Deepa Gahlot

in Rediff

The film works when it seeks to portray the tragedy of war too. The tanks, grenades, guns and bayonets are out in full force, but the little scenes work, like a man using up rationed cooking oil, to keep a lamp lit outside a temple because it was a promise. This is overdone later, however, when his blood drips into the lamp as he dies.

in Scroll

For Kapoor, who usually makes independent and unpredictable films, Everybody Loves Sohrab Handa must feel like a palate cleanser between heavy courses.

in Rediff

Deepa Gahlot of Rediff.com rated it 1.5/5 stars and writes that "Every lead character is nuts in Psycho Saiyaan."

in Rediff

Happy Patel is not supposed to make sense, and doesn't even pretend to. But most of the time, it is trying too hard -- which ruins any comedy -- and the jokes fall flat. Still, the silliness is layered with such good cheer that it does get some laughs.

in Rediff

The long road trip with the grim Sara and griping Heer is, of course, heading for both getting the answers they need, but the journey lacks a sense of adventure that would have made it worthwhile for the audience. Heer Sara needed a lot more fizz, humour, and maybe even some stranger danger. What are the chances of two young women riding from Indore to Puducherry, without a single memorable experience -- good or bad? The latter seems more likely. Maybe it was a budget issue, or time constraints, or just a shortage of imagination that the plot remains flat -- pleasant enough to be watchable, but not funny or dramatic enough.

in Rediff

Max, Min And Meowzaki is not something Bollywood audiences are used to in their cinema that thrives on melodrama and noise.

in Rediff

The political drama directed by Prakash Jha, takes the idea of revenge as a dish best served cold to the next level. In Sankalp, a man who wants to punish those who wronged him goes about it in a far-fetched and convoluted way, fanning his grudge over 30 years.

in Rediff

There is not much that’s fresh about Subedaar, and the sandy, brown landscape is reminiscent of another Kapoor starrer, Thar. By standards of evil that villains are gauged, Prince is just a nasty punk who is not a strong enough antagonist for a man like Arjun, which is why their confrontations do not have that Richter scale of menace that could power a plot so predictable. (Think Rehman Dacait!) Of course, the villain will be defeated in a film -- that is never a spoiler -- but the process should be thrilling. It’s a walkover for Anil Kapoor. Aditya Rawal tries hard, but remains one-note. Radhikka Madan has a couple of good scenes, when she stands up to her harassers, but the father-daughter equation is never emotionally fraught because the misunderstanding could have been sorted with a normal conversation. Subedaar is not a boring film.

in Scroll

If it also serves the purpose of giving forgotten heroes of history their due, bring on the shiny Bollywood filter.

in Scroll

The two are well matched, and Devmanus is richer for their maturity.

in Rediff

The messages about dowry eradication or bias against dark complexioned girls are gently eased in. Actors like Gajraj Rao, Yashpal Sharma, Renuka Shahane, Bhuvan Arora and Sparsh Srivastava make Dupahiya watchable, but the lesser known actors fit right in too.

in Rediff

Even though this season of Gram Chikitsalay is way short of expectations from a TVF production, Amol Parashar's earnestness makes one care enough for him to see where his journey takes him.

in Rediff

Hardly anything stands out in Heer Express. The comedy is unfunny, the emotional bits are dubious (why would a man take on a murder charge for a stranger?) and the music forgettable. In many lazily-written films, characters overhear long-held secrets blurted out in detail with doors open but how could anyone think up a scene in which an intimate expository letter is read out from the commentators' box at a public sporting event? Prit Kamani channels Shah Rukh Khan, mimics Dev Anand in a scene and ceases to have any life of his own after meeting Heer. Divita Juneja is passable in her first film. Umesh Shukla has directed much better films, and really successful plays. Emotional dramas are his forte, how did he direct this dud?

in Rediff

Ghaywan gives the young men some moments of joy, laughter and even love -- Chandan and Sudha have a tentative romance -- but does not otherwise sugarcoat their despair. Their struggles are not romanticised, and when a dream does get fulfilled, it is too late, as if to say that the poor do not even have the right to better their existence. There is a marked lack of self pity or melodrama, but the simmering anger at the daily injustice they put up with is not suppressed or sanitised. The performances by Khatter and Jethwa are wonderfully empathetic. The fury, pain and hopelessness are expressed with a raw sincerity. Homebound is shot without any fake embellishment. Pratik Shah's camera is unflinching in showing the ugliness of the spaces the underprivileged are forced to inhabit. The film is deeply moving and the director's view of social reality is profoundly compassionate.

in Rediff

It's not that Abhishek Bachchan does not do a good job, considering the limitations of the altered script. He works to bring a kind of baffled innocence to his face, and the slightly tragic air of a man, so weighed down by responsibilities that he never learnt how to really live. The joy on his face when a plate of Biryani is placed before him or when he meets a character from his past, indicates the actor's sincere investment in the role. Daivik Baghela plays Ballu with a winning zest, and mercifully keeps the precociousness in check. (With no cinema or television in sight, how does he know Amitabh Bachchan's dialogues and gestures from old films?) Kaalidhar Laapata is worth a watch, more so because clean family-viewing films are getting scarcer by the week.

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