The snowy locales of Himachal Pradesh is the setting for this curiously titled film, and one soon learns that it is the name of a hotel in Manali. The film opens with a person running frantically in the snow as if the devil was after him. Cut to ACP Ashwin Dixit and his wife Shikha […]
That famous victory sign, the pugnacity of the man, the perennial cigar in his mouth with those protruding jowls under the bowler hat and the oratory skills which earned him the 1953 Nobel Prize for Literature, are all brought to screen via an intense portrayal of two-time British PM Winston Churchill by Gary Oldman. The […]
Films of this genre normally start off sedately – the protagonist (being an ex-cop helps) working hard for a living, usually with a spouse and child (comes in handy as hostages), and losing his job – wondering how to break the news at home. So, in The Commuter we have Michael MacCauley (Liam Neeson), an […]
Imagine the plight of this planet a couple of decades hence — overpopulated to the extent of being almost uninhabitable, with dwindling resources and unmanageable waste. Scientists have been confounded. But not Hollywood’s filmmakers. Director Alexander Payne and co-writer Jim Taylor seem to have found the ultimate remedy. The film opens somewhere in the future […]
The bear is carnivorous, but it can also be cute and cuddly, as Paddington 2 – following up on its hugely successful earlier instalment of 2014 – tells us over a delightful and rapturous 102 minutes of fun-filled fantasy. The marmalade-loving Paddington Bear (adroitly voiced once again by the talented Ben Wishaw), is now firmly […]
The film was almost ready for release when news of Kevin Spacey’s alleged sexual misconduct hit headlines and prompted the studio to beckon the 88-year-old Christopher Plummer – the oldest to win an Academy Award, at 82. The 80-year-old Ridley Scott pulled off a near miracle by refilming Spacey’s scenes (as the multi-billionaire John Paul […]
‘Shikar toh sab karte hain lekin Tiger se behtar shikar koi nahi karta.’ This needless allusion here is to wonderboy Avinash Rathore aka Tiger (Salman Khan, as if we didn’t know), who single-handedly, sometimes with the help of a bazooka, knocks off a mini-army in the barren tracts of Abu Dhabi, which is attempted to […]
Science-fiction and fantasy films come with their own baggage – they are over-reliant on SFX, the plot is rather predictable, the climax is left open-ended for the studios to cash in on the franchise’s popularity and leaves little scope for an actor to display his/her acting abilities; unless of course, you are a fan of […]
It’s the impertinent versus the imperturbable – the cocky versus the cool as cucumber. The 100 minute film braces us for the tennis match of the century – the thrilling five-setter of the 1980 Wimbledon finals in which the upcoming superbrat had threatened to halt the champion’s march to a fifth consecutive title. Shia LaBeouf portrays […]
In one of the scenes in the film, Maatun (Urmila Mahanta), promoted from a lowly housemaid position to a responsible post in the office, is the only one who doesn’t arise from her chair to greet her boss, Abhiraj Malhotra (Narendra Jha). That eloquence just about sums up the genre of the film, besides the […]
At the recently concluded Parsee Gymkhana (Marine Lines) All-Parsee TT tournament, on 25 and 26 November, 2017, Parsee Gymkhana (PG) won three of the five titles. Percy Mehta prevented a clean sweep by winning the Veterans Singles. Zubin Taraporewalla and Frenaz Chipia (just back from the Belgium Open) reached the Open Singles finals, and combed to win the […]