During the coronavirus pandemic, the government ordered nationwide lockdowns including checkpoints at the borders. Inspector Surya Kumar Singh Tikas is tasked to control one of the checkpoints but thousands of travelers get stuck on that border because they are not allowed to cross. The consequences are heavy. The impatience leads to frustration and people begin to quarrel, blame, and protest.
REVIEW
Bheed
I am not sure if the film “Bheed” is based on a true geographical event but if I assume that it is fictional, then the incidents in this fictional event represents one of the million stories that occurred in India, and one of the billion stories in the world. Bheed plays at least five different stories in the same parallel. Due to this reason, the growth of the characters are challenging within two hours of the screentime. Moreover, Bheed has another challenge that the screenplay must not exhaust the viewers because almost an entire film is shot on the checkpoint.
Although the film didn’t do well at the box-office because it was understandable that the audience do not wish to spend the time on a severe depression that recently haunted almost every one in the world. But frankly speaking, it is an absurd reason if I consider that’s the case. Bheed, in its full potential, served the purpose. The dramatization of tension building was remarkable, the panic in the crowd was impressively alarming, and the emotions were rightly despair.
BLACK AND WHITE
The one aspect that I found very impressive about Bheed is that the director Anubhav Sinha chose to make this film black and white. As an observer, there can be two reasons. One is that the migration in the film will heavily remind you of the partition era. Second, the colorless theme can represent the national tragedy. Such creative aesthetics indicate that the filmmaker is serious about conveying a message to the audience. And I like that spirit when the film-making artistry is taken too serious.
A POTENTIAL BEST SCENE
There is a scene where a sudden noise among the crowd erupts and Inspector Tikas has to run to check what happened and it is the police that sanitizes people by showering them. I wish if I was Anubhav’s assistant so I would have suggested him to make that a one-shot scene from Tikas’ angle running the entire route of the noisy crowd until that mark of sanitizing them. I know that could have been a very difficult shooting but that is the beauty. What’s the fun if the director has to shot the film plain and simple. My suggested shot would have been the best Bollywood scene of the year 2023.
THE DAUGHTER
I think the best of all stories was the hopeless cycle riding of a young daughter and drunk father. Their survival was not imminent but were not giving up. It was strange that only one car spotted them riding towards a different route. And this was followed by that car following them until a very moving scene caught our attention when the driver of the car refused to obey his madam and helped them cross the route. This was an important message to the audience coming from the global disaster. On such a cruel planet, the natural disasters are the only certain situations where strangers help each other out.
THE TROUBLEMAKER
But then there are circumstances where people do not allow helping each other. Balram Trivedi is one such character who provoked the harmony twice. When the Muslims aided the Hindus with food, Balram snatched all the packets and returned. It was too late to realize and regret that he was wrong and then the packets were distributed somewhere. When he couldn’t borrow the time of feeding them by not dropping his ego, he chose desperate violence of invading the mall nearby which was illegal and unacceptable. Had he allowed the Muslim aid, the circumstances would have not gone worse.
CLOSING REMARKS
The commercial failure of Bheed gives a wrong reflection on the choices of the audience. Because the film had technical brilliance in direction, story, screenplay, cinematography, and editing. The dialogues, the major performances especially of Rajkummar Rao as Tikas and Pankaj Kapur as Balram, and even the closing in the final 20 minutes were impressive. So forget the box-office and do yourself a favor, watch Bheed on Netflix.
Bheed successfully shows how the pandemic still cannot defeat the caste system, the religious conflicts, and the prejudices. People still find reasons to raise hatred and squabble by differentiating. Perhaps, the humans fighting over stupid reasons is a bigger pandemic than the pandemic.
RATING: 8.2/10
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The Andaman and Nicobar Islands is threatened by the horror of the pandemic when the territory is infected by a mysterious disease. When hell descends and starts to take the lives of the affected, people from all walks of life struggle to survive. Solidarity embarks, families and friends get disjointed by the unwanted incidents. The medical experts and the decision-makers are muddled with such a complicated situation.
Kaala Paani, in these seven episodes, folds the viewers in the mighty scare of the widespread and makes us watch the toughest times of getting stuck in a situation where there is no escape.
REVIEW
This Netflix series brings back the COVID vibes. The entire setting of the screenplay that painfully welcomes disease precisely reminds us of the world we began to experience in 2020. Staring at people coughing in the public place, distancing from the affected ones, spraying on the doors and locks, wearing masks; it is a victory for the show that they settled the viewers with discomfort.
Kaala Paani’s writing grows in the nerves because the show runs several stories, dig in the lives of the main characters, and give us a deeper look in the complexity of human relations, their getting distanced, expressing their fear of losing someone or themselves.
The emotion code will break the viewers when they watch Kaddu struck with epilepsy, when Chiru is in state of shock receiving his mother’s ashes, when Dr. Ritu’s father is slapped in front of her, when Santosh listens to his wife’s hiccup and starts crying.
In fact, Santosh is the most heartbreaking character of the show. A husband who lost his wife, a father who lost his son, traveled with pain in quest of his daughter. Vikas Kumar has boiled his Santosh character with severe desperation. His slipping in to the hole settled our mind that he will have to overcome fear and somehow escape. And boy! what a physical performance that was. All his crying scenes were jaw-droppers.
Besides, the other standout performer was Sukant Goel as Chiru. Watch him when he offers himself to Dr. Shashi for the test and when he reacts over his mother’s demise.
Some parts of writing are very interesting. The panic in the festival was intense, so was the car almost crashing Kaddu. When water became a concern, notice the governor dropping only few drops of water on his toothpaste.
The show must be praised for its technical productions. If the series is based and shot in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, surely the camera work is one of the preferred focus. And we happen to watch some amazing shots throughout the show by Ewan Mulligan & co. Rachita Arora‘s background score, Dev Rao Jadhav‘s editing, and Biswapati Sarkar‘s writing are a few names to mention that they are responsible in the making of an excellent series.
And an Indian film or a TV show meeting a technical finishing with excellence rarely happens. But now I get to know that the show is renewed for the second season. And I cannot stop myself from admitting that I am a little impatient about the show’s return.
CLOSING REMARKS
Kaala Paani has a deeper message about the human evolution and survival. The entire defense of the governor on his action against the Oraka tribe is thought-provoking. Something inside us tell you that the failure in survival has put halt to many races and civilizations. To shape the world in the better direction or for a sustainable future, the old world has to collapse and disappear. Whether the wind of fortune takes them away or the poison of ego and hatred writes off their history. Only the strongest survives by defeating and killing the weaker. Kaala Paani just showed us the picture we do not want to see at all.
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Bruce Wayne warns Barry Allen of severe consequences if he keeps traveling back in time to see his mother alive. Overcome by his emotions, Barry uses speed force to alter the past and ends up in another universe where there is another version of Barry with his mother alive.
INTRODUCTION
Welcome to yet another sad chapter of an ever-collapsing brain-farting universe of DCEU or DCU. A cinematic universe whose Gods are still devising a plan to jump-start and level with Disney Studio‘s Marvel Cinematic Universe.
After seven years of inception, or maybe ten if I do not dare to miss Man of Steel, the story of this cinematic universe still fails to get the confidence vote of comic book audience and DC Comics loyalists. Meetings after meetings, reshoots after reshoots, executive producers are still clueless and now almost every Justice League actor is out besides Jason Momoa. If you ever get to know that a DC film has been interrupted with the bosses ordering reshoots, realize that the film is already marching towards the failure before even hitting the theatres.
REVIEW
The Flash is just another DC superhero film that is badly trying to follow one of the successful routes of MCU philosophy which is dragging humor in almost everything. Yes, The Flash is a cool dude and I cannot imagine his solo film going dark despite his dark origins and many portions of comic book pages turning black in the past.
The Flash film is supposed to entertain the audience. But you have to apply the fun and the entertainment only when the cinematic universe is either fixed or turning towards a game-changer. Fixing the universe and being a game changer are the two major factors this film was to be made responsible for. Instead, the film overcooked the whole screenplay with a very unconvincing plot. After such a messed up plot and extremely bad CGI, you will have to ask yourself, what was the value of the entire story of the film? Exactly, close to none.
Warner Bros. bosses have still not learned their lesson from DCEU failures. You cannot drag so many characters in a single film to get the audience approval. The story of the film needs breathing. And there is no space or time of maturing the supporting characters who are introduced.
Michael Keaton‘s Batman has returned and roped into this miserable DC universe just like wrestling legends are often dragged to WWE events to attract the audience. After mere ten minutes of onscreen appearance, Keaton’s Batman agrees to fight alongside visibly two boys with silly jokes to find Superman and stop General Zod from invading the planet. Ten Minutes! Keaton’s Batman who looked so washed up to his old game suddenly finds reason to return and fight. Such development requires build up and that lacked here.
There is nothing Wow! about Supergirl at all. Boring introduction, unattractive fighting sequences, and no character development. Plus, Sasha Calle doesn’t look fit for the role. Michael Shannon‘s General Zod is terribly wasted. You must have felt Zod’s wrath in Man of Steel ten years ago. Why? Because Zod’s character was widely stretched to fit in the story and make you feel uncomfortable about his madness. But this time, I was not getting that thrill to see him attempting to invade the planet. Zod was in the film for hardly 15 minutes.
Unprecedented cameos in the final act were meaningless and once again, dragged. Yes, thank you. Super thank you for finally uniting Christopher Reeve‘s Superman and Helen Slater‘s Supergirl in the same frame in such a blood-boiling use of CGI. But at what cost? In fact, I am curious to know the real cost of production for “The Flash”. Wikipedia and various sources on the internet says that this film costs over $200 million in the production. I fail to believe a film with such heaving budget hitting the theatres with that deepfake and horrible CGI.
The dialogues of the film lacks substance. There is no impact but very off dialogues.”Come on Barbie, Let’s go party?” “You wanna get nuts? Let’s get nuts.” The Music score is super ordinary. So many vital scenes lack a musical impact. Zero inspiration.
I am unsure of Ezra Miller‘s future after being surrounded with so many controversies but after watching “The Flash”, I feel it is time to find a new face. This character portrayal is way too cheesy. And it feels like the television portrayal by Grant Gustin was more fitting and closer to comic books in comparison.
When ‘The Flash’ was announced years ago, my first impression was that this film will be based on “Flashpoint” due to the nature of the continuity in the first phase of DCEU indicating about it when Barry comes from the future to warn Bruce in Batman v Superman. But I guess I was in delusion to assume if WB executives will come up with a plan smart enough to run a comic book inspired storyline.
PLUSES
Despite being immensely disappointed with the film, I liked a couple of scenes. One was Ben Affleck’s Bruce Wayne’s thought-provoking advises to Barry. The life lesson Bruce gave here to Barry were quite hard hitting that actually makes Ben Affleck’s version of Bruce more subtle. I wish DCEU had valued this angle of Bruce/Batman. The other scene was Barry meeting his mother one last time in the supermarket. Knowing the fact that he is reversing the altered timeline which means his mother will remain killed in the past breaks Barry and makes the audience re-imagine what if the sons and daughters meet their dead parents while traveling back in time one last time? How does it feel? Painful, isn’t it? This is what Bruce was trying to understand Barry, “These scars we have make us who we are. We’re not meant to go back and fix them. And there’s nothing broken with you that needs to be fixed.”
TWO BATMEN IN THE SAME FILM!!!
A cinematic delight to our eyes was appearance of not one but two Batmen in the same film. Let’s not talk about the third Bruce Wayne of the film which was also meaningless. But anyway, a story that had to make two Batmen from different worlds appear for Barry didn’t give much chills to the audience. One may ask themselves, should two Batmen have shared the same screen? Just like three Spidermen? I think it obviously would have been exciting. But at what cost? The given story didn’t support to bring them together. So I think it was a good decision. Maybe it would have been more heartbreaking to see two Batmen together being part of an unusual disappointment.
THE DCEU MESS UP
So what now? Now, I wait for Aquaman and observe how James Gunn‘s vision for a fresh DC universe will give birth from there. Am I excited? About what? This DCEU had a weak foundation due to a punctured storyline that was unjust to the Justice League. The slating of the films, the interferences of Warner Bros. bosses, the reshoots of the films, the Joss Whedon chapter, and last of all rejecting Zack Snyder‘s version of continuing of what possibly looked like a very promising trilogy of the JL. All this failed to present a DCEU that we comic geeks ever wanted to watch out.
Just take a small example of planning Michael Keaton to play a Nick Fury kind of role in the future films of the DCEU. And for that purpose, Keaton starred in this film. And then, he worked in Batgirl and then the upcoming sequel of Aquaman. When WB hired James Gunn, he came up with a new plan that held no future for Keaton. Therefore, he was killed in ‘The Flash’. Batgirl got shelved in the post production. And his scenes from Aquaman cut. How do you expect actors to work with you in this universe for a long period?
ANOTHER BOX-OFFICE DISASTER!
When it comes to the box-office collections, The Flash, believe it or not, is the sixth consecutive flop in the DCEU. Shazam in 2019 was the last DCEU film that met success. Since then, two of the DCEU films didn’t even reach the cost of the film budget, Wonder Woman 1984, and The Suicide Squad. Perhaps because of COVID-hit 2020. But still, the last three DCEU films didn’t even meet the break even point. And now Blue Beetle has become the seventh consecutive flop in the DCEU.
GUNN’S VISION
Shall I be optimist about James Gunn’s vision for future DCU? See I am inclined towards Zack Snyder’s vision but it is useless to whine about something that is shelved. The one aspect I really like about Gunn is that he is a comic geek and knows this shit. The developments of the future projects that he announced all have essence of comic books which is exactly what a comic geek desperately wants; a universe that identifies and recognizes the efforts and contributions of the writers. Where and what is the enthusiasm if a superhero film doesn’t have a comic book value at all? To devalue book sources and detach a comic character and story line for a new once-upon-a-time, you need to come up with an extremely rich writing content that can hit the audience while playing the right chords. So not every film can be Joker at all.
CLOSING REMARKS
To end my never-ending assessment, take ‘The Flash’ as a comedy film and a forgettable past, and for some time, we believe in the theory that S stands for Hope.
RATINGS: 3/10
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Sami Naik | Film Critic 