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Arjun Patiala
...feels like a Punjabi film masquerading as a Bollywood one. The humour is deliberately rough and rustic and the filmmaking clunky.
Jul 2019
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Jhootha Kahin Ka
...Kang can’t stop the humour turning loud and crass with double entendre slipping in, specially when it comes to women. It’s not just the sexist jokes, here the women are rendered deliberately vapid and inconsequential...
Jul 2019
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Super 30
A salutary cause and an inspirational story about the triumph of the underdog doesn’t necessarily make an engaging film.
Jul 2019
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One Day
...everyone, from the actors to the audience, is left either direly bored or unintentionally amused.
Jul 2019
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Article 15
Sinha lays the onus of the societal transformation on the privileged. They have to alter the lopsided canvas.
Jun 2019
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Kabir Singh
Entitled, toxic hero and a heroine without any agency whatsoever. What’s new?
Jun 2019
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Jun 2019
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Student Of The Year 2
Despite the fresh, young faces at the centre, a staleness looms large over SOTY2.
May 2019
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Setters
Chaudhary gets the milieu, lingo and the social nuances and hierarchies right and has a fabulous ensemble of actors, some in smaller roles, but the film doesn’t hit a high note.
May 2019
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May 2019
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Kalank
You could say that I am being overly righteous and needlessly cautious here but the climax left me discomfited and disturbed.
Apr 2019
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Albert Pinto Ko Gussa Kyun Aaata Hai?
The narrative meanders pointlessly, as a bizarre background score plays on noisily and the climax feels just as needlessly knotty. The film would have actually been better titled as Albert Pinto Ki Ajeeb Dastaan.
Apr 2019
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No Fathers In Kashmir
Kumar comes with a solid background in documentary filmmaking and has sound grounding in the politics of the State (Inshallah, Football and Inshallah, Kashmir), the reason one would have expected a far more searing and incisive account in the film than what one eventually gets to watch.
Apr 2019
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Romeo Akbar Walter
Fashioned along the lines of the childish, old-fashioned B-grade Bollywood-Hollywood thrillers, RAW is all about the hidden transmitters and surveillance rooms and gratuitous third degree torture in ISI detention centres, laughable polygraph tests and sundry similar procedurals and investigations.
Apr 2019
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Junglee
There is a sweet stray dog and magnificent tuskers and an unintended nostalgia unleashed for Haathi Mere Saathi. I came out raving about Kulkarni's fitness and agility and Jammwal’s voice and jawline. But that wasn’t quite the point of the film, was it?
Mar 2019
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Mard Ko Dard Nahi Hota
There’s an innocence and transparency, a steadiness of tone and tenor, a perpetual energy and the delectable thread of whimsy that knits the film through and through.
Mar 2019
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Kesari
All that has stayed on with me is the landscape—the brown, arid earth pitted against the majesty of the snow-laden, silver mountains. If only panoramic settings could make a good film.
Mar 2019
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Photograph
...I was also left feeling a sense of void and dissatisfaction, in that it barely scratches the surface of what could have been a far deeper engagement.
Mar 2019
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Hamid
..given the recent turn of events it’s the very simplicity, humaneness and a sense of poise that resonates, connects and is profoundly moving.
Mar 2019
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Sonchiriya
It’s an intricately woven script which strings many threads and themes together—crisply, economically with hardly a note out of place. The sure-footedness, self-assurance all adding to a deadly impact.
Mar 2019
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Gully Boy
...it’s a classic, empathetic underdog story with a crowd pleasing, feel good finale about turning your imperfect reality into a long-cherished and impossible fantasy.
Feb 2019
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The Fakir Of Venice
Released a decade after it was made The Fakir of Venice, disappoints with the lack of alchemy between the lead actors.
Feb 2019
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Ek Ladki Ko Dekha Toh Aisa Laga
...might be bringing a “new story” to Bollywood but plays out too flat, lightweight and facile to be of any consequence. Tell us another love story, please.
Feb 2019
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Thackeray
The film is not just a justification but a no holds barred celebration of the ruthlessness.
Jan 2019
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Manikarnika
A flat retelling of the legend of Jhansi Ki Rani that aims at stoking nationalism but reduces the story to mere platitudes.
Jan 2019
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Bombairiya
This kind of multiple stories device has been used time and again in cinema to great effect. Bombairiya, however, is a call to give it a long, if not permanent, rest in Bollywood. Its use in the film feels entirely needless...
Jan 2019
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Why Cheat India
Complex problems need complex cinema. Why Cheat India prefers to stay on the surface than dig deeper.
Jan 2019
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Uri
At times I found myself standing clear of my own political biases to acknowledge his engaging craft. At other moments, I broke away from the film’s emotional sway to question its politics.
Jan 2019
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Simmba
Be it as brutal violators or patronising saviours of women, Simmba shows that it all boils down to the same toxic masculinity which the men behind Simmba have been perpetuating film after film. There is a saying in Hindi: “Sau choohe khake billi haj ko chali (After eating a hundred rats the cat goes on a pilgrimage)”. Need I say more?
Dec 2018