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‘Spotify: Cinema with BR’ Episode 7: Dhanush / Selvaraghavan / Vaathi-Sir / Bakasuran
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Readers Write In #548: Not defending a movie tradesman about testosterone, but defending
February 15, 2023
By Kartik Iyer Anupama Chopra sat down with actors for a discussion. She brought up a comment shared with her by a tradesman: testosterone filled movies will work in the future. Unsurprisingly, Ayushman Khurrana was first to call it out as a ‘patriarchal’ statement. Fellow actors followed in tandem with Vidya Balan rounding up the […]
Readers Write In #547: Maid of the Mist
February 6, 2023
By Karthik Amarnath Unpacking the centerfold of Park Chan-Wook’s “Decision to Leave” At a little past the halfway point in Park Chan Wook’s moody new film Decision to Leave, there’s a three minute scene that unfolds at a marketplace. We hear muffled sounds of shoppers but we don’t see them; we’re staring at a bunch of […]
Mega Critics Roundtable 2022, by Nona Prince
December 30, 2022
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My Top 10 list of films for the Sight & Sound poll, 2022
December 11, 2022
Accompanying note: It is really tough to nail down ten films definitively, and one’s personality certainly plays a part in picking them. For instance, I still wanted to choose Vertigo or Citizen Kane but somehow these other (and newer) films kept raising their hands for inclusion. I have tried my best. I look foward to […]
Readers Write In #443: A Hero, by Asghar Farhadi
February 20, 2022
By An Jo SPOILER ALERT In ‘A Hero’ Asghar Farhadi lays out to you a story that could be passed off as an Aesop’s fable. A man, already declared by legal system as a criminal, trying to be honest: This is the emphasis; this is what the story is about; you need to make an […]
Readers Write In #378: Princess Mononoke: Getting Ambiguity Right (?)
July 2, 2021
(by Adithya R) One WTF fact I came across recently was that Hayao Miyazaki doesn’t write screenplays for his films. WTF! * This is pretty hard to imagine given the myriad themes, characters, and incredible world-building that is stuffed into a typical Studio Ghibli film. And the typical Studio Ghibli film is a visual masterpiece […]
Readers Write In #376: What’s special about South Korean cinema?
July 2, 2021
(by Sudharsanan Sampath) South Korean cinema is clearly superior, with its creativity, consistency and film-making style, when compared to other film industries of the world, at least in my opinion. Malayalam cinema is attempting to come dangerously close, but still some way to go. South Korean filmmakers somehow managed to capture the elusive art of […]
Céline Sciamma, Jacqueline Lentzou, and the other women with films at the Berlinale
March 6, 2021
https://www.firstpost.com/entertainment/berlinale-2021-celine-sciamma-jacqueline-lentzou-and-the-other-women-who-competed-for-the-golden-bear-9384711.html Five of the eighteen titles that will compete for the Golden Bear, are directed or co-directed by women. A look at ‘Petite Maman’, ‘Moon, 66 Questions’, ‘Ballad of a White Cow’. Spoilers ahead… I’ll begin with a shout-out to the web site womenandhollywood.com. It was founded in 2007, and it “educates, advocates, and agitates […]
Luiz Bolognesi’s ‘The Last Forest’, playing at the Berlinale, takes us to the Yanomami tribe in the Amazon basin
March 5, 2021
https://www.firstpost.com/entertainment/luiz-bolognesis-the-last-forest-playing-at-berlinale-2021-takes-us-to-the-yanomami-tribe-in-the-amazon-basin-9381571.html This is a record of a rapidly vanishing home. In 1986, the discovery of gold deposits led to an invasion by 45000 prospectors and the death of 1500-1800 natives. Spoilers ahead… In Ex Pajé (2018), filmmaker and anthropologist Luiz Bolognesi captured the spirit, the essence, the modern-day conflicts of the Paiter Suruí, an indigenous […]
Hong Sangsoo’s ‘Introduction’ is at once wispy and profound, like eavesdropping on the universe
March 5, 2021
https://www.filmcompanion.in/film-festivals/berlin-film-festival/berlinale-2021-introduction-hong-sangsoo-brothers-keepers-bad-luck-banging-or-loopy-porn/ Plus, the boarding-school mystery, ‘Brother’s Keeper’. And the marvellously titled ‘Bad Luck Banging or Loony Porn’. Spoilers ahead… In the opening scene of Hong Sangsoo’s Introduction, a man is praying. He says he will do anything. He will give up half his wealth, give it to an orphanage even, if God gives him one […]
Berlinale 2021: Ted K tells the story of the Unabomber as a demented eco-activist
March 3, 2021
https://www.filmcompanion.in/film-festivals/berlin-film-festival/berlinale-2021-ted-k-tells-the-story-of-the-unabomber-as-a-demented-eco-activist-taste/ If someone told you what ‘Taste’ was about, you may think of Zakariya Mohammed’s ‘Sudani from Nigeria’: a footballer from the African nation ends up in Asia… Spoilers ahead… While watching Tony Stone’s Ted K – as in, Ted Kaczynski, as in, the Unabomber (played by an excellent Sharlto Copley) – I kept thinking […]
Dekel Berenson’s superb short film ‘Anna’ sheds light on the “love tours” industry in Ukraine
February 27, 2021
https://www.firstpost.com/entertainment/dekel-berensons-superb-short-film-anna-sheds-light-on-the-love-tours-industry-in-ukraine-9344531.html This 15-minute film is about: meat. Rather, women treated as meat, ready to be picked up by American men who want someone to cook and clean. Spoilers ahead… The first scene of Anna, a 2019 short film written and directed by Dekel Berenson, is about two people inside a meat fridge. One’s a man, a […]
The 25th International Film Festival of Kerala: “The heart of the festival is Malayalam cinema”
February 16, 2021
https://www.filmcompanion.in/interviews/malayalam-interview/malayalam-movies-the-25th-international-film-festival-of-kerala-bina-paul-talks-about-pulling-off-a-live-festival-in-these-virtual-times-baradwaj-rangan/ It takes a village to put together a film festival, but when it comes to the films themselves, the proof is in the programming. Bina Paul, Artistic Director of the International Film Festival of Kerala, talks about pulling off a live festival in these virtual times. Congratulations on pulling off two big premieres, with […]
Lijo Jose Pellissery’s Jallikattu is out of the Oscar race, but it was always a long shot
February 10, 2021
https://www.filmcompanion.in/opinion/hollywood-opinion/oscars-2021-nominations-jallikattu-india-entry-lijo-jose-pellisserys-jallikattu-is-out-of-the-oscar-race-but-it-was-always-a-long-shot-malayalam-movies/ The only way to hope for a shot at the Academy Awards is to make India matter in the eyes of Uncle Oscar as a “country that makes good movies”. As always, there was this dim hope that we’d make it to the shortlist, at least. After all, we’d picked a really deserving film, […]
Rotterdam 2021: The Dog Who Wouldn’t Be Quiet, A Corsican Summer, and Charlotte Gainsbourg in Suzanne Andler
February 6, 2021
https://www.filmcompanion.in/film-festivals/rotterdam-film-festival-2021-iffr-the-dog-who-wouldnt-be-quiet-a-corsican-summer-and-charlotte-gainsbourg-in-suzanne-andler-baradwaj-rangan/ Charlotte Gainsbourg captures both the “First World Problem”-ness of her situation as well as the genuine quandary a married woman finds herself in. Spoilers ahead… In her acclaimed novel, Mrs Dalloway, Virginia Woolf described a single day in the life of her titular protagonist. In his new movie, Suzanna Andler, Benoît Jacquot describes a […]
Rotterdam 2021: ‘Dear Comrades!’, Andrei Konchalovsky’s record of the Novocherkassk massacre
February 6, 2021
https://www.firstpost.com/entertainment/international-film-festival-of-rotterdam-in-dear-comrades-andrei-konchalovskys-record-of-the-novocherkassk-massacre-9276631.html The movie is based on a true story that happened on June 2nd, 1962, and kept secret until the Nineties. Culprits have never been convicted. Spoilers ahead… Andrei Konchalovsky has had one of the odder careers in world cinema. He began by writing a couple of Tarkovsky classics (Ivan’s Childhood, Andrei Rublev) in the […]
Rotterdam 2021: Talking automobiles in King Car, spreading HIV in Feast
February 4, 2021
https://www.filmcompanion.in/film-festivals/rotterdam-film-festival-2021-iffr-talking-automobiles-in-king-car-spreading-hiv-in-feast-portugal-baradwaj-rangan/ Our ancestors tried to amplify the body’s ability by using a rock to split open a seed. The “tool”, therefore, was not just a rock – it was an extension of the body. Spoilers ahead… The Rotterdam Film Festival has a reputation for programming fascinating oddball fare, and Renata Pinheiro’s King Car (Portuguese) is […]
Rotterdam 2021: Reimagining Joseph Conrad in Lone Wolf, exploring motherhood in Aurora
February 3, 2021
https://www.filmcompanion.in/film-festivals/rotterdam-film-festival-2021-iffr-reimagining-joseph-conrad-in-lone-wolf-australia-exploring-motherhood-in-aurora-costa-rica-tandav/ The fact that almost all the primary characters are seen through video footage becomes a distancing device, which is probably intentional. But it also makes it hard to invest in the stakes. Spoilers ahead… Jonathan Ogilvie’s Lone Wolf is based on The Secret Agent by Joseph Conrad. The outline is the same. The characters […]
Baradwaj Rangan 
February 17, 2023
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