Review
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At this point, I suppose, I should define “we”. I refer to peole like me, born in Madras in the nineteen-seventies and ripening into cinematic awareness in the decade that followed, in Mani Ratnam’s decade. We are possibly the most qualified to write about Mani Ratnam. We might also be the least qualified. — Conversations…
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What is this fascination for intelligence officers in mainstream Indian cinema these days? There was Agent Vinod, a secret agent who seemed to get caught so often and in so many countries that he clearly ought to have picked a different line of business. And Ek Tha Tiger, whose ridiculousness was redeemed by the fact that the…
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A CIA agent manages to help six Americans stranded in Iran by making them impersonate a Canadian film crew scouting for locations for a Star Wars-esque sci-fi action extravaganza named Argo. Now, this is Iran at a time when Khomeini has just ascended to power, and anti-American sentiment is at its peak. And these guys…
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There were moments during Skyfall when I wondered: How did they ever manage without Judi Dench? How many actresses can you think of who can recite Alfred Lord Tennyson and say “Take the bloody shot!” with the same amount of gravitas? George Orwell once said something to the effect that by the time he’s fifty, a…
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Here’s the thing: I suspect Christopher Nolan didn’t want to make this movie at all, or even if he did, I don’t think he wanted it to be about Batman fighting the bad guys. Long passages in the film feel like a meditation on the nature of superheroism. The tone is so bleak, only thing…
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You know that black screen with white lettering that appears before nearly every movie these days? The one that tells you that smoking and drinking is bad for you? Cocktail is the first one I’ve seen where, not only does it say there for a while, there’s actually a voice-over that reads it out. And…
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The Avengers is like an amped-up version of Mr. and Mrs. Smith, that Jolie-Pitt starrer that worked wonderfully when it focused on its characters and got a little ho-hum when it focused on the gunfights. I say amped-up because, while a grudge match between two professional killers only trashes a suburban house, anything involving Thor…
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Beware: There may be occasional spoilers! I’ll try not to give the movie away, but no promises. I spent a fair bit of time trying to write this review, but the words came in fits and starts and the thoughts were a bit too disjointed. So I’m just going to dump them here. Let me…
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It’s a dirty trick, really: setting a movie in Kolkata during Durga Puja, knowing that this very fact would make it nearly impossible for me to find fault with it. I lived in Kolkata for around 6 years as a grad student, and I haven’t lived in any city before or since that I have loved…
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I often wonder about star/numerical ratings for films. How does a film earn, say, 3 stars out of four? Is there a sort of formula employed by those who give out these ratings, or is it a quantified version of what is essentially a qualitative reaction? Is there an objective way of doing this? Here’s…
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