By Ayesha Arfeen
The butterfly is shown many times in the film: at the start of the film when we are introduced to the characters; then at the beginning of the story, where Kala is shown waving to the crowd of press and fans after an award ceremony.
By Yanis Iqbal
In Pathaan, the attempted shift from the maternal nation through the personality of Rubina encountered a cultural backlash from right-wing activists, who said that the saffron bikini worn by Padukone in the song “Besharam Rang” was an insult to Hinduism.
By Niveditha Prasad
The state in ‘Kantara’ is an ambiguous presence whose place in the narrative is grey. It appears as the post-colonial state in 1990, in an India at the cusp of neoliberalism. There are bikes, telephone poles, bottled soda drinks and freely flowing Scotch.
By Leya Mathew
What Ajay Raina has compiled and presented is but a part of Tikoo’s efforts. The work of activism is long and dreary; some of the ordeals of life under siege can be glimpsed through what Raina chronicles in ‘Mout`e Rang’.
By Rimli Bhattacharya
As I watched the film, I travelled ages back when I was only a fifteen-year-old teenager and was a victim of a severe sex abuse.
By Rimli Bhattacharya
While the movie slightly deviates from the book, Sachin Kundalkar deserves credit for portraying a poignant tale of love, relationship, and societal norms on screen.
By Prithvijeet Sinha
Teevra Madhyam is ultimately about how women are often expected to cast themselves in a mould similar to the men in their lives, leading them to give up their innate vocations.
By Prithvijeet Sinha
Maati Maanas actually integrates the art of pottery and sculpture to make it a collective act, an iconography, a visual representation.
By Vanshika Lakhani
‘Hum Aapke Hain Kaun’ reminded people how beautiful it is to have Indian traditions and culture while having fun with your extended family.
By Anjali V Raj
Similar to Masurkar’s Newton, Sherni is also quite distinct from general Bollywood movies. The movie is evenly placid and maintains hilarity without losing the serious vigour of the story.
By Sourya Chowdhury
Tamhane is only two films old but is already in the process of mastering a distinct mode of storytelling, auteur-like in his predisposition for long, lingering shots, naturalism and loving portrayal of the mundane.
By Panchali Ray
While feminists have long been critiquing the institution of marriage, it took a global pandemic to bring out the unequal gendered division of labour, care work and violence entrenched within the family.
By Shinali
‘The Great Indian Kitchen’ is not a film that celebrates food in all its gloriousness, but one that entails the glorification of unpaid labour in its most prosaic form in the kitchen.
By Anjali V Raj
The movie doesn’t offer much to those viewers who expect a jubilant climax; rather, it offers a harmonious one.
By Kieran Correia
Based on the (dare I say, better!) book by André Aciman of the same name, the film is a tour de force of emotions, turbulently beautiful and devastating, exploring themes of Jewish identity and sexuality along the way.
By Raunaq Saraswat
The comedy in Ludo rests largely on the shoulders of Aalu, the good-for-everything waiter who blurs the boundaries to fulfill his unrequited love.
By Sramana Saha
Ek Phaali Rodh ends on a note of hope and positivity in a dark and gloomy bystander-filled world. It conveys the message that the Good Samaritans not only exist but emerge the brightest, relegating all the negative elements to the background.
By Aaryata Agarwal & Ishika Mittal
The idea here is that society and legal systems have often so spectacularly failed women and justice seems so unattainable that the fantasy of a wronged woman being reborn as a goddess seems like the only way to get something even close to it.
By Bijaya Biswal
A young Waad al-Kateab arms herself with a camera around men equipped with snipers and tells us the story of a war from the perspective of a woman.
By Kanak Mishra
Even in today’s times, Blue Collar is yet another reminder that a classless society is still a far-fetched dream for the world where the capitalist structures will always pit those at the bottom rung against each other by hook or crook.
Cafe Dissensus Everyday 