Toolsidas (Rajiv Kapoor) is a snooker player who, every year, loses the final of the Snooker Championship to Jimmy Tandon (Dilip Tahil). Humiliated by the losing streak, Toolsidas’s son Midi vows to learn snooker and defeat his father’s rival and settle the dust.
Toolsidas Junior is the director Mridul Mahendra‘s story. So if this story is true then he holds the liberty to dramatize his account if he wants to. It is an interesting story and from the cinematic point of view, a very predictable film. Besides, this story is unable to justify its importance due to extremely weak filmmaking that subdues plotholes and stretches the script needlessly.
Due to inexperience in film direction, the director fails to understand what scenes didn’t need to stretch and which scenes had the potential to expand. Just for an example, Midi’s coach arrives in the tournament’s final to watch him. The staff knows him and are surprised that he is none other than the former Snooker champion who trained him; and here the audience will realize that there was something about the coach the director failed to include – some character development. Our instincts will develop a theory here that perhaps they knew him personally or met in their primes. It would have been so better if the director had bothered to reflect on the coach’s character.
The first forty minutes of screen time gave me a regret-feel because the buildup in the plot was unimpressive and a needless comedy was very forced. The writing of this film was really below-par.
Sanjay Dutt as Midi’s coach Mohammad Salaam is the biggest plus of the film. After a long time, the audience will get excited to watch his performance. In his usual baba-style, it looks very inspiring when he tries to inject spirit in Midi that the game is not played for winning but for playing. The Midi kid Varun Buddhadev was quite an excellent selection and showed some glimpses of acting promises.
I just don’t understand one point. What took so long for Rajiv Kapoor to return to the film industry? He returned to the silver screen in more than thirty years. I am not saying that he was impressive but he fairly played his role and I feel he could have been in a lot of films doing some average or above-average supporting roles. Unfortunately, this was Rajiv’s final film as he died last year. Therefore, Toolsidas Junior is a posthumous release.
One thing I liked about the film is that I happened to watch a sports drama based on a very different sport. So India doesn’t stick to one sport and the filmmakers are eager to focus on different sports stories. Yes, I believe that the film deserved a better director to give justice to Mridul’s story.
Vijay Borade (Amitabh Bachchan) is about to retire from college as a sports teacher. One day, he notices some boys and girls in the slum area playing football with remarkable skills. Vijay finds new enthusiasm and after his retirement, he works with them and makes a valuable effort for the development of football in the slum area for the underprivileged children.
Jhund is based on the real-life story of Vijay Barse, a resident of Nagpur who founded Slum Soccer Organization after watching a lot of slum kids playing impressive football.
See, it is a fresh idea. A lot of sports films are showing up in Bollywood every year but this one is quite different from the others. The reason is that this sports drama doesn’t focus on a legendary player and his/her personal and professional life. This is about some children of different ages, boys and a few girls, who were involved in drugs and hoodlum. This is about the birth of a football organization that paved way for the street children throughout the country to participate, play football, and make their name.
Jhund’s aesthetics are genuine. You get a feel of a slum and I have not researched but I have a feeling that those children were all actually from the slum areas. Because those characters were so real to judge. If they really are from the slums then kudos to the makers to come up with this idea and give them a chance to work on the screen and that too with none other than Amitabh Bachchan, the only known cast of the entire film. Besides Big B, almost every actor in the film has marked his/her debut which makes me think that perhaps those people are really from the slums but not professional actors.
Unfortunately, despite a command over the story and Amitabh’s presence keeping me hooked throughout the film, Jhund has a lot of critical errors. The biggest issue is screen time and no way is this film suppose to clock nearly three hours, absolutely not! Jhund’s plot has variations and lengthy continuity for sure but the screenplay is overstretching.
Believe it or not! there is literally a half-an-hour sequence of a football match. I get it, that was the most important scene of the film that changed the lives of slum kids and made Vijay Borade devise a plan for the foundation. But thirty minutes of a match is just too much. And even a very predictable one. And I am not sure if such a match actually occurred in a reality where those kids defeated some well-trained football team of a college with a comeback from 5-0. My mind doesn’t accept that. But when they began to score over the college team, it became highly predictable that they will stretch this whole sequence to a thrilling penalty shoot-out and win. With a better direction, this football match could have been reduced to fifteen minutes easily.
And the direction is the problem. With a lengthy screenplay, one can easily notice that the pace of the film picks up and sometimes get slow. Yes, there are scenes that needed to grow on the audience and I felt it was the need of the hour like Vijay repeatedly offering the kids to play for money and the efforts by those kids with their family and friends in submitting forms and passports for the World Cup. The latter part needed emphasis and the director dramatized all those scenes well. I liked the sequences of Monica’s struggle to make a passport with her father. This is what the audience needs to watch; some harsh realities about efforts made for one passport. Ankush’s story was heartbreaking and one of the thousand stories in India whose fate keeps twisting even if he wants to leave his tragic past behind to become better. Jagdish’s backstory had a special sequence that rightfully addressed the audience about those who give up and try to commit suicide. He becomes the team’s goalkeeper.
There are a lot of plotholes in the film that indicates a rookie direction of Nagraj Manjule. I have no idea how the court allowed Vijay to give a five-minute speech and that too openly instead of sending him to the witness box. How come a team played a football match in the tournament without a goalkeeper before Jagdish asked to fill the place? How come a college agreed on a football match against the slum kids in the first place, and that too with the criminal backgrounds and drug consumption?
Jhund is an inspiring film, and thanks to Aamir Khan‘s show Satyamev Jayate which introduced Vijay Barse and gave him the chance to narrate his story.
No doubt, Jhund is a fresh and exciting film that highlights so many social issues and encourages the audience to spare a thought and do something good or right for others.
Inspector Surekha Singh (Anil Kapoor) is a veteran policeman who is posted in Munabao village of Rajasthan. He regrets that he never got a promotion in his line of work. In 1985, when he is closing toward retirement, he gets a case by chance when a psycho killer begins to haunt the village. Meanwhile, an antique dealer Siddharth (Harshvardhan Kapoor) arrives at this village for business and crosses paths with the police inspector.
INTRODUCTION
Thar is an action-thriller directed by Raj Singh Chaudhary. By the style of film-making, it is quite obvious that the production methods are pretty much inspired by Western noir and therefore I felt very fresh by watching something different. I like when the director tries to do something different from the way the films are usually shot. Not exaggerating but when I watch this Western-inspired film that makes me think that if the Italian filmmakers can introduce Spaghetti Western sub-genre, why not Bollywood introduce Curry Western? Sholay was inspired by the Spaghetti Western and I don’t remember a single that took inspiration from this sub-genre after Sholay ignite this genre in 1975. So, Thar deserves its piece of appreciation.
Due to applying this sub-genre, Thar reminds me of a few films like Sonchiriya and No Country For Old Men. With a very limited plot-line, the screen-time of around 110 minutes justifies and despite being slow-paced, doesn’t bore at all. Thar holds a strong command of technical brilliance. Adopting a Western demands excellence in cinematography and action sequences. This film qualifies both. I am amazed by the dramatizing of physical torture the film has depicted. And those tortured characters performed with really great intensity.
TECHNICAL ASPECTS
Costume and production design are far excellent too especially the latter. The production setting plays a significant role in presenting an accurate sketch of a shot the makers are willing to film especially in such cases and due to high standards, Thar looks very impressive.
PERFORMANCES
The performances are average. Not that the actors didn’t perform well but the actors do not contribute much to the performances when the action is more in command. In many portions of the film, all you will watch is beating, killing, and car-chasing, so there is not much room to have plentiful scenes in the film where the actors have their time to dramatize their characters. And this is not their fault, the film is like that.
But I want this Harshvardhan Kapoor to pick films more often. In six years, this is only his fifth film. Of which one was a cameo and one was an anthological part of the whole film. He is someone who picks the rhythm of the character too quickly and settles himself well. And he is a better talent than many new faces who belongs to a strong film fraternity.
CLOSING REMARKS
There are a lot of films to be released as Bollywood is nearing towards halfway mark. But I sense that by the end of the year, Thar is going to be one of the best films of this year. If this film doesn’t get its deserving praise from the critics and the audience, not sure what film-goers are really willing to get impressed with.
RATINGS 8.6/10
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Jalsa is a hit-and-run thriller revolving around two women from different backgrounds. Maya Menon (Vidya Balan) is an influential television journalist and Rukhsana Mohammad (Shefali Shah) is the servant at Maya’s residence who looks after their cooking and her son with cerebral palsy. One night while returning from her work she gets heavily sleepy and unfortunately hits a girl who luckily survives but is in critical condition. But Maya in a panic doesn’t help her out but runs away. The next day, the news is broken to her that the girl is Rukhsana’s daughter.
REVIEW
First of all, what a magnificent story! And then a superb script that, at a low pace, builds the consequences on nerves and depicts the reality from both sides. If regret has a face, just look at Maya throughout the film after the accident. The definition of misery is flawlessly installed in Rukhsana.
Jalsa’s aim was to show us how both parties are affected by the accident. And it is so complicated on Maya’s part as she would have never imagined that in the entire city of around twenty million people, it had to be Rukhsana’s daughter.
The film gives enough space to both Maya and Rukhsana to boil themselves with regret and fury respectively. Rukhsana demands an answer to who hit her daughter whereas Maya tries to settle herself but the norms keep compromising due to Rukhsana’s existence.
Maya is already troubled with her personal life due to her divorce and then her only child with challenges. And then her nature of work going live to her millions of television viewers was also heavy. So this is one solid reason for her questioning herself to either help the victim or run away.
DIRECTOR & CO.
Director Suresh Triveni previously worked with Vidya Balan in Tumhari Sulu. But the directions of both films are quite different. Tumhari Sulu was quite an entertainer but Jalsa is very dark and gritty. This shows that Suresh Triveni is flexible with scripts. But one common thread is improvising Vidya’s character. Vidya in Jalsa is incredible. A tone she has set for Maya after the accident doesn’t evaluate if her performance is for reel or real. Many of her scenes break you like when she screams in the parking lot, throwing her anger at her son, when her car is stuck in the rally, during her argument with her mother, or when she accuses Rukhsana of laziness and demands not to show up again. This is easily her best performance since Tumhari Sulu.
When the film developed from the accident, I was very sure that Shefali as a heartbroken poor mother will nail this role. She had comparatively less challenging scenes than Vidya but whatever she got in her part, she did exceptionally. See her superb desperation when she beats a guy in the shop.
MINUSES
Yes, Jalsa has plotholes and some are beyond logic. When Vidya screamed in the parking lot, how come no one listened to her? If the security guard slept in the CCTV room, how come he didn’t check the recording later? Unarguably the most senseless scene was Maya’s mother letting Rukhsana take her son to the beach. How did she allow that? Knowing that Maya is always furious about not letting her know first, how come she allowed without checking Maya?
And just another Bollywood film where the director failed to conclude the film where it should have. That final scene was totally rubbish and made no sense at all. It could have been so better if the film would have ended with Maya’s car stuck because of the political rally and Rukhsana on the other hand assumingly taking her revenge. You needed no more justification after that.
CLOSING REMARKS
I didn’t get why the film was titled Jalsa. Why not Sadak? It would have made more sense with the latter as the same sadak had constable More been bribed, Maya’s car hitting the girl and then her car stuck on the same road in the rally when her son was in danger.
Jalsa is remarkable storytelling with two powerful performances.
RATINGS 8.3/10
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Brij Gopal Sharma (Rishi Kapoor and Paresh Rawal) has been retired from the company at the age of 58. Now, Sharma struggles to adjust to his second inning but faces difficulties. Through the help of his friend, he gets into temporary assignments of cooking for kitty parties. As time moves on, his eldest son begins to feel more insecure than ever due to some life crisis.
Sharmaji Namkeen is a posthumous release of Rishi Kapoor’s final film who died back in 2019. He couldn’t complete half of the film due to his battle with cancer. Therefore, Paresh Rawal was offered the role to complete the remaining portions of Rishi’s role. It is widely regarded as the first instance in the Indian film industry or maybe anywhere to complete a film with two different actors playing the same role without sharing the screen.
Usually, the films get shelved or re-shot but Sharmaji Namkeen continued with the other actor to fill Rishi’s shoes. It was quite an innovative approach to complete a film with expectations from the audience to accept this two-in-one idea. And it worked pretty well. The film never looked to exaggerate this idea at all.
This two-in-one approach will give an idea to the audience about film editing and how the makers and the crew shoot and complete films by working on different scenes in an unarranged order. Many of the viewers are not aware of the fact that the shooting of the film begins not in the exact order as depicted in the film’s theatrical cut but whatever scene fits in the schedule with all the contributors available. So this film will give you a precise look at what scenes Rishi got to shoot first and what scenes did he miss for Paresh to complete.
Both the performances were equally excellent. For a much broader scope of filmmaking, I felt if this film can be reimagined with what if Rishi Kapoor had played those Paresh scenes and vice versa. I also reimagined if Sharma thinks of himself settling into twin personalities and living life. Not a bad idea at all.
I think the film made a promising start and raised a very critical old-age issue of an elder who loses his/her job or gets retired and tries to fit in a new life where he/she is more at home or meeting people in the social circle more often. At this age, it becomes a lot harder to adopt a hobby or try to enjoy life as Sharma’s sons suggest.
And I liked how Sharma’s character had so much of a real feel. He was keeping a mini booklet to check the dates and things to do. His clumsy behavior, discomforts, and social criticism were on the point. There is a forty-second scene calling Susheel that had nothing to do with the story but the scene depicted to the audience the difference in the mode of conversation and concerns in the old-age people as compared to the younger ones which are completely different.
There are a few moments in the film that demanded pressing but didn’t occur. I waited for the humiliation to cause its fury on father and sons when his dancing video is shown at home. Silence looked pretty unnatural. I was expecting his eldest son to shatter his father’s shambling embarrassment in front of the others. In the next scene, the father and son did have an argument and Rishi gave such a brilliant act of an embarrassed father making failed attempts to convince his son about his new line of work. But that conversation also didn’t get a solid sequence. When Sharma comes to know that he is leaving, the son abruptly leaves and the scene ends. I was expecting Rishi’s typical angry avatar to rise on his son who kept this news from his father.
With time, the film began to lose the thickness of the plot and apply lame jokes to slip the story’s intensity towards a weaker conclusion. And that happened in the last half-an-hour when Sharma’s son is in trouble and all the ladies shoulder Sharma breaking into the police station shouting and losing all their canyons of richship over his son’s atrocity. Despite the fact that the son was wrong in all sorts, the film shows him in defense, and a mayor steps into the station and clears the case just like that. The film ended so awkwardly.
In the past couple of days, I have observed that in recent Hindi films that I have watched, the story held promise but the screenwriting shattered the essence of the film. The scriptwriter must always know how to conclude a story.
It was so good to see Juhi Chawla paired with Chintuji one last time as they have appeared together a lot of times in the 1990s. Sharmaji Namkeen is a one-timer but also our last chance to see him perform once again.
RATINGS: 6.5/10
(I would like to end my review with a brief note of thanks to Chintuji for his contribution to the cinema. Perhaps, he was the only leading male actor from the mid-1970s, besides Amitabh Bachchan, who was playing major roles frequently. He really began to perform when he was no more joking, flirting, and dancing with young girls as their lover boy. Thank Lord! Chintu’s that hero phase somehow met an end and we watched a lot of great character-driven performances from him).
Tanay (Dr. Neelay Mehendale) belongs to a traditional Marathi family and is a story narrator, commentator, and an exciting author who meets a family tragedy when the elders pass away. That leads to emptying the room of the deceased and is decided that they will add a paying guest into their house.
When a handsome paying guest joins the family, Tanay develops an interest in him and starts a secret passionate affair until an unwelcoming event hits the family further.
Cobalt Blue is based on a Marathi novel with the same title that Sachin Kundalkar wrote back in 2003. Decades later, Sachin writes and directs this film. So the creative control of the film is in Sachin’s hands. So that means it is totally okay if he takes liberty from his own novel to use it in the film with as many alterations as he wishes to.
Cobalt Blue heavily reminds me of Call Me By Your Name but it is quite a surprise that none of these copied each other because both were based on different novels. Call Me By Your Name was published four years after Sachin published Cobalt Blue.
Cobalt Blue is visually striking and very artistic. And when the filmmaking of such films gives cinematography its deserve piece of respect, the detailing of relation starts to look more compelling. This is a coming-of-age film that defines the first strike of love spell with authenticity. The film’s major win is the chemistry, two souls melting with eroticism and finding opportunities to quench their thirst. The depiction of rawness in the love affair is terrific.
Sachin Kundalkar has made sure that quality literature plays an important role as Tanay is fittingly a dreamer who is excited about sharing beautiful moments with the paying guest.
When I watched Cobalt Blue, I felt as if I am reading Arundhati Roy‘s The God Of Small Things. So if you are also getting the same vibes, that means Cobalt Blue has an excellent narrative design.
Cobalt Blue tests patience because, with a screen time of around 115 minutes, this film looks quite lengthy. And is visibly slow. Prateik Babbar was average but Dr. Mehendale gave a terrific performance.
If you are willing to watch a coming-of-age film that has quality writing about sexuality, I’ll suggest checking this film on Netflix.
RATINGS: 7.5/10
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Police officer Shardul (Rajkummar Rao) and physical education teacher Sumi (Bhumi Pednekar) are homosexuals. They are fed up with their families who pressurize them to marry someone. Shardul and Sumi happen to meet somehow and after knowing their sexual orientation, they decide to marry to silence their concerns. But the matters get worse and they keep hiding from their families.
Badhaai Do is considered a ghost sequel to Badhaai Ho so a sexual issue is addressed to ‘perhaps’ continue the series and commercialize the awareness. Two factors play important role in such an impressive story. One, South Asian families are too demanding to their young ones and strictly make their life decisions and believe they are right and the young ones are opposite. Why their wishes and ambitions are never asked? Why their future is decided by the elders? Only they can explain this but this matter is wonderfully exaggerated in Badhaai Do. Two, the existence of homosexuality is almost impossible to express for the LGBTQ community, and unfortunately have to lie all their lives to avoid any social havoc. Because of their being homos, the balance of life hangs around whether the family and society will accept them or not. And this also is brilliantly picturized in the film.
If these two central characters are played by Rajkummar and Bhumi, more than half of the film is guaranteed either commercial success or acceptance by the general public. These actors along with Ayushmann Khurrana have successfully addressed social issues existing in India that need the audience’s attention.
Badhaai Do is quite a lengthy film for the subject. Because the story didn’t have enough detailing to make it to 147 minutes. Around half an hour is spent on the songs out of nowhere. Besides the tracks, a lot of the film’s screenplay is written about Shardul and Sumi struggling to escape from the whys and hows of their marriage.
The film got serious after over a hundred minutes and addressed the issue. And at this point, I detected that the screentime would have easily been reduced. There were many instances where they would have been exposed.
In the last few years, the makers have raised a lot of social issues. They even start on a promising note but the plot is lost in the middle and ends either abruptly with no technical conclusion or is very predictable. And that is the same problem with this film. The hatred of family about homosexuality turns into accepting their choices so abnormally. Absolutely no consequences on the homos from the elders. Maybe the elders are aware that the film is finishing so let us just drop our egos and embrace them.
The director had his best chance to finish the film at the LGBTQ rally on the highway with Shardul wearing that mask and smiling at his friends. Anyway, the performances are first-rate. Both Rajkummar and Bhumi were excellent. Seema Pahwa and Sheeba Chaddha are superb but I am afraid they are getting typecasted, especially Seema Pahwa. Most of the time she shows up in the film, Seema will be stuck in similar roles.
Badhaai Do deserves praise for raising such a sensitive issue.
Ganga Ram Chaudhary (Abhishek Bachchan) is an uneducated politician and Chief Minister of his state who is imprisoned for a scam. His arrogancy leads to weakening his rank in his party especially after he appoints his wife Bimla Devi acting CM. During his time in prison, he pretends to earn his right to complete his education as an excuse to avoid labor work. But after reading a few history pages, he develops an interest. With time, he realizes that completing education is the key to succeeding in elections by building optimism through individual development.
Dasvi is like Sardar Ka Grandson, a thoughtful and impressive story but weak execution. But the difference is that the former had better comic timing and applied sensitivity in humor quite well in the middle whereas the latter had no decency to push for an emotional tale by applying extremely forced humor.
Secondly, Dasvi also looks to reimagine the Munnabhai duology but calling it copied from the latter will be incorrect because the director tried to separate the elements of the Munnabhai series in Dasvi. There is a glimpse of matching the plotline but both films run in different parallels.
Yes, Dasvi is an exaggerated comedy but the film can be qualified as a political satire. Abhishek Bachchan, who I believe has begun his second inning from Manmarziyaan and has been selective in picking films and roles, has found the momentum in Dasvi where the audience will accept him and give him another chance. He has always been a good actor but his past choices and being compared to his father ridiculed his career. But this is the first time I feel that like many actors in the past few years, Abhishek is building a repo and may come out of being underrated for more than a decade.
Although, Abhishek’s performance in Dasvi wasn’t really as impressive as he has performed like this in the past. But if someone has watched him in a lot of films, will observe that in the past films he didn’t have the confidence to act nor did most of the directors try to dig his hidden artistry. But now, he is a learned actor making rounds.
But more than Abhishek, Nimrat Kaur is the winner here. Her character development was impressive. Her transition from a clueless and illiterate housewife becoming an interim CM to a refined one was splendid. Also, I must mention Yami Gautam‘s supporting role. Looks like she is getting serious about playing character roles.
Dasvi deserved a better script to do justice to the story.
Alisha Khanna’s (Deepika Padukone) personal life has been through a lot of torments due to her parents’ marital failure which led to her personal battles with anxiety and depression. She is a yoga instructor and struggling in a live-in relationship with Karan (Dhairya Karwa) who is a writer but not yet employed. Her cousin Tia (Ananya Panday) is engaged with businessman Zain (Siddhant Chaturvedi) and invites Alisha and Karan to their beach house. And there, Alisha finds Zain in similitude through understanding and trauma of their disturbing past. In a couple of meetings, they sense unusual and a secret love affair begins.
Okay, we all have our opinions about this film but let me admit this, Gehraiyaan has an ordinary story, a typical soap drama where relations keep changing. But Gehraiyaan has more things to offer than the story itself. Gehraiyaan has technical brilliance in direction, background score, cinematography, dialogues, editing, and credible performances. The story is ordinary but the screenplay gives a lot of depth to relations and human behavior complexity which is the biggest plus of the film.
For once, we have to keep our opinions aside if the story is toxic or vulgar, put yourself in Alisha or Zain’s shoes, and feel the air. That guilty vibe releases a lot of negative energy but also makes people suffer from heavy consequences, and this film perfected both situations. A lot of factors are involved in making this rectangle complicated. Alisha and Tia are cousins, Tia’s money is involved in Zain’s business, Alisha’s yoga app has Zain’s investment, and Alisha-Zain’s chemistry occurs at the wrongest possible time. And Karan is someone who is mostly not in the picture because he is usually occupied with writing and looking for a publisher to invest in him. Alisha is the provider but basically, they both are strugglers. When all this is happening in the rectangle, it becomes highly unlikely to lose one of the ropes. So I feel Gehraiyaan gave us a look at the relationship and the cost of digging a forbidden well.
Shakun Batra surely has some particular sentiments that help him describe toxicities and omens of relations so well. He did that brilliantly in Kapoor & Sons and now this. The realism of Gehraiyaan’s tense emotional hiccups hinges on the capricious tone of uninvited events that keeps knocking on the broken doors. There are loose ends in the middle of the film but emotional fluctuations have excellent depictions. Alisha’s poignant individuality and scattered melancholy is a remarkable observation. I like how she connects small things with her past and explains perfectly how a shattered tragic past keeps haunting and agonizing a human.
The continuity of such a screenplay is blessed with a very unfeigned and heartfelt background score, very indie and blue. When it comes to performances, Deepika and Siddhant have stolen the show. Their body language and facial fluctuations are superb. Observe Siddhant when Jitesh shouts at Zain to separate his love life from business, and you see how he mentally breaks in replying. Siddhant seems to be a promising actor to me now; this performance and the one in Gully Boy are quite different and settled himself into his characters which is one of the few critical things the actor must learn. Deepika’s breakdowns are just phenomenal. Her Alisha’s anger toward her father, her verbal heated exchange with Karan when he doesn’t inform her of his leaving, her tense buildup in Zain’s office when the studio gets closed, her emotional breakdown in Jitesh’s car, her heated imbroglio with Zain outside the building, and her fight with Zain in the cruise, and maybe the scenes of Alisha goes on and on to describe what a sensational performance Deepika has exhibited.
This is the first time I watched a film featuring Ananya. Not good but also not a bad actress at all. There are glimpses of establishing her name but will take time. But she has her moments where she played her role well, most prominently in her scenes with Zain; like the one where she doubts who the contractor contact is. Observe her facial expressions when she immediately places Zain’s phone back. Naseeruddin Shah and Rajat Kapoor gave strong supporting roles, especially Rajat.
Gehraiyaan met its low in the last half an hour. From the cruise to the shocking development from the will of Tia’s father, I detected that the film could have concluded somewhere better than what it showed. But I also sense that ending on a simpler note of breakup after Tia gets to know would have killed the story because we all knew that this is the most understood theory and no one would be happy. But I am impressed with the final scene. It was a smart technical finish where the audience can build a lot of theories.
I noticed a severe backlash about the film, the unacceptance of the audience, and their being dismissive of the relationship. I think India is still not ready for a film like Gehraiyaan. Perhaps, the audience will understand this film in a few years.
Gehraiyaan is for those who have been through an emotionally disturbing past and are stuck in relations that certainly had a present but no future at all. Gehraiyaan has a genuine score of wants, goals, and desires. The film does not exaggerate the chemistry but gives realism to how the not-so-promising love affair ignites the emotion code.
RATINGS: 8.2/10
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Ahmed and Jyoti have eloped and decided to court marriage because of obvious reasons. The court rules to produce a letter of approval from both of their families when they show up in the court a week later. Until then, they live in a district-safe home. But to their horror, a hunter is assigned to kill them.
I think Love Hostel is quite a lengthy film for such an ordinary story that cannot be stretched to play the film for 100 minutes. It is a chase film that offers not enough thickness of the plot. The film runs on survival with a couple of understood predictions. But I must say that the film ended well.
Vikrant Massey and Sanya Malhotra have given a fair performance but it is Bobby Deol whose horrifying psycho stature made his role impressive. He looked off-beat but that is how his character was. A mercenary on a mission to eradicate debauchery.
Love Hostel deserved better writing. This film kept running and didn’t lose breath. And because it didn’t stop running, the makers could not develop the characters. This film was about honor killing and with that plot, the makers messed up in scriptwriting.
Sami Naik | Film Critic 