Movie Analysis : Mardaani 2

Directed by : Gopi Puthran
Imdb link -> https://www.imdb.com/title/tt5668770/

Asthma hai na tujhe, le paint khaake marr..

Spoilers ahead...

Shivani Shivaji Roy (Rani Mukerji) gets appointed as new DSP of Kota and soon gets to know about the rape and brutal murder of a young girl. She assures to the media that she would bring the killer down to her knees. And that hurts the ego of the psycho killer Sunny (Vishal Jethwa) who now will challenge her to the limits and in process hurt more girls.

What I loved about last film in this series was that you were quite involved with the antangonist Tahir Raj Bhasin to an extent that even though he was always wrong, yet the cat and mouse chase was a lot fun to watch and ofcourse he gave a brilliant performance as well which then made Rani Mukherjee's act even more to applaud and you actually let the 'heroic' act she gets to have in the climax work.

But in Mardaani2, everything is different, here we got Sunny who is pure evil to an extent that he would eat flesh (possible Hannibal fan) and breaks fourth wall to talk with us directly, an idea that gets irritating after a while. Then we see Shivani in Sherlock mode easily identifying the crime and people involved. Infact leaving asides 2-3 moments, her act is shown as a superhero cop who is just failing to catch the culprit because that would happen in last 5 mins since its a movie.

There's a big speech Shivani gives at one point to a news channel interview, telling the lifestyle of a woman and comparing it to a guy, and I have no problem with that as most of it was truth. But, how does that help the movie and the narrative, or if they could had altogether kept focus on the troubles a female faces even after been DSP, and let the guy get caught without all the drama.

Being such a serious topic, its strange how the director and writer duo mess up so much that the emotions that certain scenes should have brought just don't because it just feels like you aren't watching something real.

Vishal Jethwa is good in his performance as debut, slightly one note to my liking though. Rani Mukherjee just overplays the character this time but more of that is to blame the writing team.

Mardaani2 isn't unwatchable, its just a disappointment after having seen how well the franchise (I expect more films in future) started.


My Rating : 4.5/10 

Movie Analysis : Pati Patni Aur Woh

Directed by : Mudassar Aziz
Imdb link -> https://www.imdb.com/title/tt9680136/

Sense of humor.. 

Spoilers ahead..


Chintu Tyagi (Kartik Aaryan) is  middle class man who is not much happy with his life that lacks fun and has become boring, whether its at work or his wife Vedika Tripathi (Bhumi Pednekar) who herself is a teacher. She keeps telling Chintu that she would love to live in Delhi than Kanpur. And then enters Tapasya Singh (Ananya Panday), who has come from Delhi, on a work basis and meets Chintu. He is immediately attracted towards her and ends up lieing about Vedika having an affair to get sympathy and be able to spend more time with her.

Its a remake of the well known movie by same title in the 70s that starred Sanjeev Kumar. I haven't seen that movie, but knowing the story, there's definately one change, in that one it was the secretary at work he had affair with, and here its a client who meets regularly for finding a plot and thereby develops a bonding. In a way its more progressive, the melodrama even in a scene when Vedika finds out the truth, is very underplayed which was good to see.

But I just felt the comedy kept falling flat with most of the punchlines not really working. Kartik Aaryan is in his usual 'I have a fucked up life mode', and a monologue again thankfully shorter one this time. Its become tiring to watch him, maybe Imtiaz's movie would bring some change. Also it doesn't help when actress is Bhumi Pednekar who I somehow find not interesting enough even though she acts well. Maybe its the effect of her last few films. While Ananya Panday looks great, actingwise found her wooden throughout.

Shubham Kumar who plays 'Rakesh', a student in Vedika's class, in a somewhat of spoof from 'Main Hoon Na' was best part of the movie, albeit it was a small role. Also, Aparshakti Khurana playing best friend of 'Chintu' gets some good scenes, he is getting typecasted however in similar kind of roles everytime.

Pati Patni Aur Woh fails for me, despite it not taking a vulgar path which most other movies would having the affair story, if only the punchlines were strong and a lead cast was different.

My Rating : 4/10 

Movie Analysis : Hotel Mumbai

Directed by : Anthony Maras
Imdb link -> https://www.imdb.com/title/tt5461944/

Here at Taj.. guest is God.

Spoilers Ahead.. 


Its a movie that would be a different experience depending on if you were in Mumbai during those attacks day, or watched it unfold on TV in some other part of India, or you are a non-indian having Taj Hotel as one of the places to visit in future.  I myself been in Mumbai for almost 10 years, but in 2008 I didnt live here, ended up watching on T.V how horrendous and painful it was to see the terrorists do havoc.

Director Anthony Maras begins the movie with the boat scene on which Kasab and rest terrorists came into Mumbai, they are on a call where their boss is reminding what they have to do and basically brainwashing them which he must have done while making them join the training.  Maras builds the narrative 2 way, the arrival of the terrorists onto the Mumbai streets/cabs as you know where its heading and on other hand the head chef of Taj Hotel, Oberoi (Anupam Kher) telling the chefs and waiters how the guests are God and there shouldn't be any mistake from their sides.

You are literally waiting for the misery to start, how the happy faces at the hotel busy in their routine life will turn into 'Will I make it out alive?' There's a chilling sequence where the lady is hiding inside a closet with hands on mouth of the little kid so that he doesn't cry, and you wonder if he could die due to loss of breathe instead. Not much focus is given to the VT Station attack which is good in a way or it would had been a lot to watch. Having said that, Maras does show a nice detailed look at the attacks with good use of camera, something that Rgv's film some years back couldn't do.

We see terrorists knock on doors as room-service guys who then shoot down the guests as they open door, the lives meaning nothing to them like its a video game, you just kill the people on other side. Its very brutal and tough to watch knowing it had happened in real.

Oddly, the main leading actors don't really get enough scenes to shine through, Armie Hammer especially as the tourist american guy is totally wasted. Dev Patel also should had got few more scenes whether before or after the attacks. Nazanin Boniadi who plays wife of Armie Hammer, gives a good performance, love the scene where she tries to save herself through prayers not letting the terrorist kill her.

Hotel Mumbai mainly works because its well directed, and tries to not divert away from the main plot at anytime, it could had been lot better though if the main characters were written efficiently to make us care more about them. Definately not a easy watch and probably I won't see the movie again but its always nice to see how in such a situation there were some brave people who cared to keep others around them alive.

My Rating : 6.5/10

Movie Analysis : Frozen 2

Directed by : Chris Buck and Jennifer Lee
Imdb link -> https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4520988/

When will you see yourself as I see you ? 

Spoilers ahead.. 

A mysterious voice leads Elsa (Idina Menzel) to find the place its coming from. Anna (Kristen Bell) isn't keen to let her sister go alone which means Olaf (Josh Gad), Kristoff (Jonathan Groff) and Sven join in too. The adventure takes all of them to an enchanted forest covered with mist, as they all try to find the answers.

I personally liked the first part mainly for the bonding of the sisters, Olaf part and the music.... story wise it wasn't that special. Frozen2 very much delivers the same pattern!

Except for Kristoff musical number, everyone else was good though none as good as 'Let It Go' was.. 'Show Yourself', 'Into the unknown' and 'When I am older' were my favourite tracks.  Kristoff whole sub-plot was probably the weakest in the film. Instead I would had liked to see more of Elsa and her adventures that I felt weren't too many this time.

Totally adore Olaf character, but the best moment was when he enacts all the events of first movie. Also, when he talks about change which is basically the theme of the movie. Not much to savour in terms of emotional moments, and the story for most part is predictable including the mysterious voice everyone is after.

Even though the screenplay at some places isn't tight enough, its the great visuals that still keeps you engaged along with the Elsa-Anna scenes with the funny Olaf bringing smile on the face almost every time his character is on screen.

Frozen 2 may have its problems, and won't be my pick out of the two films.. but its still good enough to sit through for its duration of 1 hr 40 mins.

My Rating : 6/10

Movie Analysis : Pagalpanti

Directed by : Anees Bazmee
Imdb link -> https://www.imdb.com/title/tt9495690/

Tera bimaar mera dil, mera jeena hua mushkil.. 

Spoilers ahead.. 


Raj Kishore (John Abraham) is considered to bring bad luck to anyone he tries to work with.

Thats basically the main one line plot around which director Anees Bazmee and the writers tried to construct a 2 hr 30 mins long movie which not to my surprise fell flat right from the first firecracker sequence that tries to be funny but isn't, just like the rest of the movie.

If I had to count the number of times I laughed at the comedy scenes, then I would struggle naming 5 such instances. Pagalpanti just fails to deliver, lacks good punchlines and tries to use 'madness' to escape the fact that the film didn't deserve to be made once the writing team (whatever mood they were in while writing) got it done. Makes me wonder why don't such films ever get shelved and interesting ones usually do.

I totally felt like banging my head somewhere when in a scene out of no-where Patriotism comes out of every character, as if saying we are failing in the comedy department lets try this out to let the frustrated looking audience in theatre cheer up, well better luck next time!

Looking at the positives, there's Arshad Warsi who gets some laughs in few scenes specially that singham lion pose. Then, the glamor quotient was good, clearly both Kriti (plays a irritating dumb girl role) and Urvashi (another aatma role) were casted for that and not anything else. And Urvashi's 'Bimar Dil' (re-created version from Sridevi's 'Chaalbaaz') was actually quite likeable, guilty pleasure I guess I will call it.

When you got nothing to say about Anil Kapoor and Saurabh Shukla's performance, then that itself sums up a movie! Ileana is totally wasted in a nothing role and a very less screen-time, maybe she declined to be glamdoll like other 2 actresses and paid price (good one I would say) for it. I don't think John Abraham has ever worked for me in comedy roles, and this film proves it again.

Anees last movie Mubarakan despite how bad it looked from trailer was still a decent watch with some laughs, but with 'Pagalpanti' he has just made what could easily be his worst film (No Problem would be a close 2nd to it). He's got 'Bhool Bhullaiya 2' next, so he better get his mojo back or the angry akki fans are coming.

My Rating : 2/10

Movie Analysis : Bala

Directed by : Amar Kaushik
Imdb link -> https://www.imdb.com/title/tt9420648/

Badalna kyun hai, kyun badle .. 

Spoilers ahead.. 

Balmukund Bala Shukla (Ayushmann Khurrana) is balding prematurely and takes on every possible remedy on earth to solve the problem and lead a 'hero' kind life he used to had during school days that included mimicking actors, having girlfriends and roaming on streets with style.

Such a good concept and Ayushmann who's been on fire in last 2-3 years, with director who's last film Stree was very entertaining, and a brilliant trailer, all had me in high hopes which Bala couldn't fulfill at all.

Where did it go wrong? Hate to say it but for once Ayushmann performance didn't work for me, it just felt like a long chain of sameness coming out in the character, and the fact that after a while there's a sense of overdose of 'how to solve this hair loss problem' that it gets tiring and boring to watch.

If there's something to love in the film then its Pari Mishra (Yami Gautam) who in the best scene of the film tells why she loves the fact that her usp is her looks and she won't shy away from admitting that her looks gets her comments on social media and she dreams of marrying a good looking guy. That monologue you could totally buy it, and also it was fun watching her tik-tok sequences with Bala where they do plenty of 90's hit songs, mine favorite being Ram Lakhan's 'Tera naam liya, tujhe yaad kiya'. Oh I wish the movie's main character was Pari and we were told the story from her point of view.

On the other hand there was Latika (Bhumi Padnekar) a dark skinned girl who hates society's take on 'good looks only matters' and has constant fights with Bala who during childhood calls her 'kaali'. Now my problem isn't with what she thinks, because she is right but the fact that Bhumi was casted to play this role where in many scenes the overdose of paint made her dark skin hard to look it plus the irony that they couldn't cast a dark skinned lady for the role.. Already her character wasn't strong enough and this just made you want her scenes just end quickly. Also, I ain't much of a Bhumi admirer minus her debut film.

There are few fun moments involving the supporting cast of  Saurabh Shukla, Seema Bhargava, Javed Jaffery, and actors playing Bala's brother and Bala's grandfather.

'Bala' to me is the most forgettable Ayushmann movie since 'Hawaizaada' which was a long time ago so thats a positive if any I can take away from this film apart from Yami's performance. It tries hard to give the message of 'why should we change ourselves for others, and not just love ourselves for the way we are' but sadly the route taken to this message doesn't work at all.


My Rating : 4/10 

Series Analysis : Stranger Things S1-S3 (Netflix)

Directed by : 

Matt Duffer/Ross Duffer (14 episodes each, 2016-2019)

Shawn Levy (6 episodes, 2016-2019)

Andrew Stanton (2 episodes, 2017)

Uta Briesewitz (2 episodes, 2019)

Rebecca Thomas (1 episode, 2017)

Imdb link -> https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4574334/


Spoilers ahead... 

Season 1 :

Something is coming. Something hungry for blood.

Its November 6, 1983.. at a place called Hawkins where a young boy, 'Will Byers' (Noah Schnapp) suddenly disappears leading to speculations if he is alive or not, while slowly all doubts about what happened to him leads to a government Hawkins Laboratory.  Chief 'Jim Hopper' (David Harbour) starts the search, but at the same time, Will's friends, 'Mike Wheeler' (Finn Wolfhard), 'Lucas Sinclair' (Caleb Mclaughlin) and 'Dustin Henderson' (Gaten Matarazzo) go their own way to find him and end up meeting 'Eleven' (Millie Bobby Brown) who is a mysterious girl and has a past associated with the Hawkins laboratory. While Will's mother 'Joyce Byers' (Winona Ryder) believes Will is alive and is present in a supernatural way trying to communicate from a place called 'Upside Down'.

First season takes time in getting going, took me atleast 3 episodes before I was totally involved with all characters, but one of main reason was the similar plot to 'Dark' i.e a young boy gone missing and everyone slowly discovering the sci-fi behind it. I was happy though that the similarity ended there with no time travel. 

Another reason why I was wanting to see the story pickup pace was because, there was too much of one character believes in some kind of spirit, and rest are in the 'are you out of your mind?' mode. Which is why when Will's elder brother 'Jonathan Byers' (Charlie Heaton) asks Mike's elder sister 'Nancy Wheeler' (Natalia Dyer) if the bear she saw had no face, I knew this is where series going to get the move on and there's literally no stopping from this point.

What I love about season1 is how the characters are not one-note, they are developing on with every episode even if its at a slow pace. At one stage I was thinking how cool it would be if 'Steve Harrington' (Joe Keery) would go and join Jonathan-Nancy in monster killing and it actually happens, and boy what a complicated fun scene that was when Steve out of nowhere learns existence of Demogorgan (creatures from Upside Down).

Joyce is another great character, that unlike everyone else is correct from the start and is willing to go to any extent to find her son, not caring how crazy she will look to others. 

Lovely use of 'Should I stay or Should I go' song. Also, despite not been fan of D&D (I didn't knew it even existed), the dialogues like 'Something is coming, something bad' or 'The Demogorgan, it got me', right at start of season was super writing as we are told in advance what's going to happen to this character. 

Dustin is a fun character, love his interactions with 'Mr Clarke' (Randy Havens), specially when he's getting info out whether its about how to reach Upside Down or creating the sensory thing for Eleven. The 'curiosity door' or pretending to be sad scenes were fun to watch. 

Great choice made on when to show Hopper's past story related to his daughter Sarah, pretty much got me emotional with the parallel cutting of 'breathe in, breathe out' scene. Also, the use of 'Upside Down' theme at many places was very well done, my fav being when Eleven tells Mike and his friends who Will is hiding from. 

Ending on Will still infected reminded me of Insidious Part1 where Patrick also came from a place called 'The Further' along with the spirit attached to him. Despite being slow in pace, the season picks up very well, engaging enough with some interesting characters and also keeps you interested for Season2.

Season 2 : 

Do you wanna be normal ? Do you wanna be just like everyone else ? Being a freak is the best, alright ? I am a freak!

Unlike last season, here the episodes are pacy, with good use of Halloween backdrop in initial episodes. The story of new monster 'Mindflayer' which is linked to Demogorgan, is very smart writing and there were many gem of scenes based on it.

Very much like Steve in S1, it took me time to like the new characters, i.e  'Max Mayfield' (Sadie Sink) and specially her stepbrother, 'Billy Hargove' (Dacre Montgomery), who was irritating to watch. Its still an interesting character that shows off the kind of parenting he got from his dad being the reason behind his abusive behavior towards Max. Chemistry between Lucas-Max is great, and also fun watching how Dustin keeps trying to impress Max through wierd ways. 

There's one major hiccup, which is the entire 'The Lost Sister' episode. The initial introduction of 'Eight'/'Kali' (Linnea Berthelsen) with which the season begins was thrilling because you felt maybe Kali would have a important role to play, then we get nothing at all for next 5 episodes. Finally, they decide to show a whole episode on Kali at such a poor time because the ending of previous episode has most of main characters at Hawkins Lab in a death kind situation. This totally ruins that effect, plus the significance of Kali episode is only that it makes Eleven finally return back to Mike and Hopper to help them out, which she could had done without going to meet Kali. The only takeaway from the episode was the reveal of 'Dr Brenner'/'Papa' (Matthew Modine) being still alive.

Even though Hopper-Eleven plot gets little boring at places, I like the parallel it draws with how Papa treated Eleven at the Lab, and despite being not allowed to go anywhere, Hopper's intentions all the time is to keep Eleven safe. I didn't understand though how Hopper came to know Eleven was alive, or was he keeping those Eggos intentionally there to let Eleven reveal herself ?

Heartbreaking moment ofcourse was watching Bob Newby (Sean Astin) die, it just looked like happening all the time when he decides to help Joyce find Hopper. I was just hoping Eleven would just reach in time and save him but guess you gotta kill few characters as part of getting 'oh no' reactions from us. Why did he have to breathe for a moment, just go out of the door and be fully safe first, sigh! I love his car scene with Will, where he tells his childhood story of being scared of someone. How Will listens to his advice to not run away, and thinking it would help him, it rather ends 

up doing the total opposite as the shadow monster/virus gets hold of Will's body.

One of the key moment of the entire series happens this season when Steve goes to Nancy place mumbling to himself to say sorry to her and then telling himself what the hell I am sorry for, and ends up meeting Dustin which is start of their extremely lovable bonding. 

Love the scene where Joyce does the crazy yet essential thing, making rooms of her house look like a map with all the drawings she uses from Will who is trying to tell everything he can see (a condition he has got now) ever since he returned back from the 'Upside Down'. She did something similar in 1st season too, that time it was the use of bulbs to communicate with Will. Also, great use of Morse Code too, felt like checking what messages Will was saying in S1 with those bulb blinking. The music used in the scene also slightly reminded me of 'The Things' theme whose direct mention they actually had in S1 when Mr Clarke is watching the movie with his wife at home.

Another great addition to the cast, is Murray Bauman (Brett Gelman), who even in the few scenes he gets, shows off his good comic timing. Dr Sam Owens (Paul Reiser) is a tricky new character, you are just never sure for most part if he is really on the side of Joyce-Hopper, or he is another one out of Brenner's camp. 

Nice to see Nancy and Jonathan together, whether it lasts for long or Steve comes into picture again is the question. I didn't like Mike's constant disapproval to not have Max part of the group, specially when he never thought same way about Eleven who was rather more dangerous as a stranger. I do however enjoy how Mike always acts smart, knowing what trouble is approaching like the whole 'The Spy' angle, same for whole group though, which is why its fun to watch this series. 

I can't make up my mind if I liked this season more or not, there are days I will choose S1 and then there will be days when I go with S2. 

From next season, I want Will not to suffer anymore and probably Billy character to become more likeable. Maybe little about Dr Brenner too, how did he survive when we were clearly shown he was attacked by Demogorgan in S1. 

Season 3 : 

Make mistakes, learn from them, and when life hurts you, because it will, remember the hurt. The hurt is good. It means you are out of that cave. 

Expected this season to be high on struggle when it comes to beating the monster. And there's no disappointment in that regards even though I will admit this version of Mind Flayer (human/rat flesh melting) was very gross and tough to watch of all the monsters so far. The inspiration clearly was 'The Things' and  a direct reference too happens in this season in a very awkward 'Coke' advertisement scene.

Some good new additions again, with Robin Buckley (Maya Hawke) and Dr Alexei (Alec Utgoff) standing out. Robin has amazing chemistry with Steve and also would make for a great pairing with Nancy, given her very sharp mind. Alexei on the other hand provides some fun moments, and you do feel bad when he dies, even if it doesn't have same impact like say Bob had. 

It did took me a rewatch of the season to like it, the main issue still remains which is the handling of the Russian starcourt plot. The comic tone puts me off a lot because being trapped in that lift and then trying to find a way out, the situation calls for a desperation and when eventually they would manage to escape without dying it would had made for a great watch. Also, it makes the entire Russians look so silly, as if their army can't even deal with kids. Good thing is, this is just a sub-plot so I tried to dismiss off as much as I could using the famous 'keep your brains away' theory. Also, I totally disliked the Nancy workplace harassment mainly because by now she has become one of bad-ass characters always ready to take the lead and win against monster, so to watch her obeying others orders felt very odd to me.

The Hopper-Eleven-Mike situation is fun, at times it does irritate but overall I enjoyed specially the song 'Hopper' happily hums to, think it was the same song in S2 too when he and Eleven were cleaning the house. Max bonding with Eleven is great to watch, and also I liked what they did with Billy because it was one of very unlikeable characters and in the end you feel for him in his vain effort to defeat the monster but bought the much needed time to save Eleven.

Dustin is again fun to watch, and the addition of Erica Sinclair (Priah Ferguson), Lucas's sister to the gang provides some good sarcastic fun moments. Hopper-Joyce story expectedly develops well, they make for a great pair, infact personally I prefer them over the much hyped Mike-Eleven pairing. It was good to see Will not suffer this time around, and I could somehow connect to how he felt being sidelined by Mike and group because not everyone likes to grow up fast, Will probably wants to still keep playing the silly D&D games all the time. 

The finale was very good and so were the last 2 episodes leading to it, even the song Dustin sings at a very precarious situation made me laugh despite it being silly. The whole idea of Eleven not strong enough to fight off a stronger monster was very well executed, also leading to a question 'why did she start losing her powers?' 

The final teasing scene is again spot on, brilliant use of 'Upside Down' track to reveal how we maybe getting parallel monster stories, one in Russia and other in Hawkins. I also enjoyed the use of 'Rats remix version' too, which is used first during the cinema blackout and then the field where Dustin is taking gang to talk to his girlfriend Suzie. No mention of Dr Brenner in this season was a surprise and also no part of Kali, maybe we would more on that in Season4.

Overall, this season had flaws but its the power of strong characters that kept me not get bored at any moment.   

My Rating : 7.5/10