A female voice impersonator Karam Singh gets an offer from his best friend Smiley to recover from the financial crisis by getting married as a woman to a man whose sister he is with. The reason for all this trouble is that the girl’s father has set the condition on Smiley to get his son married first before he hands his daughter to him.
REVIEW
Dream Girl 2 is a spiritual sequel of Dream Girl with a few actors from the previous venture showing up.
Like most of Ayushmann Khurrana comedy films, Dream Girl 2 also entertains with rib-tickling comedy in the first half and then the writing suffocates to conclude in the second half resulting in a comedy, that was fittingly working before, beginning to look forced and dragged.
The major plus is the plot followed by the complexity of sub-plots that stayed in the connected roots and exhilarated the viewers. The thread of all exaggerated and nonsense comedy reminded me of both comic flavors of David Dhawan and Priyadarshan films.
Many one liners and several follow-up scenes were impressively funny and that is hugely because Raaj Shaandliyaa directed this. And his CV says that he was behind the immense success of Sony TV’s Comedy Circus and wrote scores of lines for a few comedians including Kapil Sharma.
For me, the funniest scene was when the old man in the family passes away and Smiley & co. jubilantly arrives at their doorsteps for wedding.
CLOSING REMARKS
Dream Girl 2 slipped in the second half with a terrible cringe conclusion but the film must be praised for Ayushmann’s shameless performance and comic writing.
RATING 6/10
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After annoying a strongman Vicky during the film shooting, the popular action film star Maanav accidentally kills him when he chases Maanav. In fear of getting caught, Maanav runs away to his home in the UK but he is unaware that Vicky’s brother Bhoora is coming to take revenge.
REVIEW
The plot line indicates that I was up for a cat-and-mouse chase and a survival action thriller. An interesting idea was pitched for a typical Ayushmann Khurrana pandemic. The first 50 minutes were the best part of the film. But the entire comical setup of a thoughtful plot devalued after that, because Maanav faces off Bhoora too early.
My opinion about the continuity of such plot is that “An Action Hero” must have been written in a way that Bhoora would make efforts searching for his head and Maanav running from him and the local police throughout the film. That would have built the intensity and their eventual face-off had captivated more interest and undivided attention. But since the writer decided to let Bhoora meet Maanav too early in the film, the question mark over Maanav’s survival become vital. Instead of killing off the character, knowing the fact naturally how furious a brother will be for the deceased, Bhoora comes to his face and wishes to go no-holds-barred. Brother, you came all over from India to Portsmouth just to fight and then kill him? Of course, it is unrealistic and the main purpose of the plot gets killed before Maanav due to such premature encounter.
There is no doubt that the action choreography, besides a couple of scenes, were above-average because Maanav is action master so performing stunts and fighting against all odds was natural. But in a given scenario, I felt it was pretty unnatural for a film star to go Die-Hard or Mission Impossible against firing bullets and going one-on-one against the trained fighters of crime.
The film’s hype is centered around two extremely different actors in Ayushmann Khurrana and Jaideep Ahlawat. But due to bad screenplay and execution, and much effort put on a comedy unsuccessfully transforming into a black comedy, Maanav-Bhoora chemistry fell flat. With an introduction of a don in the second half that made Maanav and Bhoora became tag-team, the film completely slipped from its purpose and went far from logic and reality.
CLOSING REMARKS
Some of you may criticize me finding logic in a mainstream Bollywood film. But try to understand my point. In 2015, a similar story in this very industry blended with realism and black comedy ran a full life circle due to excellent execution. And that was Badlapur. I do not demand for another Badlapur. I opine that the quality of writing a screenplay and a fitting execution could have done justice with the plot. Sadly, that is not the case.
RATING 2/10
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Dr. Uday Gupta lives in Bhopal and is done with MBBS. He wants to become an orthopaedician but the particular course is unavailable in the city. So he chooses gynecology. And while working in a department full of female staff, he is surrendered in a series of awkwardness.
REVIEW
Doctor G presents to the audience a fresh plot, never depicted before. Ayushmann Khurrana in the leading role spices the aesthetics and increases the expectations. But Bollywood’s major issue for several years or maybe decades has been the predictability of screenwriting. We are fully aware of how this film will proceed and conclude. Doctor G is no mystery to the expectations. And if you have noticed, Ayushmann Khurrana films have set the bar for being funny in the first half and then addressing the actual subject in the other.
I totally get it that the story about one male doctor in a room full of female staff demands to be a comedy. But the turnaround in the second half was so sensitive that I felt, what if Doctor G was centered around serious content with dark humor. Even some of the jokes were silly. A comic segment about a husband unbeknownst to impregnate his wife at the precise body part is way too senseless for being funny of all sorts.
Another unnecessary push was the love angle. Although, it carried some sentimental weight about an asking-for-trouble affair with a woman who is engaged, but that time could have been covered in the core of the film.
Doctor G focused on entertainment more than depicting how a male gynecologist has to make a place in the department. Because Dr. Uday’s heart was not there and was still reading an Orthopedics book. The rescue attempt to save Kavya was his heroic effort but had nothing to do with his profession. Assumingly that would have been anyone’s effort if the staff was not attending the wedding.
CLOSING REMARKS
Ayushmann’s presence stuck with the usual performance he is known for. Doctor G needed quality screenwriting that would do justice to a welcoming plot. But I must praise the writers for forwarding two interesting issues that are critical and needs awareness.
One is Dr. Uday’s cousin Dr. Ashok, a surgeon who went into an extra-marital affair with his underage high-school student and impregnated her. The other is Dr. Uday’s mother Shobha, who wants a partner to speak to and get in relation with.
The latter’s writing was really dramatized well. And Sheeba Chaddha‘s performance as Shobha was actually the best part of the film. Just look at her mannerism in a scene when she asks her son to take her pictures. Shefali Shah in such an important role was not utilized to the maximum.
Doctor G is medically a professional situation that missed the opportunity to treat the audience with an accurate prescription.
RATING: 4/10
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Anek is about a government official secret agent Aman who is sent to the Northeast region to negotiate a peace deal between the government and the separatist groups.
A director-actor combo of Anubhav Sinha and Ayushmann Khurrana who are enjoying the peak of their careers for the last few years come up with a very sensitive socio-political subject of the North Indian people.
It is good to observe that a few films have been produced in recent years that are based on the racism that the Northern Indians have been facing for quite some time. Communal subjects have gradually increased over the last decade which indicates that the audience is now enthusiast to try watching different content.
Unfortunately and to my own surprise, Anek neither picks screentime from a solid-looking plot nor the writing does any justice during the prosecution of the film. There is no impression from the aesthetics besides action sequences. The film is over-talkative and some scenes are overstretched. Around 150 minutes of screentime with an uninspiring plot leads to nowhere but disappointment.
There are a few scenes that were shot well though. There is a scene where Aman and Anjaiyyah argue about how to define an Indian, it was a thoughtful conversation. Then the performance of Niko’s mother when she mourns and cavils to Aman at the funeral. For me, the best scene of the film was that one-shot scene in the village when Niko witnesses a series of arrests and some parts of the place put to fire.
Anek could have been a masterpiece if the screenplay was engrossing and held a grip on an important subject. The film visibly began to collapse after approximately thirty minutes.
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.
A bodybuilder from Chandigarh Manu (Ayushmann Khurrana) falls in love with the Zumba teacher in his gym Maanvi (Vaani Kapoor) but to his utter shock, he discovers that Maanvi is actually a trans-girl. Things expectedly do not go well and the film majorly begins to focus on the repercussion.
It is neither a typical masala entertainer nor a trans is put to mocking for fun as usually, the makers intend to put the subject to entertainment. But the problem with the film comes around by application of a very forced humor, stereotypical aesthetics like super-cringe pariwar or over supportive friends, or needless video songs that break the sensitivity of the subject and the rhythm this film could have built when the flow was going right.
And then the direction. Is that Abhishek Kapoor‘s direction? I refuse to believe that the guy who directed Rock On!! and Kai Po Che executed this project. Vaani Kapoor as the trans-girl deserves the credit of playing such a courageous role. She performed her being insecure pretty fair and the argument with Manu in a public place was also a very good attempt. She hasn’t acted much in the last few years so not sure what was she capable of but she did her best.
Ayushmann, like always, picked a film with a social issue that needs to be addressed and did his part that he always does. And I like that professional stance that he maintains making good choices and attracting the audience to watch what they need to watch. But one factor he needs to consider while picking the film is to scrutinize the team involved in the making of the film. Because most of the time, Ayushmann addressing a social issue meets low expectations due to weak screenplay and direction resulting in awful execution. I respect his professional attitude of taking the risk.
Chandigarh Kare Aashiqui could have done so well if the screenwriting was not been so off. Maybe a writer like Juhi Chaturvedi or Shonali Bose would have done justice and made this film with a very good plotline making a strong impact. The clear indication of the writing going off is the entire second half of the film, the continuity from the first half fell flat. Someone explain to me why Manu lifted the car. At that moment, the writer could have come up with dozens of ideas. This is why I say, the writing was badly let down.
You may watch this film for its subject, Ayushmann, and Vaani’s try on acting such a critical role.
Welcome to my world where Sami Naik presents you his annual report about the best things that happened in Bollywood that year. It has been declared that the quality of Hindi-language films has declined due to mainstream commercialism and entertainment which is unfortunately true but believing that quality films in India are extremely less in production, I beg to differ. The prime reason is that the sensible audience has to discover such projects and in the times of streaming services, more chances have increased that a lot of writers and directors, who were not getting the platform, will get offers and earn recognitions from the audience when they release their work. Audience or film critic like me make efforts here by blogging and do justice for people who deserve to be recognized for their quality work.
Since 2014, I have been publishing an annual report into my blog about the Hindi-language film industry of India. The purpose of this report/blog is to inform my fellow cinephiles about the better prospects of filmmaking in the film industry and making them aware of the rich quality of films that either caught the viewer’s attraction and received the deserving praise or unluckily went unnoticed and unrecognized. Following are my previous reports about the best of Bollywood:
My judgments are based on the realistic measures fetched from the films whether those are big or small budgeted, comprised of the ensemble or lesser-known cast. No compromise on quality. Every year, I dig around three dozen potential Hindi films, watch, and judge, pass the reviews and note down the artistic and technical excellence. For 2020, the following 38 films were selected:
There is a scene where Bhonsle is done with the meeting. Bhonsle is fixed in a crowd of 70,000 people during a festival of Anant Chaturdashi. That lengthy scene took six retakes to complete the shot. In all this continuity, Bhonsle becomes a deep muted narration of a revolutionary poet.
The most important consideration for a slow cinema is the camera work which makes the viewers observe the detailing of the smaller portions of the screenwriting. And this is where Bhonsle was very impressive. Visual shots fixing you to the neighborhood like dirty old tableware, a mischief of rats, a loaf of bread near to a street dog, etc are the essentials of adaptable graphics that squeezes you to care this kind of visual bravura.
Axone highlighted the social challenges the Northeast Indian migrants were facing in the capital. Mee Raqsam depicted the fondness of a young girl about a classical dance in a conservative Muslim family and the consequences. Kaamyaab voiced their support for the lesser-known side actors and told an influential story about such an actor who wishes to conclude his career on a memorable note. Ram Singh Charlie gave a painful insider into the circus entertainers and their struggle to survive at an old age after the business is put to halt. AK vs AK was an unusual plot about celebrities taking professional and personal revenge.
But my pick is Chintu Ka Birthday which was astonishingly built on innocent hopes between the screaming agonies of political conflicts. A six-year-old boy wants to celebrate his birthday with his Indian family, and friends in war-torn Iraq in the times when the US military has invaded the country. What is more observing about the story is feeling the agony of one of the great political conflicts of this century through the eyes of the kid who is not even a civilian of that country. That said so, the story indirectly takes you to so many millions of stories of Iraqi children into sparing a thought who wished to live free in those times enough to cut a cake on their birthday.
Many of you have noticed about my film reviews that I concentrate and judge more about the film’s screenwriting. Because it is the most essential part along with the editing which keeps the spirit of the film intact and helps in maintaining finesse.
Halahal, Ram Singh Charlie, Thappad, and Bulbbul, all had the best screenwriting to compel the audience and drive into it. But why I feel Kadakh is the best work from all these? All four films have a story interchanging its parallels whereas Kadakh has time to spend in between the lines of an unusual incident to get a hold of the entire story towards the conclusion. Rajat Kapoor’s screenwriting had smartness of continuity by playing a lively party with well-crafted supporting characters giving the couples a helping hand in a limited time. The audience will feel the misery and stay in the party unnoticed and waiting for the couples’ next steps towards the body lying in the box.
What else can there be the best scene of the year than the slap? Thappad is Anubhav Sinha’s social drama film centering on a slapping culture generally forced by men as a sign of gender dominance over women. Now we as the audience know that Taapsee will be slapped at some time in the film. The excellence of the slapping scene lies in the whole buildup which makes it so special.
Vikram enjoying one of the best evenings of his life, celebrating with his friends until that call which infuriates him and makes him verbally come into a rough argument with his colleague. Enters his wife, Amrita, trying to take her man to avoid the scene until becoming herself a scene and then comes a whacker.
Interestingly, she was nowhere involved in this incident. She became the victim and all the party attendees stared at her. Even after the slap, the scene continues to shoulder her in a slow-motion camera work towards her room with the female members of the family shell-shocked.
This slap scene is the core of the film and that part was directed superbly than any scene I have watched last year.
Barun Sobti was one of the driving forces in Halahal’s excellence. Amongst the other best-supporting roles I have noted below, the only genuine competitor to him was Anurag Kashyap. But Anurag’s capacity as a supporting role was misleading and becoming equivalent to Anil’s leading character despite the plot’s thickness demanding the importance of Anurag’s role as secondary. What makes Barun worthier than Anurag to me is his supporting role justifying in the script and becoming a helping hand to Sachin Khedekar’s role. And Barun gave a realistic look to his role. His body language was more precise to work on the screenplay.
Manisha’s terrific performance was penalized to a shockingly shorter period in the film where the leading roles were given to the amateur actors having a tough time running the film on their own. Manisha’s role had the weight, the charisma of the character who went into the skin and displayed rich body language, accent, and physical performance of a typical Parsi woman.
Surprising, innit? None other than Kumud Mishra. Am I serious? Yes, I am. We have been watching him playing different character roles, most prominently since starring in Rockstar. But expecting to do a leading role? One has to ask the director’s thinking behind considering him for such a physically challenging role. He dropped his weight, he did Chaplin impersonations, he ran driving a rickshaw. And there were moments where Kumud executed so well. That scene where Ram Singh paints his face and gets emotional or when he meets himself and speaks to him, those were the melting points.
There were other actors who did so well like Adil in Pareeksha especially when he confesses his crime, drops my jaws. Sachin surprised me in Halahal. Sanjay did such justice to his role in Kaamyaab. Amitabh with age proved that he still is phenomenal in whatever role he considers to play. Anil Kapoor’s role in AK vs AK was the only tough competitor to Kumud’s as he gave his career’s best performance.
This one was easy for me. No, I am not judging her performance because the makeup was impressive. With this real-life character, Deepika smoked a soul and gave a performance she has rarely given before. She applied a different facial and body language. Notice how she smiles and laughs when she interacts with Amol.
Amongst the best performances I have written below, Deepika’s toughest competitor for me was Taapsee Pannu who had a similar victim card but less severe than an acid-attack which was a face slap. But Taapsee’s most acting minutes in consequences of the incident were gloomy and in despair. More emotional and a little slow.
On his directional debut, I think Randeep Jha has learned a lot of directional techniques straight from Anurag Kashyap for whom he was assistant director in Ugly, Raman Raghav 2.0, and Mukkabaaz. Because you will see some glimpse of Anurag when you watch this Halahal. I am really impressed with the tone of the film on which the story is developed.
Keeping it to hardly 100 minutes, Randeep Jha wastes no time in building the plot and grows it to further implications. And the most important element which the director misses about the film in India, Halahal gets its deserving technical ending, a fitting conclusion.
And now the final winner!!! Six films were in my mind. And after closely observing all of these works, I believe AK vs AK is easily the best film of 2020. AK v AK is about real-life celebrities, director Anurag Kashyap and actor Anil Kapoor, who were not destined to work with each other in the past, and at some event, they throw themselves into a heated argument resulting in a professional enmity. Anurag takes his revenge by kidnapping Anil’s daughter Sonam Kapoor and films his struggle to find her.
This is the funniest kidnapping you will watch in any Indian film. You are watching something you have never experienced. This mockumentary-style cat-and-mouse mystery chase is a blend of suspense, black comedy rich with entertainment.
Other Notable Works:
Halahal
Bhonsle
Ram Singh Charlie
Thappad
Chippa
MULTIPLE WINS & NOMINATIONS
WINS
NOMS
FILMS
3
7
Bulbbul
3
7
Halahal
2
3
Love Aaj Kal
2
9
Taish
1
2
Ginny Weds Sunny
1
2
Anwar Ka Ajab Kissa
1
2
Chhapaak
1
2
Chintu Ka Birthday
1
2
Maska
1
3
Kadakh
1
4
Choked
1
4
Bhonsle
1
6
Thappad
1
7
AK vs AK
1
10
Ram Singh Charlie
1
Shakuntala Devi
1
Baaghi 3
1
Shubh Mangal Zyada Saavdhan
1
What Are The Odds
1
Panga
1
Dil Bechara
1
Sir
2
Angrezi Medium
2
Gunjan Saxena
2
Malang
2
Axone
2
Yeh Ballet
2
Pareeksha
3
Shikara
3
Kaamyaab
3
Mee Raqsam
4
Ludo
4
Gulabo Sitabo
6
Chippa
(Most of the images used in this blog are produced from the web sources inserted in the image.)
Thank you for reading my annual Bollywood honors report. I will return with a new report next year. Share your opinion below. Stay safe.
I cordially welcome to my 6th annual Bollywood honors report.
In the past three decades, I have observed that many showbiz platforms, especially the most prestigious Filmfare, do not do much of the justice with their Hindi-language films with their ultimate decisions about the nominations and wins. So, many ‘good’ work doesn’t get the credit.
Since 2014, I have been publishing an annual report on my blog about the Hindi-language film industry of India. The purpose of this report/blog is to inform my fellow cinephiles about the better prospects of filmmaking in the film industry and making them aware of the rich quality of films that either caught the viewer’s attraction and received the deserving praise or unluckily went unnoticed and unrecognized. Following are my previous reports about the best of Bollywood:
My judgments are based on the realistic measures fetched from the films whether those are big or small budgeted, comprised of an ensemble or lesser-known cast. No compromise on quality. Every year, I dig around three dozen potential Hindi films, watch, and judge, pass the reviews and note down the artistic and technical excellence.
To be honest, I decided the winner between the three best songs of 2019 unsurprisingly from the same film; Doori, Apna Time Ayega, and Azadi. All three songs were the outcry on social problems and rebel rage. Azadi was the one I felt the best with much deeper commentary.
Yes, it has to be Hamid. People tell me that Bollywood doesn’t make good films. The point is if Bollywood is coming up with quality stories, yes. That is the other thing if viewers are ready to accept or not. Article 15 raised the equality issue and Upstarts was a much-needed push for the people who create a startup with dreams of building it big. Section 375 was a courageous effort of depicting a misleading part of feminism and Photograph was a situational drama about the meeting of two very different people. While Gully Boy was about the struggles of the street rappers.
Hamid is a completely different plot than any 2019 film I have watched. Hamid is an impressive, heartbreaking and emotional story about a 7-year-old kid in Kashmir who has lost his father and his relatives comfort him that his father has gone to Lord to do some work. Desperate to meet his father again, he quests for some source to speak to God in all innocence.
I am much focused on screenplays whenever I watch a film. The entire film can drop your emotions wherever the screenwriting falls flat. It is a very essential part of filmmaking. People hardly know about this film and astonishingly is the best screenwriting against many excellent writings of 2019 for me.
Let me tell you why. In almost 120 minutes of the screen time, writers Ketan and Udai (who is also the director) tell you about some friends who think about creating a startup and convincingly fit all the phases of business cycles. The film neither runs in haste not goes slow. The pace is neutral and the story easily grows on me. It is not easy to tell all the business phases in precision in given limited screen time. And that is why for me, the screenplay of Upstarts is the best.
I don’t know if anyone will agree with me but this film actually had the most contrasting dialogues than any film last year. A young journalist gets an assignment to solve the decades-old mystery about the assassination of the former prime minister of India, Lal Bahadur Shastri. She gets a place in a committee to dig into this matter where different kinds of intellectuals sit and argue.
So for this kind of political thriller, the dialogues require a terrific momentum of an intellectual conversation, history talks, rumors, blames, heated arguments, bold and bullet criticism, and I believe Vivek Agnihotri nailed it. Impressive dialogues were the main reason that the loud performances of such an ensemble cast doubled the worth of this film.
This may be unpopular or unexpected choice after watching all the films of 2019 but I found this 8-minute shot one of the best things ever happened in Bollywood in recent years.
This is when teacher Anand Kumar orders his students to perform a street act outside the school for 20 minutes strictly in English without uttering a single Hindi word. The next day, the kids strive out in front of the scores of students and get an outrageous response. The spectators roar to leave and the performers refuse. In repetition, the performers somehow finds the way to extend the act by giving an unexpected entertainment for which they didn’t prepare for. The beauty is that Basanti Don’t Dance naturally happens without the teacher’s instructions with the help of the spectators and angry response by floor beatings.
This crazy segment was deep, dark, bizarre and a remarkable commentary of class divisions. This was an astonishing presentation of a mind-blowing provocation against classism. Ganesh Acharya’s superb choreography and powerful performances by those youngsters gave that lengthy sequence a distinguished quality of filmmaking.
Not MC Sher from Gully Boy? I am afraid not. I admit it was, without any doubt, a wonderful performance on his debut but my opinion is that it is the popularity of the character and the performances leading to his favor, especially in the awards function. Tremendous confidence in the role he played but there weren’t many minutes to invest for acting than the focus was on his performance. I think Murad’s other friend Moeen had a much sensible performance.
Another factor that the readers must understand is the comparison with the other supporting roles. There were other actors last year who I believe certainly did better than Siddhant. In my mind, two were the closest in this honor, Deepak Dobriyal, and Vishal Jethwa. Deepak’s case was highly physical and Vishal’s case was mental. Deepak has the experience, Vishal is a 25yo debutant whose incredible villainous role in Mardaani 2 caught our attention. Vishal’s facial performance and killer eyes brought horror in the script and gave a memorable performance which will certainly remind anyone of Ashutosh Rana’s earliest success in Dushman and Sangharsh. Imagine, both Dobriyal and Jethwa were not nominated in this category in Filmfare!
I never thought Ranveer will ever impress me but one thing was for sure that his energetic charisma can get the use of better promises. He needs a director who can develop his acting potentials and here we are. Zoya picked the right man for the role. Ranveer is naturally the perfect Gully Boy.
An escapist and socially furious Murad is lost in the troubles from his domestic life and love affair. Addicted to his passion, he raps his social commentary and inclines towards the changes in the coming times.
I don’t know how did Alia Bhatt win Filmfare in this category. Technically, Alia’s role in Gully Boy is more of supporting as the film is completely centralized on Ranveer as Gully Boy. More bizarre was Bhumi not being nominated for her performance in Saand Ki Aankh but won the critics award.
Anyway, why Bhumi? She plays the role of an old villager and the portrayal is spot on. She brilliantly gets hold of the Haryanvi dialect and superbly adopts the mannerism of an old woman. Observe her walking style, rage, facial expressions and all funny scenes with Taapsee. This is Bhumi’s best performance to date and I found her to be the most impressive in executing her role.
This was a difficult decision. The tie was between Zoya and Shonali. Why I chose latter is because she took a very sensitive subject to its utter depth and also directed a few shots which hit straight to the heart like the couples arguing over transplant in the hospital, Aditi’s first mental collapse, Niren falling on his son’s lap and crying and many more. Shonali had a tough time in developing the characters due to different time periods.
What other film wins this honor than Gully Boy? There is no strong competition. There do are excellent films as mentioned below but none comes close to this. Gully Boy is the outcry from the slums of Mumbai where Murad is stuck in his tense domestic life and for escapism, tries to focus on rapping and does the social commentary.
Gully Boy, from all sorts, was a unique cinematic achievement where the voice of a lower-middle-class common man was whispered and the struggle of street rappers was depicted. I wish Gully Boy had made to the final round of the Academy Awards for the foreign-language category because this film was the most potentially acceptable film from all standards to reach the Oscar.
Gully Boy is full of energy and covers a few significant aspects like parent abuse and child labor. The story, screenplay, and dialogues are so carefully worked that the film easily grows on the viewers. Then the characterization also goes in favor to apply on remarkable writing. Some very impressive characters in the support develop the plot. The brilliance in the musical numbers does the rest.
Other Notable Films:
Sonchiriya
Hamid
Article 15
Upstarts
Section 375
MULTIPLE NOMINATIONS
NOMS
FILMS
15
Gully Boy
10
Article 15
8
Sonchiriya
8
Hamid
7
Photograph
6
Laal Kaptaan
6
Section 375
5
Kesari
3
Mard Ko Dard Nahin Hota
3
Kalank
3
Badla
3
The Sky Is Pink
3
Chhichhore
3
Posham Pa
3
Upstarts
2
The Tashkent Files
2
Super 30
2
Mardaani 2
1
Marjaavaan
1
Kabir Singh
1
Batla House
1
Jaoon Kahan Bata Ae Dil
1
Mere Pyare Prime Minister
1
The Accidental Prime Minister
1
Saand Ki Aankh
1
Mission Mangal
MULTIPLE HONORS
HONORS
FILMS
6
Gully Boy
2
Sonchiriya
2
The Sky Is Pink
1
Photograph
1
Kesari
1
Kalank
1
Mard Ko Dard Nahin Hota
1
Laal Kaptaan
1
Hamid
1
Upstarts
1
The Tashkent Files
1
Super 30
1
Mardaani 2
1
Saand Ki Aankh
Thank you for reading my annual Bollywood honors report. I will return with a new report next year. Share your opinion below. Stay safe.
Sami Naik | Film Critic 