Badhaai Do, Review: No blessing for this messing Watching Badhaai Do, an old thought re-surfaced. I used to wonder what would happen if, by some quirk of circumstance, a homosexual and a lesbian ended-up marrying each other. Looks like some antenna picked-up this concept and turned it into a lengthy film. Unfortunately, the writers and the director are unable to decide whether they should inject humour or treat it as a tear-jerker. They lean towards the latter, but fail on the mise en sc&egra...

Shimla Mirchi, Review: Chilly? Don't be silly! Several highs dot the career graph of director Ramesh Sippy, right from his debut in 1971 as a 24 year-old, with the remake of A Man and a Woman (Claude Lelouch, France, 1966) under the title, Andaz. Crests include Seeta Aur Geeta, Sholay and Buniyaad (TV series), relative high points were reached with Saagar and Shakti, and troughs bogged him down when he attempted Shaan, Bhrashtachar, Akayla and Zamaana Diwana. Completed 19 years after Zama...

Stree, Review: Ironing ‘bored’ What do you call a female ghost? For want of a better word, the villagers who are haunted by this entity call it Stree (Hindi for woman). Fair enough. If English film-makers can call a ghost Entity, what is wrong with a Hindi film selecting Stree as its eponymous title? Mind you, this is no ordinary ghost that haunts or possesses the simple village-folk. It kidnaps only men, every year, with precise accuracy, on the same dates, and leaves behind only...

Omerta, Review: Omer talk Alright, Omar, if you insist. His full name is Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh. If you see the film, you will discover that he is a hardcore terrorist who indulged in at least one act of barbaric butchery as well. With a name like that, he has to be a Pakistani or Pakistani sympathiser. Omerta spans the canvas from Bosnia to the hijacking of an Indian Airlines’ plane to the Mumbai terror attacks. The film derives its title from the Italian term for a criminal code of ...

Newton, Review: Gravity of the situation Had he been alive in the modern period, the British scientist would have bagged multiple Nobel prizes for his pioneering work in Physics. As it happens, the film of the same name, not a biopic of Sir Isaac, rather about an idealist in the Indian bureaucracy, has been eliminated from the race for the Oscars. A million or more Newtonians are feeling heart-broken that a film that they considered a breakthrough, and the best film made in India in recent t...

Bose Dead or Alive: Rajkummar Rao in thriller take on Indian freedom fighter If you were a patriot and freedom seeker in the British colonial India of the 1920s-1940s, you either believed in non-violent struggle, a movement led by ‘Mahatma’ Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi or the increasingly violent approach of ‘Netaji’ Subhas Chandra Bose. Mahatma means great soul and Netaji translates as leader. Both belonged to the Congress party, but when Bose called for armed struggle,...

Dolly Ki Doli (Dolly’s bridal palanquin), Review: The Milky Way Dolly Ki Doli is about a cheat called Dolly, and her support gang of confidence tricksters. Their modus operandi is that Dolly’s so-called brother Raju identifies prospects, then Dolly and the gang lures these eligible bachelors into falling in love with Dolly, leading on to marriage. On the wedding night, Dolly serves drug-laced milk to the groom and his immediate family, ensuring they fall into deep slumber, and the...