Within a few minutes into the film, we understand the backstory behind the title, which is quite interesting in itself. D. Raghavan, a studious young man, changes his name to Dragon to elevate his “cool” quotient in college and attract good-looking girls. From this point on, he embarks on a path of self-destruction, with his... Continue Reading →
Lubber Pandhu – My Flash Review!
The title of the film is Lubber Pandhu, which means Rubber Ball in English. The film opens with a cricket match scene in a village in Tamil Nadu. Just in the initial 30 minutes, there are enough references to IPL and CSK. About half the film's run time features some cricket match or other. A... Continue Reading →
Meiyazhagan – My Flash Review!
There are movies that have a few scenes that evoke a bit of nostalgia. What if the entire stretch of a movie is about taking you on a nostalgic trip? You get a film like Meiyazhagan, directed by C. Premkumar whose earlier film 96 was also in a similar template. I couldn’t relate so much... Continue Reading →
Maharaja – My Flash Review!
On Netflix, there are 2 films with almost the same title that are being streamed presently. One is Maharaj – a Hindi film and the other is Maharaja, a Tamil film. This review is about the Tamil film with Vijay Sethupathi in the lead in what happens to be his 50th film. He makes a... Continue Reading →
Irugapatru – My Flash Review!
Family dramas and Romcoms as genres are a rarity in Tamil cinema these days. Consumed by the “Star” and ‘Mass” fixation, films of big stars and wannabe stars have all been treading the same beaten path of extreme violence, adrenaline-pumping action sequences, revenge sagas, murder mysteries and excessive noise. Irugapatru meaning “Hold tight” in Tamil... Continue Reading →
My pick of the Top 10 films of 2022!
Another Friday. Another big-ticket Hindi film release. Another flop at the Box Office. This has been the recurring theme in Bollywood this year. The latest one to suffer this ignominy is Cirkus directed by none other than Rohit Shetty - a filmmaker with many 100 crore grossers under his belt and one who is touted... Continue Reading →
Love Today – My Flash Review!
While the opening credits roll, we are taken inside a smart phone production line where we get to see visuals of phones getting assembled completely on a “hands-free” basis except at the final packaging stage where we see workers doing the packing. This irony is stark for a product that is destined to be at... Continue Reading →
Venthu Thanindathu Kaadu – My Flash Review!
Francis Ford Coppola’s Godfather might have inspired quite a few films in the gangster genre all over the world but in South Indian cinema, it is Mani Ratnam’s Nayagan that has inspired filmmakers to try that genre. Promising filmmakers in the post-Nayagan era have made at least one film based on the Mumbai Don story,... Continue Reading →
Ponniyin Selvan and its aftermath!
This piece was originally written for the news portal “The News Minute” and was carried on 7th Oct, 2022. The link to the piece is here: https://www.thenewsminute.com/article/mani-ratnam-s-ponniyin-selvan-and-its-four-types-audience-168671 It has been a week since Mani Ratnam’s Ponniyin Selvan-I hit theatres across the globe, and the chatter around the film on social media remains unabated. By and large, the... Continue Reading →
Ponniyin Selvan -1 – My Flash Review!
A friend who knew I was watching Ponniyin Selvan today, called me to check on the film and this is how the conversation went: Friend: Before asking you for your views, tell me if you have read the book? Me: Well, I purchased the book 2 months back and started reading as if I was... Continue Reading →