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May 2021
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Pagglait
With an ensemble cast and its heart in the right place, this Sanya Malhotra film only veers off-course when it becomes too heavy-handed.
Mar 2021
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Saina
Parineeti Chopra gives us a good, solid Saina Nehwal. When she raises her racket after a hard-fought win, you cheer.
Mar 2021
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Mumbai Saga
In Sanjay Gupta’s better films, the bad guys used to be more interesting, the action used to be classy. This John Abraham-Emraan Hashmi film, however, feels jaded.
Mar 2021
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Sandeep Aur Pinky Faraar
This is a director who doesn’t hang about. But the films’s hold upon us starts slipping when it starts casting about for good reasons for its leads to be the way they are, coming back into focus sporadically.
Mar 2021
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Roohi
What’s missing is a coherent plot and writing. All we get is one cringe-inducing sequence after the next...
Mar 2021
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Madam Chief Minister
This film had potential. It could have redressed a shameful lack.
Jan 2021
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Tribhanga
What I really like about Tribhanga is the clear-eyed, unsentimental treatment of relationships, which can often be so cloyingly exaggerated in mainstream cinema.
Jan 2021
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Kaagaz
...could have been an important film. But the plot is littered with clichés, and comes off distressingly dated...
Jan 2021
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Nail Polish
...buoyed by a wonderful performance from Kaul, and ably supported by the rest, keep us engaged.
Jan 2021
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Ramprasad Ki Tehrvi
...I found the acerbic overhang and the good-natured ribbing turning into something edgier, the quality which makes this kind of film stand out, dissolving a little. But then the director sweeps them up together, and we are back to being bystanders, amused and bemused, all at once.
Jan 2021
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Coolie No.1
We can do with laughter in these dark times, but not like this, with zero wit, no flair.
Dec 2020
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AK vs AK
Motwane’s movie is not just meta. It’s meta-meta, especially when some parts hit too close to the mark, and some are just tantalisingly off the mark.
Dec 2020
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Angrezi Medium
In its attempt to strike a balance between making us laugh and cry, broad comedy and wring-your-heart emotion, the film keeps swaying one way and another, resulting in sudden tonal shifts.
Mar 2020
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Kaamyaab
...is a moving, consistently engaging portrait of an artist as a weathering, weathered man.
Mar 2020
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Baaghi 3
The only reason for Baaghi 3 to exist is this: to showcase the amazingly ripped bod of Tiger Shroff, who is poetry when in motion, and faltering verse when there’s emotion.
Mar 2020
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Thappad
...there is not a shred of doubt that Sinha has made an important, crucial film, which shows up centuries of male entitlement for what it is. And how all it takes, from a woman who just wants self-respect, is a decision to say no, Not Even One Slap.
Feb 2020
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Love Aaj Kal
I came away with a feeling of being comprehensively let down: where has the craft gone, and where, indeed, the heart?
Feb 2020
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Shikara
A more nuanced sense of history would have made this film much more complete, even if you were to put aside the enormous irony of watching a film about a place which has been in lock-down for the past six months: when will the people in the valley be able to watch Shikara, and tell us what they think?
Feb 2020
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Malang
Here’s a film which is a perfect example of how Bollywood struggles with creating a plot in which every single thread counts.
Feb 2020
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Jawaani Jaaneman
A little more consistency with the writing, and a re-upping of the fun-meter would have made Jawaani Jaaneman super. As it is, it is fun while it lasts.
Jan 2020
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Street Dancer 3D
The first thing a good dance movie ought to do is give us numbers that make us want to leap up to our feet right there in the aisle, and go shake-shimmy-shake. On that score alone, Street Dancer 3D, the third in the ABCD line, flubs it.
Jan 2020
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Panga
I will take this, if it comes with a film that celebrates a woman trying to reclaim her dream, even if it comes sanctioned by family.
Jan 2020
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Jai Mummy Di
The title is apt, and make you smile. Sadly, the spark doesn’t percolate into the film, which comes off banal and dull.
Jan 2020
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Tanhaji
...we are so steeped in Bollywood’s patriots re-creating paeans to our glorious past, that to even bring up the fact that the bad guys are your Muslim ‘outsiders’, seems to belabour the point. For this film, it’s simple; either you are on our side, or theirs.
Jan 2020
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Chhapaak
You look at Padukone, so far away from the dressed-up, made-up parts she’s done till now, and acknowledge an actor who wants to break out of her safe zone, to actually inhabit someone else’s skin even if it’s burnt. Yes, it’s worthy, but it’s also very watchable.
Jan 2020
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Good Newwz
...so refreshing to have something so out-of-the-box (another word for ‘risky’) come out of an industry whose default option is to play safe by churning out tired, jaded sequels of tired, jaded super-starry vehicles.
Dec 2019
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Dabangg 3
No ‘pyaar’, no ‘thappad’, and even Shirtless Salman eliciting only muted ‘seeties’? What’s the point then?
Dec 2019