Uncategorized ‘તારે બોલવાનું નહિ’ (You Must Not Speak) by Parul Khakkar (Original Gujarati with Hindi and English translation) 17 Jun 202120 Jun 2021 By Parul Khakkar - ભલે હો પીડ પારાવાર, તારે બોલવાનું નહિ કરે હ્ય્યુ ભલે ચિત્કાર, તારે બોલવાનું નહિ તને આદેશ છે કે જીભ કાપીને મૂકી દેજે થશે તરોયે જાય જયકાર,…
Uncategorized The Shape-Shifting Cinematic Charms of Sriram’s ‘Andhadhun’ 8 Nov 2019 In Sriram Raghavan’s immoral universe, there are clearly defined good people and even more clearly defined bad people. Bad things happen to good people and good things happen to bad…
Documentary… Anand Patwardhan’s ‘Reason (Vivek)’ – The Discovery of New India 8 Nov 2019 It is brutal watch. Yeah, that’s the actual statutory warning, but we are all old enough for it, right? The reason I am writing about Reason is because there is…
B'wood… Andhadhun – Liver says thank you sir! 8 Nov 20198 Nov 2019 (WARNING: Watch the movie first. May spoil it for you if you don’t.) It feels a little strange to call a film titled ‘Andhadhun’ pointedly self-aware. But then if a…
B'wood… Let’s have more films like Veere di Wedding 15 Jun 201815 Jun 2018 Watching Veere di Wedding constantly had me ask two questions – What is so wrong with the film that we had to decry it louder than some of us decry…
B'wood… Bandini – The Liberated (Or the Bimal Roy tutorial on how to tell your story through your songs) 16 Jan 201820 Jan 2018 Bimal Roy's 'Bandini' (1963) is in its songs. The entire film, its essence, its soul and journey is in its music. The various themes of the film, the emotional journeys…
B'wood… Dear Ashatai, you saved my soul again. 12 Jan 201817 Jan 2018 And I felt this time you have to know hence decided to write to you. The last time I had my soul saved was six months back, by Pancham da.…
B'wood… R.D. Burman – Hoga tumse pyaara kaun 12 Jan 201812 Jan 2018 Before you read this, let’s set the mood! 🙂 Just go and listen to the first 10 seconds of this song. And then the next 10. And then the entire song, the verses…
Uncategorized Beyond the Burqa: The Muslim Woman You Can’t See 12 Jan 201812 Jan 2018 Everyone knows the Muslim man, he may or may not be in a skull cap and beard but he is visible, and familiar. The Muslim woman, on the other hand,…
B'wood… Between Raj KapooR’s ‘Boot Polish’ & Vittorio De Sica’s ‘Shoeshine’ 19 Aug 201717 Jun 2021 “Imitation, as opposed to copying, consists either in the interfusion of the same throughout the radically different, or the different throughout a base radically the same.” - Samuel Taylor Coleridge…
B'wood… Imtiaz Ali and the journey of love 25 Jul 201725 Jul 2017 Exactly ten years after a behemoth called ‘DDLJ’ (1995), came a small film called ‘Socha Na Tha’ (2005), deliciously subverting the film that created SRK. Just like DDLJ it had…
B'wood… Unshackling Sultana – A critique on the female gaze of Kali Salwar 2 Jun 2017 “Men act and women appear. Men look at women. Women watch themselves being looked at… The surveyor of woman in herself is male: the surveyed female. Thus she turns herself…
B'wood… The Begum Jaans of Cinema: Between Punishment and Redemption 2 Jun 2017 Prostitution is patriarchy’s favourite child. Like Jai’s coin (from Sholay) that ensures his victory by default, prostitution is a handy tool for patriarchy to survive, update and attempt to redeem…
B'wood… Dear Shah Rukh, We Don’t Have Much Time, You and I… 2 Apr 201712 Dec 2020 Shah Rukh, we don’t have much time, you and I. Five years, at best. You would have become an honorary star and my days of swooning over stars would be…
B'wood… Ae Dil Hai Mushkil – Flying solo in love or why I loved it so much 9 Jan 20179 Jan 2017 SPOILER ALERT First let me make it clear, Ae Dil Hai Mushkil (ADHM) is about love not unrequited love. But I don’t want to talk about ADHM the film, as much…
Uncategorized The Separate Cinemas of Hrishikesh Mukherjee & Basu Bhattacharya 20 Sep 201620 Sep 2016 The emergence of directors, Hrishikesh Mukherjee and Basu Bhattacharya in the 70s is from a singular source – Bimal Roy. Roy’s pathbreaking realism and a keen eye for exploring nuances…
Uncategorized Gulzar, A Poet and Thinker Always in Search Of The Right Word 20 Sep 201620 Sep 2016 Humne dekhi hain in aankhon ki mehekti khushboo Haath se chhoo ke issein rishton ka ilzaam na do Sirf ehsaas hain yeh rooh se mehsoos karo Pyaar ko pyaar hi…
Uncategorized S for Sex, S for Sunny, S for Sita 23 Jan 201612 Aug 2016 The word ‘Sita’ is probably more loaded with meaning than ‘Ram’, the word that promises to launch a thousand ships any minute now. In this piece I intend to compare…
B'wood Remembering Nirupa Roy and the Most Iconic Mothers of Bollywood 12 Jan 201612 Aug 2016 Recently we’ve had Tabu’s spectacular turn as a vengeance-seeking mother inDrishyam, and not to forget Aishwarya Rai playing an advocate mommy on a dangerous mission to save her daughter in…
B'wood Salman Khan at 50: The Brat We Love to Love 29 Dec 201512 Aug 2016 When Dabangg happened, Salman and I were an estranged couple. It was teenage love, you see, first crush and all. Maine Pyar Kiya had just released and my newly-born teen…
B'wood… The ‘Urban Cool’ Dev Anand: Our Very First Metrosexual Hero 12 Dec 201512 Aug 2016 It was the fifties. It was the time of a newly independent, newly integrated, newly awakened India; an India no longer only of farms and villages, but of industries and…
Uncategorized Film Recco : Kaul – A calling to 19 Oct 201530 Jan 2017 'Bring me a dish to satiate my mind and I am happy.’ No, no one great said that, I just made it up coz I wanted to begin with a…
Uncategorized Amitabh Bachchan at 73: More than Angry, Stay Hungry 12 Oct 201512 Aug 2016 Forty-five years in the industry, the well-deserved tag of the biggest star in Hindi cinema and an eventful career, which has been sharp in its highs and lows, is enough…
Uncategorized Why Real Life is Dry Without Bollywood Drama 18 Sep 201512 Aug 2016 ‘Nahiiiiiiii, tum aisa nahi kar sakte!’ This wasn’t Hema Malini moaning from the telly, but an eight year old me responding to my mother’s call to help her out in the…
H'wood… Will ‘The Visit’ Help M Night Shyamalan Regain His Past Glory? 12 Sep 201512 Aug 2016 M Night Shyamalan’s set to pay us a ‘visit’ in theatres. If the trailers are anything to go by, The Visit looks far more promising than his last few films…
Featured… Hamari Amrita: Poet of the Soul 31 Aug 201531 Aug 2015 Her story is a dream of the bitter-sweet passion of unrequited love, a soul-searing portrait of yearning and loss. It is also the stuff that legends are made of –…
Review Bajrangi Bhaijaan: Subverting The Micro Narrative But What About The Macro? 28 Aug 2015 I was not planning to watch Bajrangi Bhaijaan because things like, ‘Ready’, ‘Wanted’, ‘Bodyguard’ had once happened to me long back. It isn’t easy to recover from such life-changing trauma,…
Review English Vinglish vs Queen: The question of gaze 13 Aug 2015 Sridevi couldn’t have had a better comeback film than English Vinglish. It is a much better image-reinvention film than Queen, featuring the talented Kangana Ranaut. Both these films have a…
Review Movie Recco : Avinash Arun’s Killa – Taking the plunge 28 Jun 2015 Five boys in their pre-teens, hailing from a small-town in Maharashtra, each knowing the loss of a dear one, jump into a lake from a height in the total abandon…
Review Bombay Velvet Music – Let the trumpets and trombones lull me to sleep 3 May 2015 Disclaimer – This is not a music review. Just rambles. Just my experience of it. Back in 2009 when Dev D music hit the market it hit me (and many…
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