Upendra, starring Upendra, directed by Upendra.

I went into Kannada director-star (titled "Real Star" in the Kannada film industry) Upendra's self-titled film (now there's a turn of phrase one rarely sees in cinema!) very cautiously. My relationship with the film maker has been one part awe, one part admiration or appreciation but also one part condemnation for the, shall we say, problematic elements in his films. 

In Super (symbol), I appreciated the wild imagination that brought the film its energy, but loathed the way that women were used rather predictably as nothing but mere symbols of the bigger picture. I also had a more minor problem with the message presented. In A, the "women problem" was even more prominent, though once again the film had enough interesting ideas that I didn't hate it - in fact, I'll probably end up rewatching it at some point. 

There is so much thought behind these films, I would never want to dismiss them despite the fact that I am deeply disturbed by the way Upendra treats his heroines. Like I said in my review of Super, it annoys me because I would hope that somebody who puts so much thought into crafting his stories would really think through his choices when it comes to portrayal of women. Upendra is not the only brilliant man who hasn't considered the opposite gender much at all, and he won't be the last, but I maintain my wish that it wasn't so. I wouldn't be so hesitant in recommending his films if women weren't thrown around indiscriminately to deliver ..no point whatsoever, really. To be fair, Upendra's heroes rough-house men as well, but it doesn't make it any more palatable. These are loud, eccentric films - but there's a way to do it without so much casual, pointless violence, and I think Upendra could consider that option.

However, and this is a fairly major 'however', I feel as if with Upendra (the film), I have reconciled my relationship with Upendra (the film maker). I feel like three films in, I finally understand him a bit more, and while those problems I have remain, I can look past them and appreciate his films on the level he intended. It was as if Upendra (the film) was a journey into the mind of Upendra (the film maker) and while I think out of his films, in terms of the story, I appreciate A the most, in terms of the message, I really came out liking Upendra (the film ..yes, I am aware of how confusing this continues to be!).

Upendra is a tale of Naanu (Upendra), an absolutely wretched, selfish human being. He doesn't believe in lying, so he exposes other people's hypocritical lives while  breaking every rule society has given him to break. Despite this, a young woman named Rathi (Damini) falls in love with him. However, she soon finds out Naanu has two other women in his life - he is pursuing the rich heiress Keerthi (Raveena Tandon) and has a wife (Prema) as well. Who will be choose to be with, and will any of the women have him?

The eccentric loudness makes the film actually quite difficult to watch, and the real experience actually only begins on the second watch. The first time, you feel as if you don't know where anything is headed - Naanu is your typical loud, violent, punch-dialogue-delivering Upendra hero, but the way he points out hypocrisies in society just isn't really all that logical. It's also really not that interesting. The juggling he does between the women in his life also starts to feel a bit dull after a while - he loves Rathi but wants Keerthi, but has obligations to his wife. 

Damini is possibly the weakest link in the cast - Prema and Raveena do well with their exaggerated characters, and Upendra of course doesn't need to do much to do what he knows to do in his films. It's a drag on the first watch, when one is still under the illusion that all these threads of story are actually headed somewhere fairly typical. Even once you find out the real purpose of the film, there is just so much slack.

I read somewhere that some press in India were upset over the vulgar portions of the film - there is pretty frank discussion of the hero spending time with prostitutes and other sexual topics. I didn't mind  these parts because they were there, but even in retrospect it is difficult to see their purpose.

And that's the real downfall of this movie - the purpose is so evident on the second time you watch it when it comes to some things, but not when it comes to others. I get the sense that Upendra (the film maker) often doesn't care what the audience that doesn't already love him, thinks of him, but there is much to be said for a slight toning down of the loudness to perhaps allow all of those who haven't previously enjoyed his films another look in. 

I think sometimes it's fine for a movie to be so much in your face with its everything - from the songs (lyrics penned by Upendra, unsurprisingly perhaps) to the acting, to the dialogue and even to the initial shreds of social message you may read into the film, and I wouldn't ask Upendra to completely abandon his style. Still, I think there's something to be said for taking it down a notch - less is more, that kind of thing. 

However, with all these criticisms, I really appreciated the final message of the film. I wish you could somehow remove the frillings and just focus on the point of the film. As it concerns the very end of the film, I'll have to slap a big SPOILER warning here right now. If you haven't seen the film, by all means, check it out if you think you'd like it. If you have seen the film, continue reading!

So, I watched Jism 2. Yes, really.

There were three film reviews of Jism 2 I considered writing. 

One was a long, sprawling essay that read too much into the gender and sexual politics of the film, and could essentially be summarized with "there's a woman and two men, and one of them tells her what to do and is mean, and the other tells her what to do slightly less and is actually gives her some agency, and wait, why is she a porn star again?". That's just what happens when I watch erotic thrillers, I suppose, but it didn't quite work, and I think I knew it from the get-go. 

The second one was a short collection of rather shallow notes on Randeep Hooda's performance in the film. Not really one for the general readership of the blog, so I opted not to write this one, either.

The third option was to just snark the film, so that's what I did.

In order to support female directors, or female directors benefiting directly from nepotism, I decided to watch Pooja Bhatt's erotic treatise on international terrorism and conspiracy theories. Just kidding, I actually just wanted to watch Randeep Hooda endlessly making out with (current? former?) porn star Sunny Leone. On that front, the film was completely satisfying, no complaints. Everything else? Well...

I have to question the choice to make her character Izna a porn star as well. What exact purpose did this serve? She sleeps with the intelligence agent Ayan, who eventually hires her, in the first scenes of the film after seducing him at the bar. Was this the reason? Only porn stars have casual sex with strangers? Soon we find out her mission as the new 007 is to effectively seduce her ex  Kabir (Randeep Hooda) who's gone rogue, killing people left and right. Well, not seduce, exactly. They just need her to steal the data from the computer he keeps in his bedroom, but Ayan doesn't want her to sleep with her ex. It's almost as if she's not dealing with professionals! (Spoilers: she isn't.)

I must express concern for Sunny Leone's health, as she appears to constantly be on the verge of an asthma attack throughout the film. Not a scene goes by where the poor woman's breath is not stuck in her throat for whatever reason, and her bosom heaves in desperate need of air. Her physique suggests she gets enough exercise, and does not seem winded, so it's got to be something else, and I believe a doctor should attend to this as urgently as possible. 

As much as I harp on Miss Leone and her irregular breathing, she's not as bad at acting as the two men whose characters rope her into this mess - so bad they are in fact, that I refuse to look up their names for this review. Run to Google, should you care. Her acting is mostly just reacting to things other people tell her - and she actually does a pretty fine job of it. Isn't the most difficult part of acting reacting, anyway? Isn't Sunny Leone, by excelling somewhat at this, miles ahead of pretty much everybody? Shouldn't Ranbir give one of his Filmfare Awards to her already? Besides, for all the talk about how bad porn actors are at acting, let us consider this for a moment: how well would you act, if your character is a horny college girl who has to seduce the pizza delivery guy. It's not like you can go method with scenarios as flimsy as that. I'd like to see Aamir Khan sink his teeth into that one. (Not literally..)

Thankfully the torture from the secondary characters on-screen comes to a merciful end and we are treated to the sight of Randeep Hooda, who is under the illusion that he is in a genuinely good film. It would be tragic if it were not so spectacular. He puts his goddamn everything into the dialogue, so much so that I succumbed to the same illusion myself for a moment, and was left heaving, breathless like a poor woman's Sunny Leone. He also looked good. So. Very. Good. Suddenly, I believed in the silly, plothole-infested story. He was a tortured guy, stuck in a job he could no longer leave - she was the sole light in his life, and having her returned to him, he didn't want her to leave. Sadly, the illusion lasted only as long as each of his scenes did. (That voice, though, damn.)

Now here's the biggest plot hole of them all: why pigeon-hole a porn star into an erotic thriller that isn't even very erotic? Look, call me old-fashioned, but if you want to watch her in erotic situations, surely you just ..watch her previous career's fruits? You don't watch a low budget Hindi film with some liplocking and one potentially erotic back rub scene that doesn't even reach the heights of a softcore film. It's pretty unfair to think that Sunny Leone's talents lie solely in the world of erotica. I look forward to seeing her as prime minister, or as DCP, or as chief rowdy, or as an incarnation of a goddess. Pooja Bhatt, are you up to the challenge?

Would I recommend Jism 2? Yes, of course. It will serve its viewer in a meaningful manner and inform them philosophically. It's like an erotic back rub for your mind. Trust me. 

Chakravyuh: the red war.

You might've heard that India is at war with itself; hundreds, if not thousands, of people die in this war every year. You might've heard the term Maoist in conjunction to this war, or you might be more familiar with the term Naxalite, or the more academic name - left-wing extremist terrorists. The other side of the war is the central government, trying desperately to clamp down on the violent incidents by brutal force, with varied success.

Prakash Jha's Chakravyuh paints a portrait of this war that is harshly realistic, impeccably researched and sympathetic to both sides of the war, but does tend to give more of a hearing to the Maoists - indeed, Jha said in interviews prior to release that he's met Naxalites, and listened to their side of the story. As an issue-based film, Chakravyuh is excellent and an amusing disclaimer at the beginning of the film says up front that "nothing is coincidental" - everything is modelled after real events, real people and being true to the "war within". At the crux of the issue is that economic development and mining demands evacuation of mineral-rich areas, many of them home to adivasis (often translates 'tribals'), who resent the government for the way they've been treated in these instances. Naxalism is an old strand of India's left-wing history, that gained new momentum as the counter force to these evacuations and general poverty and misery of the adivasis.

These are all things I personally knew already, having read about them, but the fantastic way that the film presents these real-life facts and issues is commendable. It asks the age old political question: will capitalism really lead to better lives for the poor, or will it merely line to pockets of foreign company owners?

Perhaps due to my own fascination with the problems the film deals with, the actual story took a backseat in my viewing experience. Kabir (Abhay Deol, wonderful as ever), who manages to go undercover among Naxalites to help his friend Adil (Arjun Rampal), the SP trying to rid the area of Nandighat of the left-wing extremists, who act as the unofficial police force in the area. Anjali Patil plays Juhi, the Naxalite commander who Kabir ends up getting close to, while Om Puri and Manoj Bajpai play the other central Naxalite figures. 

Through Kabir's story, the Naxalite side of things becomes extremely well-rounded, and you understand their side of the dispute. These are not simple issues, however, and perhaps the one flaw of the movie is that it gives the Naxalites almost too sympathetic a hearing. We hear from the other side how many Naxalites merely use the movement as a way to gain power in society, rather than to make the lives of adivasis better, but we don't really get to see this greed for power in any of the Naxalite characters. There is cruelty among them, certainly, but I don't think there's a single flat-out evil left-wing extremist in the film, whereas to balance the morality of Adil's character, we get a few bad apples among the police. The film doesn't seem to really ponder whether violence is the answer to all the concerns of the poor people the Naxalites claim to represent. On the other hand, an alternative reading would be that they turn to violence because nothing else seems to be working - they have no other alternatives to it. But is that really so?

As far as performances go, both Arjun and Abhay deliver, as can only be expected, but the real joys of the film are the secondary characters. Om Puri as the steadfast ideologue was great, and Anjali Patil as the passionate, strong and driven Juhi is simply a joy to witness. Something about the relationship between the two main characters never truly becomes the centre of the film for me, but rather Juhi's character, and I really wonder why that is. Perhaps in the process of writing this well-researched script, Jha too became too fascinated with the issue at hand to focus all his attention on the drama that presented the issue.

The film ends up straight-forwardly asking a lot of pertinent questions. The war is horrific, and seemingly endless and inescapable, but what are the solutions to it? Can both sides give up on something to gain peace? It's an important issue, perhaps the one issue India has to face before it can move forward, and the questions the film asks also resonate to a lesser extent to the problems faced in other countries, such as growing inequality. As an issue film, Chakravyuh scores nine out of ten in my books, but as a film that tells a story, it doesn't quite reach that high. Still, it's worth watching if you want to learn more about the political realities of India today, or merely if you like Jha's style of film.

Gangs of वासेपुर.

Gangs of Wasseypur, Anurag Kashyap's epic about the titular town and its violent history, is a 320 minute film, split into two for a commercial release. I watched them re-united as one cinematic experience, spanning over five hours of my time and over 60 decades of fictionalized Wasseypur history. It was quite a ride, to put it mildly. In five hours, you meet a lot of characters and part with some of them too early, and others not as early as you would have liked. In five hours, you get to think a lot of things, and also feel a lot of things. In five hours, you ask tons of questions, some which get answered, many you're left to ponder over on your own.

The plot tells a fairly uncomplicated story of how revenge fuels decades' worth of violence between two camps. In some ways, the story in all its turns and roundabouts is secondary to the feeling of living in this world of Wasseypur: the somber narration by Nasir bhai (Piyush Mishra) walks us through it, and there are always certain constant realities to be found, like blood spilled or the greed of people. If you can stomach the very violent genre of the film, complete with unabashed and frequent, uncensored cussing, then the film is definitely among must-sees of Hindi cinema overall, and one of the best of last year, easily. It's got some flaws, like some confusing sequences (which I may have to blame on lacking DVD subtitling in part I), or certain characters being rather underwritten (more questions than answers about why they do what they do), but overall, it's a great effort.

From hereon, the review will get more specific and will contain SPOILERS for both parts.

To me, Gangs of Wasseypur was really crystalized in two scenes. Among the many characters, the main protagonists are Sardar (Manoj Bajpai) and his son Faizal (Nawazuddin Siddiqui) - they're in focus throughout most of the film, and yet they're very different characters. The revenge tale that frames the film is one things that simultaneously unites and divides them. Sardar is very much in touch with the idea of avenging his father, but the actual deed he can set aside for later. Faizal is only vaguely connected with the revenge mission, and occasionally shows signs of thinking it's pointless, and yet he inadvertently ends up killing the very man who killed his grandfather.

While Sardar wins none of my sympathies, Faizal gets a surprising amount. He's not much better than his father - he kills mercilessly, without blinking, without thinking twice. Yet he's somehow more human, more at a loss at everything he's doing, and his part in this cycle of violence he finds himself in. Sardar is at ease with his mission in life, and pursues it with ruthless precision. Faizal escapes reality to drugs. He can also be cold and calculating, and selfish, but not in the way his father is.

Unsurprisingly, perhaps, the scenes I'm about to talk about both deal with their treatment of women.

Sardar has left his wife to hide from the police, and ends up lusting after Durga (Reema Sen, who apparently now wants her name spelled as Remma), a young woman. I'd say they share a couple of meaningful looks, but this would be a lie - he stares at her, while she gives him a peek or two from a safe distance. When he finally approaches her, she is silent, and doesn't react to him, apart from trying to wrangle her arm from his grip. While the implication is that she wants him, as we later see her slipping into his bed out of her own volition, it was hard to watch these scenes and not read something predatory into the way he was looking at her. Even the eventual sex scene is far from romantic - it's fast, and on his terms, and his hand muffles whatever noises she makes. The unfortunate side effect of seeing this film after India has begun to publicly deal with its women being victims of rape and sexual harassment is that Durga's consent is almost not there at all. Most of all, Sardar's seeming lack of interest to whether she says no or yes is what really disturbs me.

He doesn't improve much after, abandoning his family for the new wife, at least for a while, and by the time he eventually gets killed, I found myself not caring particularly much.

Faizal, on the other hand, ends up approaching his childhood crush Mohsina (newcomer Huma Qureshi) after seeing her at the cinema. Their romance develops slowly after Danish, Faizal's brother, ends up marrying Mohsina's sister, putting them temporarily under the same roof. In a key scene, Mohsina scolds Faizal for holding her hand without asking for her permission. This shocks him into retreating but she assures him it's fine, as long as he asks her for her permission, and he accepts this. The contrast to the previous scenes I described were so stark, I was a bit in awe. Their relationship continues rather delightfully into a happy marriage, where they both seem playful and content with one another. In probably the best scene of the film, she comforts him (and sings to him), after he wonders what the point of all that he's accomplished in life, and in crime is, as he didn't really want any of it. It's one of the few moments in the film where everything stills and we're treated to a simple, gorgeously acted character-centric scene.

Their story ends up being the most human part of the film for me, and Nawazuddin Siddiqui is so compelling in his performance, his character becomes the only character besides the female ones (none of whom get an entirely fair deal in my eyes) who I genuinely root for. The complexities the film presents in its morality mean that this is by no means an obvious choice, nor is it the "right" one. Like I mentioned, Faizal kills a lot, often without reason. And yet, the acting makes him so relatable in a peculiar way, so interesting to watch that I cannot help but want him to make it.

I think Gangs of Wasseypur makes it onto my favourites list for the cinematic world it creates for itself. The beautiful cinematography, the music infused to it, all the performances that make up a solid ensemble cast and the real stand-outs among them, it just seems that a lot of things Kashyap and his team got so precisely right. It's gory, but compelling, and it doesn't meander much for such a long film - if anything, I think it could've used a few more character-building sequences. 

Once Upon a Time in Mumbaai: goondagiri at its finest.

Ever since watching Milan Luthria's brilliant The Dirty Picture, I've been meaning to check out his previous hit, Once Upon a Time in Mumbaai. I'm happy to report than when I finally did, I wasn't disappointed in the least. While Luthria may have began his career with the fairly forgettable Kachche Dhaage (starring Ajay Devgan and Saif Ali Khan in 1999), and Chori Chori, which I could barely sit through (despite severe cuteness from Rani Mukherjee) he's certainly progressed into one of the most solid film makers in India today.

OUATIM tells the story of Sultan Mirza (Ajay Devgan), an orphan who rises through the ranks of Mumbai's underworld into the benevolent don of the city around the 1970's. He helps out the common man when the state cannot do enough, and through these actions, his reputation is good among just about everybody but the police. As he rules Mumbai, another child grows up: Shoaib (Emraan Hashmi) is trouble from the beginning, and does not improve as he matures.

There's nothing mind-blowing about this tale of two gangsters and their power struggle, but so much can be said for the film getting everything right. Both Ajay and Emraan are fantastic in the leads, and their co-stars are also wonderful to watch. Prachi Desai as Mumtaz, Shoiab's girlfriend, is tragic in her attempts to ground the man who only seems to go from bad to worse, hinging on sociopath-like in his quest for more power. Kangna Raut plays Rehana, an actress who catches the eye of Sultan, with confident ease. It's certainly not the most challenging role for Kangna, who I know can do more, but it's fun to watch her in this, and her chemistry with Ajay just won me over. 

The sole questionable aspect of the film is perhaps the portrayal of Sultan as a doer of good and a man who provides the city with a certain balance. The streets are safer, people's problems get sorted through him, the film implies, but he's still a smuggler and a gangster. This is not the only film where criminals seem the most moral of characters, despite their actions, and in that it largely reminded me of Nayagan, the Mani Ratnam classic that also tells the tale of an underworld don in Mumbai. The contrast between Sultan and Shoiab certainly makes you root more for the former.

Then there's the police man after Sultan - ACP Agnel Wilson, played by Randeep Hooda, whose name I was familiar with but had actually never seen on-screen prior to this movie. It's safe to say I was a goner pretty much instantly. He gives the role a certain intensity that just got me so hooked I paused the film and began looking up his filmography and mentally ticking off films I wanted to see him in. Of course, the tallness and the good looks didn't hurt, either, but I know my own tastes, and actors are rarely attractive to me unless I believe they've got some kind of talent, too. (I'll save the gushing to a post about him once I've seen more of him, for now I'll just say I'm very intrigued.)

The soundtrack is not particularly memorable (though there is a song that samples Piya Tu Ab To Aaja, one of my favourite oldies tracks ever) but fun enough. Much like TDP, Once Upon a Time In Mumbaai simply excels as a film - there isn't much I'd change or alter, and while it may not have made my top favourites like TDP did, it's certainly a film I'd recommend all around. And for once, I can see how the ending, while not open, lends itself to a sequel, which is coming out later this year, I believe. I heartily anticipate it.

Remake-mania or manic remakes? Rowdy Rathore and Siruthai.

Both based on the Telugu hit Vikramarkudu, I watched Rowdy Rathore and Siruthai in conjunction with one another, and not by accident. It just so happened that I didn't have the luxury of working subtitles for the Tamil version (Siruthai). After watching Rowdy, I figured I could follow the gist of the story and compare the performances, and began watching. Even without having seen the Telugu original, it was interesting to see both of the remakes that followed it. 

I'm not one to discourage Indian film industries from remaking each other's films, as its a tried-and-tested formula, and gives interesting, new stories different audiences, and bigger audiences. I do wonder though, are some of these remakes perhaps even too fateful to the originals? It seemed as if these movies shared absolutely everything - the highlights as well as the low points. 

The plot kicks off with our hero, Shiva in the Hindi version (played by Akshay Kumar), a thief, stealing things and falling in love with our heroine Paro (Sonakshi Sinha). Eventually a young girl emerges, who insists that Shiva is her father, and from there the story snowballs into an action masala one, filled with horrifying villains, dance numbers, gory violence and duplicates. 

The comedic sidekick in the Hindi version isn't very funny and thus the beginning feels like it's lagging desperately. The romantic comedy portion of Shiva and Paro falling in love isn't quite as amusing as I would've liked, either, and so I was just waiting for the film to get going. Eventually it does, in quite a spectacular manner, and the backstory gives good pay-off as well, but I just never felt like I was too in love with the film. And trust me, I really wanted to be. I mean, Akshay doing an action role with Prabhudeva in the director's seat? Yes, please, more.

Yet something just didn't click with me. It's certainly a passable entertainer, down to great fight choreography (though be warned for gory violence) and fantastic song numbers, in which the music, for whatever reason, reminded me of 90's Bollywood. And in my books, that's only a good thing. There were also a number of delicious cameos in the songs, which I enjoyed a ton. Still, I can't help but feel a bit disappointed. Maybe there's some room for improvement in Sonakshi's acting? I like her, but Akshay definitely outperformed her here, and while the heroine role in the story is a pretty thankless one, she just didn't impress me, so I never felt their chemistry as much as I'd have liked.

Rowdy Rathore is a film I'd recommend for a viewing (if you're into Southie remake action masalas), but wouldn't list among my favourites of last year. It's a shame, because I really wanted to like it more. 

Siruthai had a lot of things going for it (the Paiyaa coupling Karthi-Tamanna as the leads, and everybody's favourite new Tamil comedian, Santhanam as the comedic sidekick) but in the end my thoughts on this film are largely similar to that about Rowdy Rathore. The plot points are replicated so loyally that in Siruthai, the beginning moves slowly as well, and it feels as if the film only really gets going about an hour in.

Of course, the sad thing about not having subtitles for this film was that it made me miss out on the comedy of Santhanam, who I've really grown to like as of late. While some comedians are pretty physical, or very expressive in their faces, making the comedy translate even when there's no subtitled translation or if the subtitles are very unclear. Santhanam's comedy tends to lean towards the more verbal side, however, and having no familiarity with the Tamil language, I was forced to miss out. It's a shame, because in every role I've seen him in thus far, I've really enjoyed him in.

Now, this was my first taste of Karthi in full on masala mode. Paiyaa was masala, too, but his character in it was a rather stern, serious type, whereas Siruthai features some broad comedy besides the action and the romance. I'm not yet sold on the guy - he seems to have the bright-eyed charm of his brother Surya, but he's not quite there yet for me in terms of really selling it. He was merely okay in here, and while I won't mind watching him in the future, I doubt I'll be rushing to get more of his films.

Tamanna was once again a charming presence in a rather flimsy role. She continues to be one of my favourite actresses making a career in the Southern industries (ironic, since much like my former Southie favourite, Jothika, Tamanna is also a Northern girl - she hails from Mumbai). As sadly often in Southie films, it feels like she was there for a bit of romcom and then for the songs, which is a shame, since it's clear she's capable of more substantial roles as well. Regardless, the songs are fun, if fairly forgettable.

In some ways, the near-carbon copy-like remakes the different industries churn out are a commendable effort. Why change a winning formula? I certainly didn't want the Tamil remake of 3 Idiots to alter the plot, because the plot and writing was so good as it was. Of course, you run the risk of replicating the problems, too, as I feel like happened with these two remakes - I've read reviews where people complained the original had a slow beginning as well. But maybe rather that than trying to fix issues and failing to do so, just do the best job you can, replicating the original - it seems that's what both the Hindi and Tamil remakes did here.

Kaminey picspam.

I love the way this movie looks and feels. The oppressive but calming blue tones with occasional flashes of red and gold just seem to add to the gripping atmosphere.



Things only go from bad to worse, and the descent is beautiful to watch, and re-watch, for that matter.

Somehow, Omkara with its tragic ending still feels more rewatchable to me, but Kaminey is just so good, and so well-executed, and with such beautiful music and performances that I couldn't help but love it.

Shor In the City: oh, it's good. So good.

Sometimes you absolutely should take a gamble on your life's path. When Raj Nidimoru and Krishna D.K., two Andra Pradesh-born computer engineers who'd both moved to work in the US, decided to have a second career as film makers, it might've seemed like an odd move, but it certainly wielded great results. I've only seen their first Hindi feature, the terrific 99 (review here) and their latest, the appreciated indie hit of last year, Shor in the City, but based on these two ventures, it's clear to me that these two directors know what they're doing, and have a bright future ahead of them.

Shor tells a story of three protagonists. Tilak (Tusshar Kapoor) has recently married in an arranged match, and pursues a career in book piracy while awkwardly getting to know his new wife. Abhay (Sendhil Ramamurthy) has recently immigrated back to India to start a business, and is soon hassled by schemers, attempting to extort money from him. Sawan (Sundeep Kishan) needs money to bribe his way into a career in cricket. 

The wonderful thing about the way the narrative works in Shor, is that I wasn't constantly dying to know how the fates of these three would intertwine. Instead, I was fully content in following their three largely separate stories, because they're just that interesting. Besides providing us with fascinating portrayals of characters, I can honestly say their journeys also surprised me; if I thought I knew where the film was going, it usually didn't end up taking that route. 

As the name might suggest, Shor is a portrait of a city. It characterises Mumbai as a fairly unforgiving city, where the chaos is ever-present, but one where change (for better or for worse) is also possible. 

Tusshar's performance as Tilak was definitely the highlight of the film for me. His character's tale that leads him away from his idiotic, trouble-seeking friends and onto a path completely his own, was just really fantastic to watch. Radhika Apte gives a subtle performance as his wife Sapna, and seeing them grow comfortable around each other, after initial awkwardness, is really wonderful. The two form the heart of the film.

Sendhil Ramamurthy as Abhay was a solid performance, and he has natural, easy-going chemistry with Preeti Desai (who's not acted a whole lot besides this film - I know her better as Abhay Deol's girlfriend). He's an outsider in a country he can call his own, and it shows, and there's something really heart-breaking about the way the city forces him to bend and eventually - snap.

Sawan's story is the least interesting, if I can be honest. It's a tale of youth, and of despair (besides his cricket troubles, he has pressure from his girlfriend whose parents want her to marry as soon as possible), but it never reaches the grip that the other two stories had on me. 

The film also has a soundtrack, as good as I found that of 99, but I confess not really paying all that much attention to it. I'll probably pick up on it more on future rewatches - on this initial watch, I was too involved in the stories to really notice the music whenever it surfaced.

I find this to be one of those films where words really fail to capture what I enjoyed best. Just watch it, and discover its world on your own. It's a short (under 2 hours) journey that becomes more and more gripping as it goes along, it's seasoned with good performances and it's just a confident film by two of the most promising directors Hindi cinema has these days. It really is no wonder this was the off-beat favourite of last year.

Diving into the aggravatingly shallow world of Karan Johar: Student of the Year.

I knew full well going into Student of the Year that this would not become a new favourite. For the longest time, I was prepared to simply ignore the film. I know my tastes my now, and having watched a fair bit of Karan Johar's oeuvre, I know his films aren't my thing. But curiosity won over - the fact he was making a film with nothing but newcomers meant that this had potential to be something fresh, and if nothing else, at least I'd be introduced to a bunch of new faces.

I wasn't surprised that I didn't love the film, but I was surprised at the laser-like accuracy with which my brain could pin-point the things I disliked, and why I disliked them. Some may accuse me of going in with a chip on my shoulder, because I was not a Karan Johar fan to  begin with, and they'd probably be right on that. Still, there were things that I liked, and I'm prepared to give credit where credit's due, even if this review will be lopsided towards the negative. (Because of this, the post will be quite detailed so be warned for SPOILERS.)

The plot is precisely what you can deduce from the posters. St Teresa, an elite school, holds its annual Student of the Year competition, which ends up creating tensions between some of the school's top students. Rohan (Varun Dhawan, David's son) is the resident rich, cool kid, who at first butts heads with newest student, the ambitious Abhimanyu (Sidharth Malhotra) but soon develops a friendship with him. Rohan mistreats his girlfriend Shanaya (Alia Bhatt, Mahesh's daughter) and eventually a love triangle forms between Rohan, Shanaya and Abhimanyu, and the competition is only heating up...

The very first problem I had with the film was the highly objectionable portrayal of our heroine in the film as a largely hyper-superficial, consumerist fashionista or the other female principals as people who scheme, trying to win men and/or influence. This I precisely the sort of thing I ranted about last month, and it still gets my goat in a big way. Shanaya is introduced with a song highlighting her richness and fashion-obsessiveness. Her best friend Shruti (Mansi Rachh), it is implied, only hangs out with her because of the connections and her other relationships to women are an unhealthy one to her mother, and a rivalry with Tanya (Sana Saeed, ie Little Anjali from KKHH, all grown up) over Rohan's affections. I could forgive all of this if the character wasn't so supremely under-written. There is a scene where Abhi lovingly describes her personality, but at no point does the movie actually show us where he draws these conclusions from. At best you could describe Shanaya's character as a bit dim, and this is at times played up for laughs. But she's pretty, so of course the boys are in love with her! As for Shruti, she has short hair and doesn't seem to be obsessed with fashion, so naturally she's almost like a boy and Tanya's an exaggerated vamp stereotype. Yawn.

Of course, if Shanaya is unlikable, then so are the boys jostling for her attention. Rohan is introduced with an obnoxious pseudo-rockstar image (shirtless, playing noisy guitar) and quickly we learn his rich bratty ways are sourced from his father being a horrible person. He wants to become a musician, but I never learnt why this is his true passion. He starts out an asshole, and is still an asshole by the end. This is where credit to Varun Dhawan has to be given. There is nothing in the writing of the character to make me sympathetic to him (sure, his father is an ass, but does he have to follow?) but somehow I still ended up liking him better of the two. 

Abhimanyu gets the whole school swooning over his amazing charms from the get-go, but there is still little to care about him for. His backstory gets stuffed with a lot of filmi junk, which I suppose is meant to give him an underdog feel: he's not from the best family, he's an orphan, he has nobody but his grandmother.. Still, he's a pompous guy, not as clueless as Rohan, but not all that much better. The love story between him and Shanaya is based on very little but a few conversations, a couple of meaningful looks and, I suppose, the fact that they are both attractive.

That's the thing about Karan Johar's cinematic universes. This one is so painfully shallow it's almost funny. We get a lot of gratuitous slow motion shots of well-trained abs and bulging chest muscles, slightly less of loving shots of flowing hair and twirling dresses and this is all great and wonderful as aesthetics go, but you know what I'd like more of? Acting, charm, story, characterization.. I know a certain fascination with the glamorous lives of the ultra-rich is a modern Hindi film staple (from the 1990's onwards), and this kind of superficial love of fashion and objectification of bodies goes hand in hand with this trend, so it's to be expected, but its novelty value has worn off pretty quickly. 

There's nothing wrong with these things individually, but when they stack up, it doesn't make for great cinema. I can enjoy the gratuitous body display in entertainers, but when combined with flat characterizations, not the strongest acting abilities and other annoyances, the end result becomes unappetizing. 

Then there are the gay jokes. To hammer through the idea that Abhi and Rohan share the most epic dosti imaginable, we are treated to every possible flirtation with homoeroticism you could possibly conjure up. There's the running joke of Abhi asking Rohan, "You're not going to kiss me, are you?" whenever their unmanly friendship feelings emerge, and Rohan typically counters it with, "I'm not going to even hug you!", right before he goes in for that all-important meaningful hug. Then there are the many meaningful looks, the casual sleepover Abhi has at Rohan's house and of course, the limp chemistry they have with Shanaya, compared to what they have with one another.

You might think it's pretty rich of the girl who loves Main Khiladi Tu Anari, the absolute epitome of homoerotic implications in Hindi cinema, to harp on SOTY for essentially the same phenomenon. And yet I will, because what separates the two is the wink-and-nudge acknowledgment at every step of the way in SOTY at what they're doing. In MKTA, they did not set out to make an unintentionally hilarious homoerotic buddypyaari film - they set out to make a genuine 90's masala with some male friendship at the center of it, and whatever else might have intended, laughing at homosexuality was not the goal. There's also very little of that most aggravating of modern phenomenons, the "gay scare" humour. It's the sort of jokes where one of not laughing at gay people specifically, but at the potential of something happening between two members of the same gender, after which they quickly claim their heterosexuality. Far from normalizing homosexuality (which some may think it does), it actually does the opposite, since everything hinges on the denial of homosexuality. "I love my friend, no homo, because for it to be even a little bit homo would be weird and gross, ew."

The entirety of Dostana (another film let down by bad writing and lazy characterization) was built on this type of joke, so it's not like there's anything radically new about it. While it can be amusing and even cute at times, I wish dearly it wasn't in abundance here, because tucked away deep inside this sort of lazy comedy is what could've been the emotional heart of the SOTY - an actual, genuine, honest-to-god love story between two men. The two male leads have clear chemistry with one another. Not a whole lot of the plot would need to change; the flimsy characterization given to Shanaya almost seems to confirm the existence of the romance as subtext. The love triangle is never truly about her, and at one point the film gives her a rare moment of individual agency by having her get upset that the boys are squabbling over her. "You just want to own me!" she yells at them, because it's true: she's little more than a pretty accessory to both of them.

Closely related is the character of the school's Dean, responsible for the inane Student of the Year competition, played by Rishi Kapoor (who is good in the role despite writing). He is gay, but not exactly a positive example of representation - essentially he combines the stereotypes of the lonely, tragic homosexual character as well as the flamboyant comedy gay character who flirts with demonstrably straight men. Is it good that he exists at all? I'm not sure. Towards the end, it's almost as if he's the film's unofficial villain, and at no point is society's homophobia implied as the reason for his lonely fate. It's merely given that he can never be with somebody, because he's gay, and only straight people are afforded the luxury of loving partnerships. Homosexuality can be flirted with, because boys will be boys and boys will have close friendships (unlike girls, of course!) that teeter on the edge of romantic, but if you actually are gay, your life will be self-denial and tragedy.

All in all, it just makes you sad.

Possibly the sole shining point of the film are its ensemble cast of secondaries. Besides Shruti and Tanya, there's the lovable fool Jeet (Sahil Anand), who is also a hanger-on friend/lackey of Rohan's and the nerdy, heavy-set Kaizaad Sodabottleopenerwala or "Sudo" (Kayoze Irani, son of Boman). Manjot Singh, who played young Lucky in Oye Lucky Lucky Oye, plays Dimpy, an assistant of the coach and is very likable in the role. As expected, Jeet is subject to a lot of "haha, he's so dumb!" type jokes, and a lot of eye-rolling from his so-called friends, and Sudo is the butt of many a fat joke, but somehow these characters rise above the slots given to them and become a bit more real and relatable than the flawless, cool but flat main characters. Sudo particularly gets one true high point of the film, which really makes me want to see more of Kayoze Irani as an actor.

I also have to give credit to Johar for the narrative choices and the pleasing look of the film. The story is framed by the secondary characters telling the story of their past, in the present, which allows for a slow reveal of events. It gives the secondaries more room to impress, which I liked a lot. The only problem with this was that it made me hope for a better story than what eventually turned out to be the main plot of the film.

Then there are the few fantastic song numbers the film contains, mainly the wedding song Radha and the disco number The Disco Song, the latter of which has some nice cameos, and overall a good tune. The other songs on the soundtrack I'm not huge on, but these two are just fantastically filmed and have nice choreography so I could easily see myself rewatching them.

Student of the Year certainly did what I thought it would, introducing me to new faces who might be the big stars of tomorrow's Hindi films. I hope this write-up doesn't read as merely scathingly snarky, as that was not my intention - I think at a different point in my life I would've enjoyed a film like this, but as I am right now, I find myself distant from the characters and finding very little to enjoy in their stories. It doesn't help that the film seems to almost revel in its shallowness. Still, it's far from being without entertainment value, and even contains a couple of pretty solid performances. So if you're curious despite everything I detailed in this post, I'd give it a rental.

(For a more positive take, should you want one, there is Filmi Girl's review.)

Gandha: scent of hope, and of tragedy.

It stands to reason that if you wre going to turn any of the three stories in Gandha (Marathi for 'smell', directed by Sachin Kundalkar) into a massive motion picture, it would have to be the first one, titled "Bride-to-be". It's the sole feel-good story of the bunch, and has comedic elements to it - but at the heart of it there is one woman's independent quest for love, which she finds through the strangest means: mainly, her sense of smell.

Sound familiar? Of course, the director re-made this first story into the colourful and over-the-top Aiyyaa, which I loved and have discussed previously. The bride-to-be Veena in the original version is played by the young actress Amrut Subhash, who fits this subtle version of the story well. Her colleague is played by Anita Date, who essays the same role in Aiyyaa. Veena, just like Meenakshi, is being married off enthusiastically by her parents, and she's reluctant to agree to any matches, but plays the part of a bride-to-be to please her family.

Although the films share tone and the basic story structure, there are differences, too. The object of her obsession is not South Indian, but Marathi just like her, and the colorism gets explored not by her desire for a dark man, but by Veena's mother's complaining to her shrine that her dark daughter will never be married. (Quizzically, this gets overshadowed by odd skin lightening creme product placement..)

You can easily see why the director was so eager to expand this story and explore this character and her story some more. Of course, the result was a completely different movie, and it's a matter of taste whether one prefers the short, subtle and sweet tale of Veena to the story of Meenakshi - louder, more song-filled but still with those undeniably gorgeous quieter moments tucked in the longer running time. I personally happen to adore both versions. 

After the subtle saccharine, the next story "A man on medicines" can be quite hard to watch at times. It's a terrifically acted small piece of human drama, about Sarang (Milind Soman), a man downing pills on the regular, whose ex-wife Raavi (the fantastic Sonali Kulkarni, who most Hindi film fans probably remember best from Dil Chahta Hai) comes to visit her. What follows are basically just discussions of his sickness, their relationship and her obsession with the odd smell she finds in the apartment. 

In this segment Kundalkar decides to pay heavy-handed tribute to Wong Kar Wai and Pedro Almodovar by  having Sarang watch their films in some scenes. The tributes are probably heartfelt but don't necessarily add much to this piece of the film, as it excels more as simple human drama; big emotions in a small milieu.

There's a lot of beauty in Sarang's luxurious-looking apartment, but at times it's hard to find much relevance in the lingering shots of these surroundings. It's almost like this part of the film was meant to be a stage play, so we as audience would be forced to focus on the crux of the whole thing: the two characters, interacting. I don't want to tell you too much about the story, as it's best to watch it unfold as it slowly does.

Sonali Kulkarni, where art thou? It appears her filmography hasn't been empty since 2001, she's just managed to avoid my radar because of the kinds of films I've been selecting to watch. Being Marathi herself, she's done a bit of Marathi cinema alongside some Hindi indie fare, but aside from the Hindi Singham, not much that seems to have pushed through the mainstream. It's a shame, really, because she's a good actress - in here, as well as pretty much everything I've seen her in.

The final story ("Woman who sits aside") in the film portrays Janaki (Neena Kulkarni), a childress married woman having her period while her sister-in-law gives birth in the house. Because of cultural sanitary restrictions, she's not supposed to touch or even be close to other family members, or do the usual house chores, and her isolation is pretty painful to witness. It's also raining heavily, so she's stuck inside, alone, at least until her nephew begins communicating with her.

Potentially the most dull story within the film is brought to life by Neena Kulkarni's engaging performance. None of the stories are necessarily tied together by the end of the film. I think it does the film well to leave its theme so open for audience to draw their own conclusions. Our sense of smell is tied to strong memories, and yet it's one we rarely consider at all, other than when trying to eliminate it in its unwanted forms.

The second and third stories would make good full-length films, I believe, with a little more backstory added to each of their characters and with the tone kept as close to the original as possible. I'd especially like to see a longer, expanded version of the second story, but I'm not sure what the director's future plans involve. Certainly remaking "Bride-to-be" into Aiyyaa was an inspired move, and based on these two films, I hope Sachin Kundalkar does continue making films - it seems he's got a lot to offer.

(I watched the film legally on the Youtube Channel RajshriMarathi, and the video included good English subtitles so check out if you can, too.)