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Tubelight
...with Tubelight, my glass is half full and not half empty. When your head points out several exasperating aspects of a film and you still find yourself weeping with it, there is something to be said about the director’s ability to strike an emotional chord.
Jun 2017
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Wazir
Although Wazir falls flat on its face as a thriller when you consider the question posed earlier in this review, it does work in other departments.
Jan 2016
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Jolly LLB 2
...it pulls off humour and emotional resonance in several places, but those passages are also a reminder of what might have been if more time and thought had been invested in the writing of this film as a whole.
Feb 2017
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Hichki
The film itself is not without its faults, but its uplifting theme and Mukerji’s understated performance serve as compensation.
Mar 2018
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Aligarh
Despite a sterling performance by Manoj Bajpayee and other positives, Aligarh ends up being an inconsistent biopic – on the one hand providing a beautiful portrait of reclusiveness, yet elsewhere doing a disservice to a man to whom this country owes an apology.
Feb 2016
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Ae Dil Hai Mushkil
...is not an immersive experience and after a while I lost interest in its rigmarole of relationships, the many datings and matings, break-ups and patch-ups, marriages, divorces, friendships and the one-way scenarios involved.
Oct 2016
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Revolver Rani
...has many wonderful moments and ideas, but as a whole it’s neither satirical enough nor farcical enough nor intense enough nor thrilling enough to be what it seems to want to be.
Apr 2014
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Babumoshai Bandookbaaz
...while the film remains engaging throughout, it is hard to ignore the post-interval lack of substance.
Aug 2017
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Dabangg 2
The film is fun and funny only in parts, not a complete washout but certainly a completely unworthy successor to Dabangg.
Dec 2012
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Highway
...with all this going for it plus an unpredictable ending, Highway cannot escape from the burden of its sketchy, incomplete feel.
Feb 2014
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Jai Gangaajal
...is watchable. The film suffers sorely because Prakash Jha makes it too much about himself.
Mar 2016
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Baar Baar Dekho
If I had the power to go back in time and any power over Team Baar Baar Dekho, I would cajole or bully them into rewriting the second half of their script. In the present though, in the here and now, this is a film that starts off well but fails to sustain itself.
Sep 2016
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Noor
The film’s pluses do not eclipse its minuses though. Its news office milieu is poorly sketched...
Apr 2017
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Nov 2016
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Shubh Mangal Saavdhan
...is super-fun till it gets superficial. It is, to borrow the tagline of another film now in theatres, sundar, susheel and risky in its first half, flails about in the second, but remains entertaining overall.
Sep 2017
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Matru Ki Bijlee Ka Mandola
MKBKM’s effort to be joyously absurd is too obvious and the usually assured Bhardwaj seems to be playing fast and loose with the reins in his hands.
Jan 2013
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Dear Zindagi
I loved SRK in the film, Bhatt is always a pleasure to watch, the story visits many themes that are uncommon in Bollywood, and several of the discussions are either witty or insightful or both. Overall though, the film comes across as being not enough because the writing needed more substance.
Nov 2016
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Madaari
This Khan makes Madaari a film worth watching. And his presence in contemporary cinema, makes this world a better place to live in.
Jul 2016
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Rangoon
The Bhardwaj who made Maqbool, Omkara and Haider is a man perfectly suited to a film like Rangoon. Sadly, without the writing brilliance of the director’s Shakespeare trilogy, Rangoon gets many things right, but fails to come together as an involving, engaging whole.
Feb 2017
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Phantom
...is what we Indians call “timepass”. Considering the subject matter, it should have been more, but as it is, it’s what we Indians additionally call a “one-time watch”.
Aug 2015
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Karwaan
There can be no more appropriate a description of Karwaan: it is not earth shattering, but it is not bad at all. Which is another way of saying it is an intelligent, funny, thoughtful film and a pleasant experience.
Aug 2018
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Aug 2014
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Dream Girl
Just when you think Dream Girl has succumbed to what critics have in the past called The Curse of the Second Half though, it picks up once again thanks to certain cast members with unfailing comic timing.
Sep 2019
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Badlapur
...boasts of many memorable scenes peopled with brilliant actors. The overall feeling though is one of a sporadically, episodically effective film that doesn’t quite add up.
Feb 2015
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Pad Man
For a film that is about self-sustenance among women, there is also some needless patriarchal dialoguebaazi about a mard being one who can provide raksha (protection) to the women in his life. That said, there is so much in Padman that is enjoyable and meaningful.
Feb 2018
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Happy New Year
Team Farah-Shah Rukh are capable of much better in the over-the-top genre that they favour together. Happy New Year is a step down from Om Shanti Om, but if you enjoy boisterous entertainment that is still not entirely mindless, it’s worth a visit.
Oct 2014
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Tanu Weds Manu Returns
Despite its jumbled story and this undercurrent of misogyny, it’s hard to write off the film. Because when the going gets good the dialogues are killers and because of the immaculate acting.
May 2015
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David
...is so tedious that it’s hard to focus on its very unusual pluses. This is a film that does not seem to know where it’s going.
Feb 2013
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Sep 2015
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M.S. Dhoni
If Neeraj Pandey needed to be this careful, perhaps he should have manufactured a bottle of antiseptic instead of making a film.
Sep 2016