Baahubali: The Beginning.

At times a worthwhile talking point precedes the reputation of a film so much that while it doesn't quite color my viewing, it does hamper me with preconceptions. This was the case with Baahubali, the first part of the big budget Tamil/Telugu two-parter fantasy action film, and its alleged sexism. Yet, there are a lot of other facets that deserve discussing, too. In a year where I barely watched Indian films (and also neglected this poor blog of mine) it makes sense to begin the new year by breaking down the biggest blockbuster of the previous year.

Shiva (Prabhas) grows up below a magnificent waterfall, above which he knows there is a land he must get to, even as his mother forbids him not to climb it. But climb he does, to discover the warrior Ananthika (Tamannah) who he has been besotted with ever since he found her mask on the bottom of the waterfall. Ananthika's mission in life is to free the queen Devaseva (Anushka Shetty) from the clutches of the evil king Ballavadeva (Rana Daggubati), and Shiva joins her in this mission, unaware it is all his destiny.

In terms of the good, the look of the film is spectacular. The bombastic Southie masala style has always fit the fantasy-history stories, and it does here as well. The story never stops moving, and is so vast it can't be contained in this single film. I absolutely loved Rana Daggubati's horrendous villain and thought all female leads did fantastic. Prabhas is an actor I've never quite become a fan of, but he continues to be just fine in my books.

I liked how well incorporated the visual effects were, though not flawless, particularly in the massive crowd sequences. These scenes owe a lot both in terms of technology and inspiration to the scenes in Jackson's Return of The King, and while the inspiration is cringeworthy, it feels okay to place such a scene in a new, Indian fantasy concept. The racism in depicting the enemy as human but distinctly dark-skinned savages who seem to speak a language aping an African language is so offputting it turns comical.

Then there is the sexism, which has inspired criticism better written than mine, as well as counter-criticisms. It is gross and objectionable but it is also just so tired. The reduction of Tamannah's Ananthika from a woman with a mission, a skillset and if not a fully fleshed out characterisation then at the very least potential for one, into just a pretty young thing would be annoying in and of itself but it goes further. This change is brought on by the hero, sneakily, because his infatuation with her looks renders all other facets of her unimportant.

I suppose there are more forgiving interpretations of this that one could conjure up, but the film is pretty content in this laziness. It's strange how I've never been that annoyed with the overblown masculinity of Southie heroes, or even the casual sidelining of the heroines that comes with it. It is only these extreme cases that truly get under my skin.

The next installment in the Bahubali series promises more backstory on Anushka Shetty's character, which I am cautiously optimistic about because she is among my favorites in the Southern industries. Naturally the sequel could be as bad as the first film in the exact same ways, but I'm hopeful. As it stands, Bahubali: The Beginning is a decent spectacle elevated by its visuals and success, but not the story or its characters.

Mini reviews: the Films I Actually Liked Edition.

NH10 - I went in not knowing much about this one beyond the initial premise of an urban couple getting mixed up in rural violent disputes along the highway. I also probably won't ever go back to this one, such a brutal watch it was, but this one really nailed so many things I didn't expect it to. Anushka Sharma delivered a career-great (or career upper echelon but hopefully not the best we get to see out of her yet) performance. The mood was fantastic throughout, capturing the terror and the panic and the constant threat of violence looming over. The soundtrack underscores the mood, and the milieu is perfect for it, too. Enjoyable, but tough, precisely because of how real it feels.

Piku - This tale of bowel movement and road trip and family bonding and tentative romance feels like precisely the worst kind of "quirky" film you could imagine, and yet it's one I'll probably find myself recommending the most. The strength of the script, that immediately allows you to feel at home with these characters, added to the strength of the performances (Deepika has probably been this good before, and even so this feels special) simply makes Piku a delight. I just sat there, watching it, being awed and delighted by its world and its humour. Amitabh and Irffan are fantastic here, as well, but their value has been demonstrated before, whereas Deepika Padukone is making great strides as of late. I love that this was a hit.

Sunrise (2014) - A French-Indian co-production was one that I felt safe taking my Bollywood-hating friend to, as the whole thing clocked in around 90 minutes of running time and did not seem like your standard crime fare. Adil Hussain leads in this noir indie where rain is a constant and the narrative dips in and out of reality as we follow the cop Joshi chase shadows on the streets of Mumbai as multiple children are turning up dead. A sort of b-plot follows a group of dance girls in a heart-breaking portrayal of the underworld. I don't particularly want to get too deep into everything that happens, as the film (directed by Partho Sen-Gupta) is so small in scale and its objectives that it's best viewed without knowing too much. I saw it at a festival, so I don't know how widely it's been released yet, but worth looking out for.

Detective Byomkesh Bakshy - Sushant Singh Rajput had impressed me so little in his previous films that the poor man did not even have a tag on this here blog, following his debut in Kai Po Che and his second film Desi Shuddh Romance (which I hated). But with this Hindi adaptation of the famous Bengali detective novels, he's arrived in a big way, both to my graces and in the industry in general. I loved this Dibakar Banerjee film, in its 1940's Kolkatta milieu and noir style cinematography, the story in all its twists and turns and fantastic supporting cast. And that rocking soundtrack, by god. This might not end up being my favourite of 2015 but it'll probably at the very least crack top five, and I look forward to any possible sequels,

Mini reviews: playing catch up.

Bajrangi Bhaijaan - When you haven't been watching any Hindi films for months and months on end, it feels rather lovely to be swept up in the melodrama again, and this Salman Khan starrer certainly fit the bill, what with Pakistan-India unity themes and the missing mute child of it all. I can't say I hated it, but towards the end it was just a tiny bit too much. Loved seeing Nawazuddin Siddiqui pick up that mainstream paycheck, even if I wasn't huge on his role in this.

Oh, and Kareena Kapoor Khan was in this film, too, a fact I barely remembered until just now. I don't want to say she should pick better films, since maybe none are coming her way any more (lamentable fact of life for married actresses) but I do miss her putting in better work than this.

Dil Dhadakne Do - Speaking of Kareena, would have loved to see the original cast for this, which was Ranbir-Kareena as the siblings who were eventually played by Priyanka Chopra and Ranveer Singh, and Madhuri as the mother (a role that went to Shefali Shetty, who is great here). Still, had that happened, what would have ended up on the screen probably would have been the same, middle-of-the-road family drama with some emotional moments, comedy and dance numbers. I really enjoyed this one, but with the caveat that from the intermission I knew it would be a hopelessly forgettable film. The characters are just a little too bland and stereotypical, the drama predictable and even the twists rather unexciting. It's pretty and it's fun, and then you never think about it again as the credits roll. Indeed, my biggest take aways from the film were the following three things:

1. It is exciting to see Priyanka Chopra still in this familiar environment now that she's set to lead a major US network drama series. I've never been a huge fan, but I've also been the first to admit her talent. 7 Khoon Maaf is still her finest work, but if her mainstream US success leads to more people discovering that Bhardwaj gem, I am all for it. 
2. Farhan Akhtar looks really good in a t-shirt. 
3. ...but Farhan Akhtar annoyingly wrote the character he himself played the Righteous Male Feminist dialogue. Okay, buddy. Okay.

Any Body Can Dance 2 - This one blew my hair back. Is this a movie? Is this just things happening on celluloid in a somewhat sequential manner? Was ABCD the first this bad and I just didn't notice, too swept up in the glorious dance sequences? ABCD2 sure feels like a non-movie, with things happening to characters one barely knows, with every frequent conflict solved two lines of dialogue later by multiple deux ex machina, with cardboard cut-outs having emotions like stickers attached and removed easily for plot convenience. The dance sequences are okay, but with absolutely no emotional connection to anything else that is happening, they feel strangely hollow. I enjoyed seeing the familiar faces from the first film, including Lauren Gottlieb, but holy moly. Don't suffer through this one like I did, even for shirtless Varun Dhawan and some okay naach-gaana.

Badlapur - Am I going to hate Badlapur, I asked my Twitter timeline multiple times, seeing the review summaries pop up here and there, and for the most part people either let their silence on the matter speak for itself, or just told me a flat-out "most likely". But what with director favourite Sriram Raghavan (yes, I know Agent Vinod happened, but I blame that one on Saif), established favourite Nawazuddin and emerging favourite Varun Dhawan, how was I to ignore this film? It was the bane of my existence until I would finally see it. So I did. 

In another mood, another time, this might have become one of my flawed favourites, one that I could re-watch and re-examine for themes and nuances in performances, but at this time, during the mood I was in, I checked out about 40 minutes into the film and never quite checked back in.The tale of revenge turning one man (Dhawan) into a monster as the culprit (Siddiqui) withers in jail is certainly an intriguing one, especially held up against the empowerment through revenge narrative that was Raghavan's first film Ek Hasina Thi (11 years old this year, wow). And yet, when it was all said and done, I wondered if I should have just rewatched his debut.

Raghavan remains a capable director, allowing his leads to shine and for audiences to gain new appreciation for their range, but the "women problem" remains. Huma Qureshi, Yami Gautam, Divya Dutta and Radhika Apte all feature and do great with what little they're given, but the way the other characters or the camera and narrative choices treat them doesn't sit right with me. Sexual coercion can be played up in a way that empathises with the victim and recognises the perpetrator as vile, but instead such scenes are merely used for titillation for the camera and as a demonstration of the male lead's sickening power over his victims. It is disturbing to me when the narrative doesn't condemn a morally ambiguous character's misogyny but instead throws it up on the screen unquestioningly as a fact of life. It's all about choices in portrayal, and Raghavan seems to make the least considered ones each and every time. 

Some years back I talked about how Kucche Dhaage, a 70's drama thriller, deconstructed the revenge tale so often found in Indian films. It portrays the horrible things people do for revenge, and also how this desire to avenge wrecks the people involved psychologically. In some ways, it lets these human monsters off the hook a little too much, giving them a redemption arc on the second half, whilst also showing that since they've devoted themselves to the violence of revenge, they can't ever lead normal lives after it. Badlapur, in many ways, is an even more brutal, and unrelenting deconstruction of revenge narratives, but as Indian films often are, it's still too concerned with its murky lead, not his victims.

As much as I hated this film, I'm not ready to give up on Raghavan yet, such is my deep affection for his first two films. But would I recommend this one? No chance in hell.

The year end romantic film bloat: Khoobsurat, Daawat-e-Ishq & Kill Dil.

So it finally happened: Shaad Ali has has a misfire that I actually agree with the haters on. Jhoom Barabar Jhoom was a film not everybody was on board with (critics and audiences loathed it, but it gained a cult following that cannot stop rewatching Ticket To Hollywood), and Bunty aur Babli is not a universal dil squish, either, but I legitimately found myself telling a friend earlier this year, "He hasn't made a bad film yet." Well, he has now.

Kill Dil arrives limply clichéd from the get-go, but never catches fire in terms of story, visuals or emotions. The tale of two rascals (Ranveer Singh & Ali Zafar) separated by one of them wanting to turn good as love conquers all (Parineeti Chopra) while a father figure disapproves (a spry Govinda performance) just never really goes anywhere interesting, and it's a shame.

I get the sense it's trying to occupy some clever mid-ground between being an unapologetic tribute and/or parody to 90's cheeseball actioners and a more modern take on an age-old story, but it never reaches the point of just being a story you buy into. Instead, everybody in the film falters when the story provides such a shaky surface for them. Ali Zafar is good but doesn't frankly get to do much, Govinda has some great moments but his character is unlikable, and the main pair simply doesn't exude much of anything, despite trying very hard. I wish I had an explanation for why this doesn't work besides the obvious two: don't center your movie around cold-blooded murder, and aspire to be more than a tribute to older films.

Khoobsurat at least partly succeeds in being a part of the genre it aspires to be: a Disney princess romance in the 21st century. Sonam Kapoor's Milli is a your standard young adult novel heroine, sub-sect Mary Sue batallion. She's clutzy! She's good at her job! She cares about other people but has zero social skills! She says the wrong thing, it's awkward! A cute guy (newcomer, way-too-good-for-all-of-this Fawad Afzal Khan) is annoyed by her at first but really likes her, though, because she's just so lovable.

I liked this film for the fluffpiece that it was, and then I got increasingly impatient with it. I realised quickly I was no longer a young girl, but a young woman; I no longer want to be a princess. I can't believe in these inane fantasies anymore unless they have some sort of characterisation and fantastic acting behind them, and Sonam doesn't quite get there. It feels uncomfortable to watch her try; the best of acting is so effortless, you aren't forced to think about it as you watch somebody emote their way through a fairly simple scene. About an hour in the movie had lost me, and I wasn't going to be swept away by it. Ah well.

What a strange year for Parineeti, to start out as one of my absolute favourite newcomers of the past years and then end up with a confusingly mixed resumé towards the end, completely outdone by a woman whose first film was my worst film of 2012 by a long, long shot (Alia has come a long way, hasn't she?). I wasn't particularly into Hasee Toh Phasee, Kill Dil was disappointing, but hey, at least she had this one. Daawat-e-Ishq, a feast of love, was a vaguely food-themed movie that touches on the issue of dowry, and ends up being a modestly lovely little romcom. At the same time, however, it's all just so unmemorable I almost struggle to come up with other adjectives to describe it. There's some cuteness, delicious food scenes, and some solid acting by both of the young leads (Aditya Roy Kapoor).

The big conversation of the past few years has been the continued success or lack of success of the new generation of actors. Looking over at Parineeti Chopra's filmography, she seems destined to pick films that aren't quite amazing, and therefore never display her skills in a way that her fans, such as myself, would quite hope. It's quite easy to say "pick better movies" but who knows what kind of offers she's even getting. I still continue to hope for good things for her; she's got a spark that I think is missing from many of the other newcomers, so I hope that her presence is here to stay.

*

As the filmi year 2014 draws to a close, I'll be writing up my year's end post, and once again must apologise for not maintaining the blog as diligently as I probably should've. Still, I did a lot of travel this year, as well as a lot of work, and I even crossed some things off my bucket list. I've also got some movies I've yet to write about - including my favourite film of the year.

Talk to you soon.

Main Tera Hero. It's a film. It exists. It's not very good.

Every now and then I wonder why I watch movies, besides the fact my life is boring and ultimately empty, and circle back to thinking that in some ways I watch each film with the sincere wish that it's so good I would want to rewatch it, and make it a repeat pleasure, as opposed to just a memory of a couple of hours spent (or wasted). Not every movie has to reach this lofty goal, and indeed, if only one in ten films I watch, that's still pretty good for me.

That's probably why I hadn't seen a David Dhawan film until now. Some directors just have a style that you don't really have to watch to know; watching a few songs, a scene here or there, and reading other people's writings, you kind of pick up on what makes a director distinct from others. And much as I love comedy, every comedy I consider fantastic is not described by adjectives like "brainless" or "ear-ringingly loud". So I just figured out his oeuvre wouldn't be my thing, so I smartly avoided it, until the point came when his latest film actually interested me a little, and I thought, "How bad could it be?"

And oh boy, was this terrible, and I laughed a lot, mostly at my stupid self. At least it didn't damage my view of anybody: I have some fondness for Varun Dhawan, and I think at one point I even had fondness for Ileana (see also: Aata obsession), and I think I still have the same fondness for both of them. But yeah, this was not great.

Main Tera Hero stars Varun Dhawan as Seenu, an unlikable human being who seems to be on some magical stimulant perhaps called life, who fails upwards into a Bangalore college and proceeds to torment the existence of beautiful Sunaina (Ileana). Woefully, Sunaine already has a stalker who only likes her because of her looks, the menacing Angad (Arunoday Singh), and therefore a game of groan-inducing one-upmanship ensues, and Sunaina looks beautiful during it. On the second half, this riveting tale is complicated by the appearance of Ayesha (Nargis Fahkri), who's in love with Seenu, only not really, because she's just kind of dim. Comedy!

For a comedy to be so loud and clichéd and still have a chance of working, everybody has to commit and go all in on it, and for the most part, the cast does so. Arunoday Singh as Angad actually does extra work, and something about his ludicrously massive body makes for surprisingly good physical comedy. Varun commits, too, but Seenu is such a loathable character to begin with, it's hard to truly enjoy it. Amidst the ridiculousness, you do see those glimpses of that 'it' factor that may be the thing that made Varun stand out in the Student of the Year trio, in my eyes, but those glimpses are rather fleeting. The actresses do fine with the pitiful little they're given to work with, the songs are grating, but the movie doesn't thankfully drag.

Still, I don't know, unless you're the type with the taste for this breed of comedy, it's not particularly worth your two hours. Unless, I don't know, Varun shirtless appeals to you on some kind of primal level, in which case, hey, have at it. 

Bobby Jasoos, a mystery of modest charms.

 

 Ideally, a film about a private detective would marvel with its tightly plotted and well-scripted twists and turns. Bobby Jasoos is more focused on the detective herself, enthusiastic and smart and also a little foolish and inconsiderate, basically a nicely fleshed out female protagonist that not many actresses in Hindi cinema get to play in most of their films, but Vidya Balan seems to, in nearly every film of hers.

Bilkis Ahmed, the titular Bobby, is determined to become a private eye despite opposition from her father and derision from a more experienced detective, who laughs her out his office, time and time again. Unfazed by this, Bobby sets up her own shop, and not long after, a mysterious Aneez Khan (Kiran Kumar) hires her with a big paycheck to track down a girl with very few clues to identify her by.

The central case of the film unfolds at a nice pace, but perhaps more satisfying is just to watch Bobby in action, and all the side characters that help her or deter her. She's a fantastic, career-driven woman over 30, and that's just really refreshing, in many ways. You could argue the film should've aimed higher, delivered a more devastating twist, filled in those plot holes deftly, but I'm content with what it is; a Vidya-flavoured treat that surprises positively in some aspects, and is a bit of a letdown in others.

Bobby's love interest is the newcomer Ali Faizal's Tassavur, a popular TV journalist who is one of Bobby's initial clients, as he hires her to look into the backgrounds of girls his father wants him to marry, so that the match can be derailed and he can continue being a bachelor. From their initial scenes, you can tell Bobby is both annoyed and exhausted by this guy, but their continued chemistry is undeniable, whether they're bickering with one another or becoming partners in crime. Ali Faizal is a real find.

As delightful as the romance was, I didn't find myself in need of the other masala features, such as the many (unmemorable) songs the films has. Equally unimpressive is the bit of broad comedy the film takes a swing at by having Bobby in various disguises; a gimmick that doesn't quite work as well as the genuine situational comedy. It's really hard to criticise, though, that's how much of a treat the film really is. There are a number of other little things I could discuss as mildly disappointing facets, but again, they're so minor, I feel like I'm quibbling, or spoiling things about the film others should probably see for themselves.

So I'd without a doubt recommend it. In a year full of fun, interesting female roles, this is one of the most fun, and if you like the lead, you'll easily enjoy this one.

Mardaani: heroism for today.

 

Films react on a delay, and so it is only now that we're getting to see films that draw from the impact of the Delhi bus gang rape in late 2012, and the resulting larger discussion about violence and harassment of women in India. It's not like discussion or backlash has ever quieted since the Delhi case and the ensuing protests. Violence against women makes headlines in India every single day, and should remain the topic of discussion, much as it should worldwide, in every country, including the one I'm writing from right now.

Prakash Sarkar's Mardaani (Fighter) enters this discussion as a grounded cop drama, centered on Shivani Shivaji Roy (Rani Mukherjee), a no-nonsense cop working in Mumbai's crime branch. When an orphaned girl Pyaari Shivani has a personal connection to goes missing, she's on the hunt for the kidnapper. As the crime syndicate head Karan (Tahir Raj Bhasin) contacts her to taunt her, a game of high stakes cat and mouse develops between them.

 

The story is simple as it doesn't need to be much more. Pyaari's kidnapping and disappearance reveals a brutal, disturbing business in which young girls are traded as any other illegal commodity on the market, like drugs or guns. If there are any filmi flourishes added to this side of the story, there need not be, because just the reality of it is shocking enough. Thankfully at least in the world of film, we get catharsis - Shivani is precisely the right person for the job, following up clue after clue, putting the pieces of the puzzle together, alongside her team.

Rani Mukherjee plays the role cool as a cucumber. You could accuse the character of the same exaggerated flawlessness as many a film cop, but what I'd argue is that men get these roles dime a dozen, whereas seeing this kind of badassery from a woman is pretty rare. Let us have it, for once, in all its exaggeration. Let's allow Shivani to be awesome without undercutting it one bit.

Another thing I really enjoyed is that while they allow Karan's character to get some decidedly cool villain dialogues where he gains the upper hand, and even a moment of distinct humanity and emotion, there is never a moment in which you truly feel sorry for this garbage human being. Poor child trafficker is not a trope anybody needs to see, and while newcomer Tahir Raj Bhasin puts in a good performance, there's not an ounce of me that likes the character.

The final couple of scenes pack such a punch we might as well unpack them, but to do so, I must discuss some spoilers. Feel free to take this as a full-fledged recommendation, with the caveat that if you are a sensitive viewer who cannot stomach violence or the heavy subject matter, you naturally should skip out on the movie, no matter how good or (in my view) important it is. It's fine, not all films are for everybody.

 

Before I get to Shivani's monologue, there is another key scene earlier on the film, in which a Delhi police boss tells her to essentially back off, and uses the red flag phrase for women in any work place, "you're getting overly emotional". It's an important scene because it demonstrates a point Shivani later demonstrates by somewhat advocating for 'encounters', Indian slang for a tactical murder of crime suspects or criminals commited by the police. The police higher up is not malicious, but his attitude speaks about a lack of interest when it comes to these cases. "What's one girl, why get so invested?" he is essentially asking, but it's the same question thousands of police officers in India ask themselves, while they fail to solve the cases of disappearance, kidnapping, rape, murder etc. Female lives barely matter in the greater scheme of things.

Shivani's veiled acceptance of encounters sits uneasily with me, but her monologue brings up an important point that beyond the questionable behaviour by the police, the next step in the judicial system - the courts - are just as disinterested in the importance of women. They may be bribed, or influenced, or simply misogynist so as to not rate the life of a woman as important as that of a man. We see this, worldwide, where rape victims are questioned on their attire and sexual history, and criminals with power and influence in society can brush aside serious crime accusations with a flick of a judicial wand.

In Mardaani, it is the victims who finally get to enact revenge on the criminal, because this is a film, after all. It's a difficult thing, because as a viewer it felt right and wrong simultaneously, because in the context of the story, I needed this ending, but in the big picture of things, one dead garbage human doesn't change the system of wrong that allowed him to successfully thrive and commit horrible acts. But that's my heavy-hearted Weltschmerz-suffering overly pensive side, perhaps. The good guys won here. And I'm really thankful for that.

Traipsing through underwhelment; some mini-reviews of films.

Miss Lovely (2012 originally/2014 wider release) - I know, I know, this doesn't belong here, but I had to be honest about this. I love a lot of things about this movie; Nawazuddin Siddiqui is number two, while number one is the excellent cinematography. This camera knows where it wants to be, and creates a very interesting visual world for the film, complemented by fantastic period setting and accompanying art direction. Superb. Everything else, though? Plot, characters? I could take them or leave them. The depiction of the sleazy-yet-honest world of the A rating was fantastic, but I was never sucked in, fascinated by what was happening. Was it good? Yes, definitely. But I didn't love it.

Special Chabbis (2014) - I've tried to finish the last hour of this movie for about five to six times now, and I've failed each time. I can't figure it out. This got good reviews, I dig the cast a lot, there's things happening and yet I'm just like, "wow, this is .. something .. I'm going to go do dishes". For a heist movie, that's really bad. But I may be completely alone in this, admittedly. If something amazing happens during the final third of this movie, harass me about this, otherwise, I'm sorry but I tried.

Ishkq in Paris (2013) - This wasn't such a bad movie if it weren't for the fact that it managed to remind me why the film industry is such a rotten business, and it did all of this in a merciful 90 or so minutes. It's a simple enough romcom about two strangers meeting serendipitiously, spending a magical night talking and getting to know each other, only to depart with the intention of never seeing each other again. And yet.. The sound mix is writing cheques (emotional cues and comical effects) the writing of the film can't cash, which makes the film seem like a bad parody of a romantic film. Then there's the absolute tragedy of Preity Zinta, a tragedy too great to cover in such a small amount of space. This movie broke my heart, and I'm still recovering.

Chitrangada (2012) -  I bought this Rituparno Gosh film from Kolkata, as the plot description sounded deliciously ambitious - exploring themes of gender identity, the Chitrangada myth, love and dance all at once. Instead, when I finally sat down to watch this, I found it a slog to get even half-way through. A story about a choreographer (played by the director himself) falling for a drug addicted musician, the film plods along but I didn't connect to the characters, nor did I feel like it was saying anything very substantive. The musician character Partha is just plain unlikable and an obvious mess from the get-go, making the love story difficult to understand or root for. I get the sense that this was an intensely personal film for the late director, but I just felt very detached from it.

Ivan Veramathiri (2013) - I must stress that none of the films I'm covering here are awful, not even Ishqkqkqkq. It's just that thing where a movie fails to hook you in and keep you there for its duration. I saw ads for this Tamil flick while in Chennai and it looked okay enough, and the fact is, it is okay enough - the romance track is a little inane perhaps but Vikram Prabhu is alright and everything else works, yet I just didn't care? Now, a few months separated from the experience, I struggle to remember anything that happened in it, apart from the main points of the plot, and the heroine holding a gold fish in a plastic bag for the hero. I suppose that's something.

A treatise on masala, and Kick.

Masala films are like being sucked into a dream taking place in somebody else's head. To say they contain no logic is misinterpreting their own, magical logic, one that relies less on representing things as grounded and flawed, and more on representing them as perfect, idealised to the point of absurdity. Character types instead of characters, formula instead of story.

Devi (Salman Khan) in Kick is a masala hero, working solely as an avatar for dialogue, an empty cup the fantastical mind of the filmi imagination to pour some character traits into, while the audience forgets the character even has a name. He inspires awe from entrance to the closing shot. "Are wah!" we are to exclaim at his herogiri - the dancing, the fighting, the punchy dialogues, the comedy and the romance. A hero is never wrong. It is the flaw of the heroine to think ill of him, even as well-intentioned as her worries are. It is the flaw of the pseudo-antagonist, the Other Guy, or second male lead, to mistake the hero for his villainous actions as actually a bad guy. The Heroine and the Other Guy will eventually understand their mistakes. The Hero stays unquestioned.

Entertainment is the measure: the mirth I felt when that first overly clever, painfully over-thought and constructed piece of dialogue was spoken. It is a meter shooting up and down as the film progresses. The rating goes from fun to none, but the pace is so quick it's hard to concentrate on one irksome miscoming when the film is serving up ten different things in the next scene. The ride is great, but certain masala measures are questionable, such as the romance. Devi elbows his way into our disgruntled heroine's life without much care about how she feels about it all. Jacqueline Fernandes is quite good at disgruntled, confused and possibly a third expression I can't quite place. Happy, maybe? Is she, does the movie give her any reason to be? She just is. Women, eh?

Randeep Hooda (ah, the bias) as the Other Guy musters up enough life to the screen when the heroine seems too lost to be present or when the hero seems too tired to try too hard. His eyes light up with laughter or turn a steely stern gaze, and he's always the bridesmaid never the bride, and yet he seems to have better chemistry with the hero than the heroine. Women, eh? Why write them with personalities when you can just put all that effort into the second male lead, you know?

As a dessert to this hearty meal, we get the actual villain, Nawazuddin Siddiqui's glorious entrance into the hallowed halls of big budget. Given typical masala hay of semi-sadistic horrid rich guy, he spins gold out of it like a veritable Rumpelstiltzkin, and the results are captivating. This is concentrated, unadulterated villainy - potent, slightly nonsensical and all the better for it. I will probably rewatch the whole film just for these scenes. And the songs, and Randeep Hooda, and the dialogues, and pretty much everything. For all the easily detectable snark in this here review, I really did enjoy this.

Modern masala has many an ailment. It's too calculated and superficial to be anything but fun, cool and sexy. Most often it's an attempt at all three, since the concept of 'cool' dies anew with every Race film. It doesn't move to tears, it doesn't reach the great masses, it's just there. But while it's here, why not enjoy it, and remember it, like one remembers a great night that resulted in a hangover. And if you can't stomach it, go watch some other Nawazuddin Siddiqui films. Everybody wins.

Queen.

If there's a fast-emerging genre of films of Indian women re-gaining their self-esteem by embracing life and themselves while traveling abroad, it's a development I can't really dislike. English Vinglish was charming, and its vibrant little sister in spirit, Queen is another fantastically enjoyable film. In essence there is nothing new about travel films with empowerment messages of this kind, but sometimes a formula works not due to its presence, but its grounded, passionate application. This is a film where you love a character so much, you're entirely with her on this ride, busy making discoveries alongside her.

Rani (Kangna Raut), a sweet Delhi girl, gets dumped by her fiance Vijay (Rajkummar Rao) a day before her wedding. After wallowing in the situation, Rani decides to go on their honeymoon alone despite everything - to take a trip to Paris and Amsterdam alone. At first, she's understandably alienated in the foreign city, but soon befriends Vijaylaxmi (Lisa Haydon), a vivacious, party-hard somewhat-single mother. Encouraged by the new friendship, Rani continues her journey in Amsterdam. (And as I loved this film so much, the review will contain spoilers. Watch it, come back to this review. I wouldn't want to ruin anything for you.)

Kangna Raut, who's previously done good work in not-so-great films, really shines as Rani. The character is quite odd, but in a perfectly every-day manner. Her "very good" sense of humor finds a new audience in her foreign friends, even though they don't quite seem to understand it, either. They still like Rani, however, just as I as the viewer like her. From the first scene, when we hear her excited but fretting inner monologue during the beginning of the wedding celebrations, she becomes somebody to truly root for.

The portrayal of Rani's new-found international friends is very perceptive, as it captures the way that lack of a full fluency in a common language doesn't necessarily stop two human beings from fully bonding with one another. You can make real friends while traveling, even if they will be different from the ones you have back at home, but the film captures this, too. You get a sense that these people will meet again, after years, and catch up and get along just the same as they did when travelling together - much like I've done with friends I've met during travel.

I feel like I could possibly have some quibbles about this film, but there's a part of me that knows the world it inhabits so well, the freedom of travel and the enjoyment of embracing new parts of yourself while abroad, that it becomes difficult to really argue for those minor criticisms. Lisa Haydon's character, for example, certainly contains archetypes, but because the archetypes are multiple - the booze-drinking, smoking, sexually active Western woman, the mixed ethnicity bombshell, yes, but also working mother, caring friend, cheesy joke maker - the combination becomes refreshing.

The success in writing and casting Rani's other new friends is also worth noting. They're not characters with incredible depth, but as they play second-fiddle to Rani's self-discovery, we also learn about their own journeys and struggles and inner worlds. You get a sense that they don't just exist in the world or in this particular story for her benefit. This allows the friendships to feel real, not just between them and Rani, but between the group of the three guys on their own. It's also a sigh of relief - maybe, just maybe, the days of cringe-worthy international casting in Indian films are beginning to end.

As so often happens with these "Indian abroad" films, the homeland is never too far away. Vijay, the asshole former fiance, suddenly decides he likes this Rani abroad and pursues her, just as the audience decides we really don't like him. The flashback scenes are great in demonstrating how we are sometimes held back by those claiming to do it for our own benefit, and because they care for us, love us even. Rani insults an Italian chef by requesting more spice into her dish, and there is the obligatory "Indian cooking wins over white people" scene. Even the sex worker Roxette turns out to be just a hard-working Indian girl, providing for her large family.

The film is particularly of interest to me, because I'm about to visit Amsterdam, mostly to hang out and enjoy the great city, but also to meet up with friends who I haven't seen in a long while. Besides those personal reasons, there are a number of other things I should probably mention. The soundtrack fits the film like a glove, and adds to it, particularly in the first scenes where Rani crashes out of her element by drinking and partying with Vijaylaxmi. The direction is tight, and even though the cinematography revels in the beauty of Paris and Amsterdam as cities, the focus never stops being about Rani, and the people she meets during her travels. A city, after all, is just a city. The memories you make in it, the people you travel with, those will stick with you. Queen is an undeniable gem, and particularly great for Kangna Raut, who I think has always landed in films where her effort has risen above the actual script. This will hopefully not only inspire more film makers to write roles as meaty as Rani's here, but also consider Kangna in various, great projects.

Naduvula Konjam Pakkatha Kaanom - wait, what happened?

Bugs, Saras and Bhaji have a problem - their friend, Prem, fell over while playing cricket the day before his wedding, and as result of a concussion, now fails to recall events that happened up to a year ago. Since Prem shows no signs of having a miraculous recovery, the three friends are forced to keep up the charade throughout his wedding day, making sure the marriage goes through, even when Prem fails to recall his bride, much less what happened six minutes ago.

I have to confess I was more charmed by Naduvula Konjam Pakkatha Kaanom (A few pages missing in between, 2012) than I actually enjoyed the experience of watching it. The low-fi aesthetic demonstrates the smaller budget, and in some ways it's very clear that this is the first directorial venture of Balaji Tharaneetharan, who found his story from actual events that happened to his friend (the film's cinematographer, C. Prem Kumar). This is, in many ways, the little film that could, and I really like that about it - a small budget venture that became a cult classic.

With that said, I'm not sure most of the comedy carried over through the translation process. The conceit of the film is to be repetitive - Prem repeats certain things as he instantly forgets what he said, or what has been told to him, and it can be hard to make the same lines gain meaning or comedy through repetition. At times, there's a scene where they succeed in this, and the situational comedy is fantastic because of it - mostly on the latter half of the film. But for the most part, the repetitiveness of both the dialogue and the reaction shots can get a bit dull, and I wonder whether this is where being a native Tamil speaker would've helped. The only subtitles I could find, in a perfect demonstration of how unavailable Tamil films can be to outsiders, were fan-made, but as such, they weren't exactly flawless.

I'm forced to give this a very lukewarm recommendation. I didn't dislike it, but I fear the praise I'd read for it online was so high, it failed to meet it. Still, I'm very happy that alongside bombastic big budget films, Tamil cinema can also produce these smaller, indie gems. 

Soodhu Kavvum - just watch it. Watch it now.

We can only make farcical cinema, as far as politics is considered because politics is farce in our country. Either we can make farce or we can make (it) very dark because there is no middle road.  - Vishal Bhardwaj, TBIP interview

Dark comedies as a genre rely on the audience's ability to laugh at the very things in society that shouldn't make us laugh in the first place, be it death or the immorality of man, or the failure of societal institutions to do what they're supposed to. At times, the label seems to get applied to films that aren't quite as funny as they're perhaps meant to be, but where they fail in comedy, they succeed in some semblance of social commentary, and so the label "dark comedy" gets stamped on them, almost as a cop-out. At its best, though, the genre is genuinely funny, and the comedy emerges from the commentary itself.

Soodhu Kavvum ("Evil engulfs", though according to my DVD, "deceit is addictive") is such a film, a 2013 Tamil comedy that is as side-splittingly funny as it is perceptive about society and morals in society. The film came with high recommendations, but I luckily hadn't heard much about the plot itself, so I could discover every aspect of the movie at its own pace. And it is so good.

The story follows three young losers (Ashok Selvan, Bobby Simha and Ramesh Thilak, pictured above) who live and fail to work in Chennai, until the day they accidentally come upon Das (Vijay Sethupathi), a middle-aged guy with a flourishing career in mid-level kidnapping and extortion and an imaginary girlfriend named Shalu (Sanchita Shetty), who only he himself can see or hear. Two and eventually all three of the guys join this budding entrepreneurial venture, and things are going well, until they decide to chase a bigger payday by kidnapping the wastrel son (Karunakaran) of a morally upright minister.

The script is amazingly funny, and the type of comedy that magically carries over to the decent English subtitle translations in a way that made me laugh out loud constantly. There is an interesting central idea to the film that makes everything fall together in a splendid way - everybody in this film is a crook, apart from the villain, and it is weirdly liberating to laugh at the weird ways in which the world favours the morally loose, corrupt or just plain lazy. The first scene in which we meet Arumai, the minister's son, is one such scene. This guy is an absolute waste of space, so naturally, in this world, he triumphs.

I mean, just look at him. Ugh, go away. (Seriously, though, great performance by Karunakaran.)

Shalu, the sole female character, is of course imaginary, in an (I hope) intentional bit of meta-commentary for Tamil films, where women tend to be eye candy, rather than important characters. Das doesn't treat her particularly well, and while I could find this disturbing in a misogynist manner (you imagined yourself a girlfriend you don't even like? what?), I mostly just find it incredibly hilarious. And the chemistry between them is about what you could hope for, between a weird, semi-drunkard man and his imaginary girlfriend.

"Can we keep him?" she asks, about the child they've just kidnapped. I'm weak with laughter, I love it.

The kidnapping scenes each have so much potential to be genuinely dark and unfunny, and yet they all turn out so comical that they're a delight. Das' rules for humanitarian kidnappings, not extorting big sums but just enough that the one being extorted can afford to pay rent next month, lends the whole thing such an oddball comedic vibe, that it's hard to find them off-putting.

The film was also a constant source of discoveries when it came to the cast, as well. Bobby Simha, who I may have seen before, was incredibly effective, particularly in a scene where he is being appraised as a future film hero by a rowdy who's turned to movie making.

Witness, the next Suriya.

Then there's Vijay Sethupathi, who plays Das.

Guh.

I mean, uhh, he's okay I guess.

That aside, it's just really great to see a Tamil movie that gets it right in every way. It's been a while since that has happened, and as I don't get to see all that many Tamil films, due to scarce availability and lack of subtitles on a lot of DVDs, it's always a joy to find a great film I immediately fall in love with, that introduces me to a whole bunch of new talent, that has a joyous soundtrack, and a fantastic script that is definitely rooted in Indian/Tamil society but also translates to a foreigner such as myself in an effortless manner. Props to the subtitle staff at AP/Ayngaran Anak, who produced the DVD.

And if this sounded at all like your thing, the dark comedy, the farce and the morally ambiguous protagonists, the imaginary heroine and all the rest of it, do give it a go. I mean the film, not kidnapping.

Sorry, "kednaping", of course. 

Hasee Toh Phasee: overcomplicating a good thing.

My first reaction to Parineeti Chopra's character in Hasee Toh Phasee was enthusiastic - to use the cliche, it was something new, something different, and something that would allow her to further stretch her already great acting abilities. But then, the more I thought about, and considered the movie itself, the more this enthusiasm turned into a pensive frown. Here's the thing: what would this film be, if we placed a moratorium, a blanket ban on quirky mentally ill characters, quirky mentally ill super-genius characters, and most of all, slightly gimmicky performances surrounding them?

A lot of films, both Hollywood, Bollywood and elsewhere in the world, would be robbed of their central conceit. Hell, gimmicks are a significant part of Indian films, and you wouldn't get me to agree to this ban if it meant no Dhoom 3, or no Anniyan, or no Paa in the world, I just wouldn't allow it. And yet, when it comes to Hasee Toh Phasee, a movie that attempts at a frothy but heartfelt romantic comedy, I wonder if such a ban might be wise in the first place.

The story is simple: Nikhil (Sidharth Malhotra) is about to marry Karishma, despite all signs pointing to this being a bad idea. He discovers that a girl he met and bonded with shortly before meeting Karishma, Meeta (Parineeti Chopra), is in fact Karishma's sister, disowned by the family for various reasons. Now Meeta is back for the wedding, and Karishma asks Nikhil to make sure she's not seen by her side of the family, and thus wacky hijinks and an eventual budding romance ensue.

There's a lot to unpack when it comes to Meeta's character, her mysterious past, her strange mannerisms, her super-genius rattling off of factoids in fast English and her pill-popping antics. At first I was merely intrigued, but the further along the film went, the more I wondered whether less would be more when it came to this character. I'm sure, as ever, everything to do with her was properly and meticulously researched (isn't it always?), but something about this hodgepodge of symptoms and quirks, no matter how medically accurate, was kind of a mess.

It doesn't particularly help that the movie relies on this character to really work, so when Parineeti Chopra's natural charm doesn't quite manage to come through in this performance, I wasn't quite as engaged with the movie as I was hoping to be. The second lead, Sidharth Malhotra, does okay, but he's no acting or charisma powerhouse at this point in his career, and so the resulting romance doesn't quite feel as touching as it might with a better cast or a less messy script.

However, if it works for you, it works, and this becomes a passable cutesy romcom with heart at the core of it. Some of the songs are great, while others are cringeworthy. I still wish, being a fan of Parineeti's, that they would've scaled back on the character a bit: while I appreciate the something new in the character, especially as female protagonists can be occasionally bland in terms of characterisation, there may have been some pieces missing, both in the scripting of the character and the performance. 

Highway, and a journey home.

Sometimes being out of the loop, not following every promo and trailer, can be so beneficial for a film aficionado. I didn't expect Imtiaz Ali's Highway to be much more than maybe a strange, Stockholm syndrome inspired kidnapper-kidnappee romance. The pairing of Alia Bhatt and Randeep Hooda seemed strange, and considering her last performance that I saw was the wooden, unbearable turn in Student of the Year, I wasn't precisely hopeful that she actually had considerable acting chops. While every shitty Bhatt movie in Randeep Hooda's oeuvre is warmly embraced by such fans as myself, it's safe to say he's not universally appreciated. Imtiaz Ali is not infallible, either, and it's been in the past few years that his films and scripts have been particularly critisised for the way they portray female protagonists.

Yet, Highway manages to be a very human picture that gives its downtrodden heroine a lot of agency in a difficult situation, and thus allows Alia Bhatt to show what she can do, when acting outside Karan Johar's vapid female stereotypes. Aided by Ali's best script in a long while, this ends up being less of a kidnapping romance and more a film about two damaged people, trying to re-discover what their home in the world might be. It is, in a world, beautiful.

The story reveals all this in a very gradual way, and is all the better for it. Due to that, however, I'm forced to discuss some spoilers, so before the jump, I'll just say this: I loved this movie. It's maybe my favourite Imtiaz Ali picture right after Jab We Met, even if the two deal in two very different genres, obviously. I'll probably have to rewatch it to see how I properly rate it among my favourites, but thus far, it's stayed with me, it certainly impressed me, and I can't think of too many bad things to say about. I'd certainly recommend it.

Spoilers after cut.

The Lunchbox and the argument for self-reflection.

The pointlessness of consumption starts to hit home when the DVDs you've hauled from half-way across the globe gather dust as you're so preoccupied with life and other interests that you've got. Believe you me, I don't mean to abandon Indian movies without much warning every 18 months or so - it just happens. And then I rush back in, flushed with new-found excitement. The love is always there, in a way, even when the blog is dead and the DVD player abandoned. I just get so tired, tired with the mediocrity, tired with the dullness of the Bengali art picture I'm forcing myself to sit through just because, tired of waiting for DVDs to come out, tired of the vapid jokes made on Koffee with Karan. So I leave, and then I come back.

I should have, of course, returned much earlier, as the brilliant Dabba (or The Lunchbox, as it's so widely known internationally now) arrived in Finnish cinemas a little over a month ago. I always wanted to see it, and I don't even feel like the film suffered from praise overload. It is a darling film, full of little flavors and notes to pick up on, well-directed and written, and with captivating performances and gentle comedic touches. It's got Irrfan Khan, ambassador of Indian acting to the western world, and Nawazuddin Siddiqui, the new can-do-no-wrong actor, and Nimrat Kaur, a shockingly fantastic newer find.

It's hard to disagree that this should've been India's Oscar hopeful, as even if you find the film bland and overrated, its gentle love story, culture-specific setting (the dabbawallahs' uncharacteristic mistake setting the scene for the exchange of letters), its feel-good vibes and lack of songs included, would have made it the perfect film for that particular audience. Even a month after its initial release, the screening on an early evening was weirdly full - this film is catching considerable word of mouth even in my northern corner of the globe, and I have no doubt Oscar buzz would've helped this along further. But just as well, and I'm happy it's getting such wide international recognition, even without being pitched to the Academy.

So it's a good film, and a joy to sit through, but what I found most important about the film was that it really made me reflect on life. As most good love stories, the one in Dabba is ultimately about something greater than the connection between two people. Saajan (Irrfan) and Ila (Nimrat Kaur) are tiptoeing into a connection with their exchanged messages, and as with any two unhappy people who connect over their unhappiness, their exchanges soon become about their lives itself - what they want, what they don't want, and what they can expect from the future. It's only natural that the viewer also finds themselves asking similar questions - especially if they're relatively young, or with their life in flux, or going through a rough time, or even if they're older, like Saajan, and looking back on their past experiences.

I found myself wondering all of these things, and then arguing with myself - maybe these questions aren't really as tough as one might, in their bourgeois angst, think. After all, endless pondering about life and ourselves, our direction or our happiness, can put a person in a state of utter confusion, that can be only medicated by being marketed self-help in form of books and life style magazines and co-opted philosophies. The Lunchbox seems to also posit that this self-reflection can be rather middle class. Do the dabbawallahs themselves ponder these things? Maybe, but maybe they move on quicker than some of us. There is, in essence, much common sense in the character of Shaikh (Siddiqui), whose description of an ordinary day, full of work but also of little joys, really hit home for me. In a complicated world, simplicity can be the greatest treasure of all, even as I roll my eyes at what a cliché that sounds like. Pessimism remains my affliction.

Such is the beauty of cinema, and of all stories, really. They inspire us to see beyond what is just on the page, and consider ourselves in reflection to the characters. It's not that a film has to be deep to inspire such thoughts, it merely has to be compelling and believable as a story. And while I can't say The Lunchbox became an instant all-time favourite, I appreciate it because it certainly inspired me in many ways, and that's so much more than most films manage to do.

A month in India, part 2: R... Rajkumar.

Prabhudeva began his directorial career with the spry revitalisation of the Maine Pyar Kiya plot in the Telugu favourite Nuvvostenante Nenoddantana, and continued his directorial exploits in the South, before smashing onto the Hindi scene with Wanted, a Southie remake, but a badass one at that. I was a fan from the get-go, liking his visual, bombastic masala style, alongside the amazing choreography that his films always seemed to have. To pair him up with Shahid Kapoor, an excellent leg shaker in his own right, and add a bit of roughness to him in the action masala format - this all seemed like the recipe of a great movie.

R.. Rajkumar has a story that is almost so forgettable that I've actually forgotten the details, aside from the barebones plot structure - Shahid plays a hoodlum who joins forces with gratuitously shirtless villain Sonu Sood, mostly for monetary reasons. Things get tricky when Sonu Sood takes an interest in the daughter of the corrupt politician he's in cahoots with, who just happens to be the same girl (played by hapless, why-am-I-stuck-in-these-roles Sonakshi Sinha) Shahid's character has been relentlessly harassing for most of the movie. What's going to happen? Spoilers: the poster kind of says it all.

I suppose I should really thank the movie for spinning such a simplistic tale, as it made it very easy to follow with my beginner's Hindi skills in the cool southern Mumbai multiplex I saw this film at. Sonu Sood was great as ever, and the songs were the soundtrack to the rest of my trip, but the positives kind of run out there. What bothered me the most was the absolutely relentless, inexcusable sexual harassment by the main character, portrayed as romantic. You could say this has become an Indian film trope, and especially following the movement to make India safer for women, this trope has been called out - films may just be films, but the women on India's streets who suffer sexual harassment every day of their lives do know the effect that portraying this trope as romantic has on society. It's been a while since I've seen such a blatant example of "eve-teasing" disguised as a romantic subplot. There isn't even the slightest hint of Sonakshi's Chanda liking the main character, and he invades her personal space, doesn't take "no" for an answer, and it's just so, so off-putting.

It's also just completely unnecessary. Why can't she like this guy from the get go? Why can't they have meet-cute and then begin a bickering chemistry, which would largely serve the same function, but take away the icky issues with consent (she said no, so back off, buddy)? You could still have the songs, the arguments, even the slap scene that seems so pivotal, going by the times it's referenced back to.

I hate to turn my back on a guy I once listed as one of my top five directors, alongside such favourites as Manmohan Desai and Shankar, but I'm afraid it's come to this. I barely remember watching Rowdy Rathore, even though I know I did. This one didn't fare much better, though I still enjoy the soundtrack (and Ghandi baat is a song that will always be on my "India trip" playlist). If he insists on spicing his original films with these sorts of off-putting, regressive tropes, I'm just not interested - I like my action masala, but I also like a modicum of respect from the hero towards the heroine. This isn't a tall ask. It really isn't.