[Rec] director Jaume Balagueró’s 2011 film Mientras Duermes truly lives up to the earlier blockbuster, but in vastly different ways. I recalled Indian (Tamil, to be specific) films like Vaali (Ajith in a double role) and Aasai (Prakashraj’s career-defining film) while watching Mientras Duermes, but unlike Indian films, there are no reasons offered to the [...]

What do you get when you cross the sensibilities of Mani Ratnam’s Geetanjali (Idhayathai Thirudaathey, in Tamil), the crux of Shyamalan’s Unbreakable and the relationships in Audrey Niffenegger’s book The Time Traveler’s Wife (I’m discounting the Eric Bana-Rachel McAdams starrer made from the book because it was so bad)? You get Agnès Merlet’s Hideaways. No, [...]

Remember the days when we were young and used to start a story quite normally… but as we go, we take it to incredulous lengths unaware of where the story is heading? It was usually up to the audience (more kids?) to trust us in our story’s flow and our imagination to pull this off. [...]

As a massive fan of time travel, it is only natural that I track and watch every film based on time travel. Having seen a LOT of such films, you may not notice my all-time favorite time travel-based film listed in *any* top 10 or top 50 time travel movies list – it is a [...]

Now that the whole world has written about Rise Of The Planet Of The Apes, let me simply say I loved it. It is perfect popcorn material and is thoroughly enjoyable despite its little quirks of stupidity at times. I’d like to point to just two things in the context of the film. One, I [...]

I happened to see Delhi Belly last weekend and enjoyed it immensely. This weekend, I caught up with Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara, after a lot of prodding from a LOT of friends who assured me that I would ‘love it’. And guess what! I have some amazingly perceptive friends. Or, I’m so easy to comprehend, [...]

“The film has a story that can be summed up in one sentence on the back of an envelope.” Next time you see that sentence or its cousins and nephews in a film review, mentally kick the reviewer. The truth is, most films’ stories can indeed be written in a sentence on the back of [...]

I remember writing this, in my review of Pandiraj’s debut Tamil film, ‘Pasanga‘. Tamil cinema is home to rampant male domination. No hero in our state apologizes – its always the woman who is used to apologizing; if the man does, he’s either above 50 (in filmy age) or from a neighboring state (Mammooty?). And [...]

Can Dunning-Kruger effect be tested on Rajinikanth fans? Let me explain. Rajinikanth fans want the man to perform death defying stunts. They want him to be the uber-male who can entice any woman. They also want him to ‘perform’ his style. All sounds normal, but do they want him to be intelligent? And, if he [...]

Is this the same mild-mannered, kid-friendly uncle we saw in the Spy Kids franchise? Though Grind House did prepare us with the fake Machete trailer, the man sure seems to have acquired a lot of new things, while getting his own spin-off. A myth behind his name, an image of a stud who sweeps women [...]