I find Zoya Akhtar’s first film underrated, overall – an impressive debut which meanders a bit in the beginning but comes together and excellently threads up some very interesting character arcs into an altogether fine, engaging narrative. There is also a successful morality play that comes through effectively, even if the lessons learned are a [...]

Awful idea, if true. Will be worth it to watch the two together, (though only for one scene, really) but this would not be the right way to go about it.
LINK

Mumbai Meri Jaan
I missed the year’s most affecting Hindi film on the big screen, and didn’t catch it on DVD until months after its release, in mid-December. In my defense, 2008 has been a largely bloodless year for the movies. There were no great highs, no admirable failures, nothing to sink your teeth into, nothing [...]

Best seen in QT HD:
LINK

Don’t really feel inclined to do a review, but this film was very much in the “Aamir” mold of independent(-esque) films (UTV, I believe has produced/distributed both works) that are low on budget, high on concept and shaky on execution. Where “A Wednesday” really scores over “Aamir” is in better writing and a far, far [...]

Always look forward to Dave Kehr’s periodic pieces at the Times, and this one is especially good as he takes a look at the new, seemingly resplendent release of The Godfather series on DVD. In looking at the new, Kehr gives us some new, nostalgic insight into the classic. A great read.
LINK
New DVDs: ‘The Godfather: [...]

LINK
A nice piece here that captures the cyclic, ever-shifting dominance of Kerala’s two Ms. Even if I’ve always maintained that Lal was, is and always will be the true soul of Malayalam cinema, this article puts the “struggle” across nicely, and captures a small, recent moment in the decades-long “battle.”
From the New Sunday Express:

Ravishing.
LINK

Taare Zameen Par
When the gifted Kamal Haasan directs himself in a film, there’s almost always a sense that the actor overwhelms his story, (as he did in the otherwise majestic Hey Ram) or fails to serve it with the kind of quality of performance that it deserves, (as he didn’t in the under-regarded Virumaandi) often [...]

In a lackluster year for the movies, it’s not surprising that the Indian film event of 2007 isn’t a feature, but, instead, a diverse compilation-piece of four short films that support the very noble cause of broadening AIDS awareness in India. The Mira Nair produced AIDS Jaago omnibus represents a unique moment in Indian cinema [...]