Jude Anthany Joseph's third feature, after Ohm Shanti Oshana and Oru Muthassi Gadha, released on Prime Video at midnight today. This seemingly feel-good film, also seemingly made in limited spaces and with a shoestring budget, tackles a concept and issue never tested before in Malayalam cinema  circles. In Sara'S, we follow the life of Sara Vincent (Anna Ben), a young, bubbly, yet unapologetic filmmaker who struggles to make it big in the industry. She continuously assists male directors and is in the scripting works of her dream film. Sara has decided, from her school days, that she would not bear any kids. This is when she meets Jeevan (Sunny Wayne); her relationship with him subsequently brings her ideology and decision into a confrontation with the established norms of society, family and child-rearing.  Anna Ben in Sara'S The best aspect in which Sara'S has excelled, without doubt, is its hard-hitting taut script. Debutant Akshay Hareesh deserves praise for managin...

Debutant Tanu Balak' Cold Case was touted and marketed as a supernatural-meets-crime-thriller flick. In this review, we look into whether the film, starring Prithviraj Sukumaran and Aditi Balan in lead roles, was able to deliver on its nail-biting, spine-chilling experience. An unidentified, putrefied skull is found by a layman from the bottom of the lake. ACP Sathyajith (Prithviraj Sukumaran) is called in to crack the case, after intense political pressure, when fingers start to turn towards the kin of a prominent politician. Due to the aged state of the discovered remnant, identifying the victim becomes a herculean task. Meanwhile, Medha (Aditi Balan), an investigative TV journalist who runs her own program on supernatural, paranormal events, relocates to a new house with her daughter. There, she begins to experience strange occurrences which lead her to uncover the reasons for them. At a point, these parallel investigations converge, as both factual and the otherworldly strive t...

  Disney's dalliance with live-action retellings and interpretations of its beloved characters and stories continued with its latest venture- Cruella, which was set to establish an origin story for  Cruella De Vil.  the primary protagonist of   The Hundred and One Dalmatians,  an animated classic beloved by many. Disney roped in some of the popular names in the industry for the project- Emma Stone, Emma Thompson, Mark Strong, Craig Gillespie (director of Oscar-nominated I, Tonya) among others. Here's the review of Cruella. Young and rebellious Estella witnesses the death of her mother, of which she believes she was the reason. Guilt-ridden and orphaned, she meets teenage grifters Jasper and Horace. From there, her swindling days slowly takes her to the Baroness (Emma Thompson), a very popular fashion designer whose very presence can intimidate and frighten those in front of her (sort of a 70s era Miranda Priestly from The Devil Wears Prada ). Estella's ambi...

Animation giant Pixar's latest motion picture, Luca, released on Disney+ recently. Directed by debutant Enrico Casarosa, the premise of the film, interestingly, featured an adolescent sea monster, with the ability to take human form when on the surface, discovering the joy of being amongst humans and nature with his new friends. With its fascinating premise and promising visuals, did it satiate expectations? Here's our review of Luca. Luca follows the adventures of Luca Paguro, a teenage sea monster (unlike the visceral, violent mythological ones), who is often warned by his parents that the human world is dangerous for them to visit and explore. Still, he wants to break free from his mundane underwater life and seek out something adventurous and daring. This is when he meets Alberto Scorfano, an affable and carefree sea monster who guides Luca to the human world. Even though contrasting personalities meet, their unanimous desire to explore the unknown unites them in a journey ...

Netflix initiated a heavy marketing campaign for Karthik Subbaraj's next, Jagame Thanthiram , after securing its distribution rights, given that Dhanush was set to appear in the Russo Brothers' next for Netflix, The Gray Man,  starring alongside bigwigs like Chris Evans and Ryan Reynolds. Other reasons for the hype were that Jagame Thanthiram was Karthik Subbaraj's next after his colossal mass entertainer Petta. Dhanush was back after his rather stellar outings in Karnan and Asuran. Movie-goers were promised a bloody, cacophonous gangster thriller with its teasers and trailer.  But did the film satisfy these expectations? We find out in this review of Jagame Thanthiram. At the start of Jagame Thanthiram , we are introduced to the central characters of the film- Sivadoss (Joju George), an Eelam Tamil ganglord operating in London, Peter Sprott (James Cosmo), a white supremacist, affluent crime lord who lobbies for anti-immigration legislation, and finally, Suruli (Dhanush), ...

Amit Masurkar's Sherni released yesterday on Amazon Prime Video. The picture is headlined by the likes of Vidya Balan, Vijay Raaz, Brijendra Kala, Sharat Saxena among others. Here's the review of this drama-cum-thriller. One reason why I was so hyped for the release of  Sherni  was that its' director Amit Masurkar's previous venture,  Newton , is one of my favourite Indian films of this decade. Newton beautifully captured the angst of a dedicated and righteous government officer, when faced with a rotting and flawed electoral system and a deceitful arena of tribal politics. In Sherni too, Masurkar crafts a world similar to Newton-  a hardworking DFO, recently posted to a forest-laden region, pitted against dual threats- one, the danger of a tigress loose in the human habitat, and the other, a decaying system of corrupt officials, red tapes and, yet again, the opportunistic politicos. For Vidya Balan's Vidhya Vincent, the tigress roaming human settlements is the ...

While the cinema industry's functioning came to a moribund standstill due to shut theatres and physical distancing measures rendering shoots near impossible, Take Off (2017) director Mahesh Narayan seems to have made the most out of this constrained environment by scripting, shooting, editing, and directing a picture, entirely shot in a virtual milieu, riding on the backs of previously produced similar films like 2014's Unfriended and 2018's Searching. c u soon, starring Fahadh Faasil, Roshan Mathew, and Darshana Rajendran, released today on Amazon Prime Video, making it the third Malayalam picture to have a direct release on an OTT platform. Director Mahesh Narayanan carries the entire narrative of c u soon through a set of video calls, personal chats, google map images, screengrabs, and everything that a laptop or phone screen can accommodate. c u soon kicks off as Jimmy (Roshan Mathew) swipes right and left on his Tinder account. When he gets a match in Anu (Darshana Raj...

Honey Trehan's debut film, Raat Akeli Hai , released digitally on Netflix on the 31st of July. Starring a talented crop of fine artists such as Nawazuddin Siddiqui, Radhika Apte, Shweta Tripathi, Tigmanshu Dhulia and many others, Raat Akeli Hai was touted to be a film in the crime thriller genre, with many already labeling it as an Indian Knives Out. Here's our review on the desi crime thriller. A dead man, that too a powerful patriarch/politician, shot point blank in a sprawling mansion in the rural hinterlands of Gwalior, a posse of family members with unclear intentions who have not heard a thing or the commotion that ensued before it, and an unwanted newcomer to the family whose origins and backgrounds are shadier than those of the family members combined. Add to that a cop, like in other similar movies of the genre, hell bent on digging up the truth. What debutant Honey Trehan and writer Smita Singh orchestrates here is the perfect setting for a gripping whodunit. Whethe...

Geetu Mohandas's second directorial, Moothon (The Elder One), released on the OTT platform, ZEE5, after doing it's rounds in the festival circuit, including the acclaimed Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF). Mohandas returned to the director's chair after National Award-winning 2013 film, Liar's Dice, which starred Geetanjali Thapa and Nawazuddin Siddiqui. Moothon had a fine and talented crop of technicians behind the camera, including the likes of Rajeev Ravi, who handled the cinematography, B. Ajithkumar, who was in charge of editing, and most of all, Anurag Kashyap, who penned the Hindi dialogues in Moothon.  The film is currently streaming on ZEE5. Moothon tells the tale of Mulla, a teenager in Lakshadweep, who travels to Mumbai in search of her elder brother, Akbar, whom she calls Moothon, who, in turn, had left for the city many years ago. Mulla's journey takes her to the dark, sordid underbelly of the city, where she has to fight several odds to find h...

Dil Bechara, Sushant Singh Rajput 's final screen outing before his untimely demise last month, released yesterday on Disney+Hotstar. Directed by debutant Mukesh Chhabra and starring Rajput along with Sanjana Sanghi, Dil Bechara is the Indian adaptation of the popular John Green novel,  The Fault in Our Stars , which had it's own Hollywood adaptation in 2014. Dil Bechara is currently streaming for free on Disney+Hotstar . Like it's parent novel, Dil Bechara follows the life of Kizie Basu (Sanjana Sanghi), a cancer patient, who falls in love with a cancer survivor, Manny (Rajput), who infuses in Kizie an infectious but joyful energy to "seize the moment" and to make the most of her life. Kizie meets Manny for the first time, as he effortlessly sways to the title track, a peppy urbane 'Dil Bechara' by A.R Rahman. Kizie and Manny bond over Kizie's infatuation and fascination over an incomplete song, penned and composed by a mysterious musician named Abhim...

Greyhound , a World War-II thriller, directed by Aaron Schneider and starring Tom Hanks , released on Apple's streaming platform, Apple TV+, after a theatrical release became difficult, owing to the COVID-19 pandemic. Greyhound is based on the fictional nautical war novel  The Good Shepherd, written by C.S Forester , which narrates the treacherous voyage of a naval escort group protecting a merchant ship convoy carrying supplies to England. Here is our review on the film. Months after the U.S made it's entry into the Second World War, first-time US Navy Commander Ernest Krause (Tom Hanks), who frequently utters Bible verses and fears his inexperience, is tasked with commanding a Fletcher- class destroyer, codenamed Greyhound, which escorts a merchant ship convoy carrying supplies from the U.S to England. As they enter the 'Black Pit' in the Atlantic Sea, an undefended area beyond the range of antisubmarine aircrafts, Greyhound and it's accompanying escort group face...

For Bollywood worshipers, Netflix India came with exciting news as it unveiled the streaming giant's new slate of titles, including in-house productions, commissioned projects and acquired titles. Netflix's new announcement came as streaming platforms in the country, with the likes of Netflix, Disney+ Hotstar, and Amazon Prime Video, are racing to acquire and release Indian films on their platforms, in lieu of the now dormant theaters.  In their announcement, Monika Shergill, VP-Content of Netflix India, stated,"We are excited to share our lineup of stories across formats and multiple genres. We know our members have unique tastes, moods and needs – sometimes, they want to lean back and watch a delightful comedy, and at other times, they want a pulse-pounding thriller that brings them to the edge of their seats. Together with the finest stories from around the world and our rapidly growing selection of licensed titles, we want to give our members something to discover and...