Nonika Singh

Cyber warfare is the new geopolitical reality and thus an essential exploration area for the celluloid world. Creator-writer-director Neeraj Pandey recreates the world of AI-driven digital espionage. As the master storyteller and his lead protagonist, Himmat Singh (Kay Kay Menon), are back, compelling storytelling is in the offing once again. This time, Himmat, the RAW (Research and Analysis Wing) officer, is entrusted with the responsibility of averting an imminent digital attack. Day in and out, we get to read news of digital scams. Imagine if it gets amplified at the national level, leaving not just individuals but the entire nation’s economy crippled. Chilling… but the way Pandey and his co-writers Benazir Ali Fida and Deepak Kingrani build the espionage game, it is more entertaining and engaging than alarming.

The year is 1990, the place is Allahabad in Uttar Pradesh, and violence is the running theme of ‘Maalik’. Though Bengali superstar Prosenjit Chatterjee’s swag as a police officer is on ample display, the film belongs to Rajkummar Rao. As and in ‘Maalik’, he is menace personified, a gangster who kills without flinching, who rules through dread and fear. Rajkummar has donned a new avatar, far removed from his usual romcom films. The incredible actor that he is, he lives the character, channels the anger within, seethes, fumes and kills like never before. But when the hero is also the anti-hero, the makers could not resist the temptation to give him a romantic backstory, in this case his wife Shalini (Manushi Chillar).

Cute girl, nerdy boy — could be a romcom. A Sanskrit teacher meets one who teaches French. He is a virgin at 42, she is 32 and not squeamish about her sex life. Certainly not a cute meet, but unusual enough to pique our interest. On paper, the plot makes for some fireworks. After all, what can be more fascinating than Jean-Paul Sartre and Kalidas coming together! As the love story of Shrirenu Tripathi (R Madhavan) and Madhu Bose (Fatima Sana Sheikh) unfolds, the uncommon premise holds out, but not with magic in entirety. The heart of the film is in the right place. It opens with a tribute to KJo’s iconic ‘dosti pyaar hai’, a nudge to the fact that the film is produced by Dharma Productions’ digital arm Dharmatics Entertainment. Like many of its films in the recent past, it wears its progressive values on its sleeve. Patriarchy is on play in the Tripathi household where elder brother Bhanu (Manish Chaudhary) is every inch a male chauvinist, demanding complete subservience from his culinary-adept wife Kusum (Ayesha Raza) and daughter, whom he constantly beseeches to learn household chores. One scene with reference to ‘silbatte wali chatni’ is a direct nod to the much-acclaimed ‘Mrs’.

When the opening song itself gives you sharp snapshots of its lead characters, a whole battery of them, you wonder where the story can go from there. More importantly, as ‘Metro… in Dino’, a sequel of ‘Life in a Metro’, marks its date with the silver screen nearly 18 years after the beautiful prequel won our hearts, you also marvel at what more can the writer-director Anurag Basu offer. Though the film’s title literally means “metro these days”, have love and relationships really transformed in these two decades that we deserve yet another dose of it? Yes, we are made to believe, when we meet Sara Ali Khan’s Chumki, who sings “meri dasha hai confusion”. She alone is not emblematic of the new-world values of modern-day romance. Aditya Roy Kapur’s commitment-phobic Parth hops from one relationship to another.

When ‘Panchayat’ first dropped on Prime Video in 2020, it marked a refreshing departure from the crime-based dramas, triggering a new trend, and has since spawned a few clones too. Unlike violence and gaali-infested web shows which rule the OTT space, the offering from TVF (The Viral Fever), the original web content creator of shows like ‘Permanent Roommates’, won hearts and appreciation. With its perfect rural setting, an unusual premise and stellar performances, it figured high on the critics’ meter. Five years later and into its fourth season, it retains the series’ major strengths. Ever since Abhishek Tripathi (Jitendra Kumar), an engineering graduate, landed in the fictional village of Phulera in Uttar Pradesh as Sachivji (the panchayat secretary), all eyes have been on this roller-coaster ride of emotions, drama and laughter. An authentic slice of hinterland, it has brought forth the joys of simple things and the beauty of rural life, laced with subtle political commentary.

t’s a classic whodunit, says our desi Pink Panther, Detective Sherdil (Diljit Dosanjh). Of course, somewhere in the middle, he turns the phrase to “howdunnit”. Peppered with many red herrings, some dead giveaways too are thrown in. Set almost in comic book fashion, coming from the stable of Ali Abbas Zafar’s production house, ‘Detective Sherdil’ cuts no corners as far as the production design is concerned. Cinematographer Marcin Laskawiec trains his camera not only on the beauteous locales in Budapest, Hungary, but also matches the effervescent atmospherics of the film. Otherwise, the Hindi-English feature has all the regular trappings that come with an Indian murder mystery.

We all deserve a second chance. Does life offer it easily enough though? In the lands where nature blooms, time stands still, simplicity reigns and humanity is not a casualty, nothing is impossible. Thus, when a young girl, Nia (Dheera Johnson), returns to her hill home in the Himalayas, coping with personal trauma, heartbreak and more, her journey also transforms into one of self-awareness and self-realisation. ‘Second Chance’ is as much about personal healing as offering comfort to those who have been instrumental in making Nia feel whole again. Far away from the hustle and bustle of city life, as she spends idyllic time in a small village in the mountains, the baggage that urbanisation and modern lifestyle choices often impose is shed. First through her interactions with a young boy, Sunny (Kanav Thakur), son of the caretaker of her home, and more strongly with his grandmother (Thakuri Devi). Slowly, Nia not only finds closure but also ways to refresh, rejuvenate and connect with those far removed from her urban reality.

Ever wondered what is kankhajura and why should a series be named after it? Well, it’s an insect called centipede (with many legs), which finds its place insidiously and can worm up its way right into your brain. Our lead character, Aashu (Roshan Mathew), possesses the same ability. Seemingly innocuous, even a victim, he can curl up right into the mindscape of all he chooses to, much to their detriment of course. It’s a rather interesting premise where one moment he is an informant and at another point a convict. But let you be told that the series is an adaptation of an Israeli series ‘Magpie’, a highly intelligent bird with complex cognitive abilities, including planning. It invariably picks up on bright and shiny things. And let us confess, we have not seen the award-winning original. In case you have, maybe the surprise twists here will not be as exciting. But for those not clued in to the original, the story adapted by director Chandan Arora and co-writer Upendra Sidhaye has enough sting and venom to keep you invested all the way from start to finish.