’s Joji. If we observe the setup from a distance, society is seldom a direct component in the Panachel family. Here is a film with minimal exposition and no random third party conversations staged at tea shops and rickshaw stands. […]
Read Time : 4 Minutes
‘Saina’ review – Parineeti Chopra is ace in this simplistic sportswoman biopic
Much like several of Hollywood’s musician biopics, India’s sports biographies are interchangeable. In a good majority of stories, poverty or sexism (if its subject is female) becomes the pertinent roadblocks and the protagonist emerges triumphant with nationalistic elements thrown in for extra effects. Amole Gupte’s biopic on India’s ace badminton […]
Read Time : 10 Minutes
‘Drishyam 2’ review – Entering Georgekutty’s brand new maze of deception
“Cinema. It’s an important link. What is peculiar about movies? Visuals. The impact of visuals on mind is unmatched,” echoed Geetha Prabhakar (Asha Sarath) in a scene that thrilled us to bits in the 2013 Malayalam blockbuster Drishyam. We never predicted a cinema link to pop up even though it […]
Read Time : 8 Minutes
‘Soorarai Pottru’ review – Suriya’s rousing aviation drama lands straight into your heart
I have always wondered why Suriya never received the hype that he duly deserved. Not that popularity is a barometer to an actor’s histrionic merits but it is a measure of any artist’s perceived value. Suriya is (arguably) the best-looking actor working in Tamil cinema today. Irrespective of the quality […]
Read Time : 10 Minutes
‘Putham Pudhu Kaalai’ review – Unforeseen days, endearing stories
Let me begin with an ironic confession. Cinema in a short format seldom fascinates me. However, anthologies rank pretty high among my preferred feature film genres. Why this paradox? I would say, it is the link that often exists between the short films that captivates me no end. At the […]