Category: Movie reviews

Raat Akeli Hai

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https://www.imdb.com/title/tt12567088/

Rating: 3.5 out of 5

Starring: Nawazuddin Siddiqui, Radhika Apte, Shweta Tripathi, Ila Arun

Streaming on: Netflix

To watch or not to watch: A good whodunnit to watch over a meal

Raghuveer Singh, a politically connected, powerful and old landowner is found brutally murdered in his home on his wedding day. He was shot with a rifle and his face was bashed in with the same gun. The bride is Radha (Radhika Apte) who was sold to Raghuveer Singh and was his mistress. The wedding party was small, with only immediate family members in attendance. They opposed to the marriage, and they all collude to blame Radha for the murder. In comes Inspector Jatil Yadav (Nawazuddin Siddiqui) to investigate the crime, which includes political plot points and internal conflicts between family members.

It is not a very refreshing movie, as crime/mystery/thrillers are a dime a dozen and are a formula for success. This is different from others, in that it has a larger cast list with more well-known faces and a bit more serious crime plot. The movie touches a few social issues and doesn’t veer off the plot. They could have built upon the character stories a bit more, specially Radha, who has a key role. Even Jatil Yadav’s character is only understood by some subtext spread across the movie, making it difficult to understand the reason behind his actions and decisions.

The performances by Radhika Apte and Nawazuddin Siddiqui are perfect. In theory, they would have made an unlikely pair online, but in execution it all looks seamless. It isn’t something which demands constant attention and can be watched while getting chores done. It is good content from Netflix Originals, maybe their best yet.

C. B. Strike

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  • amazon.com

Rating: 3.5 out of 5

Starring: Tom Burke and Holliday Grainger

Streaming on: Hotstar (in India)

To watch or not to watch: A decent watch for whodunnit lovers

CB Strike (or just Strike) is based on the Cormoran Strike book series created by Robert Galbraith (JK Rowling pseudonym). Strike is a Afghanistan war hero, who returned minus his left leg. He also has a dark background, estranged rockstar father and overdosed supermodel mother. After honorable discharge, he started his private investigation agency, which became is focal point of existence. The series picks up from when he needed a temporary assistant to help manage the business a little.

The series starts with a case of apparent suicide of a super model from her third floor penthouse. Strike has been hired by her foster brother to investigate into the death as he suspects foul play. This brings forth the old-school detective work of following witnesses, obtaining files under subterfuge and harmless deception. This is exciting work for Robin, who has always wanted to be a detective and agrees to be a full-time assistant for lesser pay (and hence a permanent cast member). The first season has 3 cases spread over 7 episodes.

Tom Burke and Holliday Grainger are a strikingly gorgeous duo. They are a reason enough to watch the series. That being said, the series itself is a typical formula detective story. The protagonist is brooding with a heart of gold, unapparent intelligence and down-on-his-luck (in contrast to Sherlock Holmes’ sociopathic tendencies which make him a better detective). Robin is smart and resourceful, who knows where she see herself in the next 5 years. As to the solution to the real case, which should be the whole point of the series, Strike just has many off-screen insights and clues appearing to him which are revealed in the climax of each case. If someone is looking for something not essentially smart but decent enough, this is a good option.

Schitt’s Creek

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https://www.cinematerial.com

Rating: 4.5 out of 5

Starring: Eugene Levy, Catherine O’Hara, Daniel Levy, Annie Murphy

Streaming on: Netflix

To watch or not to watch: A must watch – a perfect pick-me-upper

A filthy rich family in a big town has all its assets seized because their accountant misfiled their taxes. The only asset left with them is a town called Schitt’s Creek, which the dad, Johnny Rose (Eugene Levy) bought as a joke for his son, David (Daniel Levy). The town is so hopeless that even the revenue department couldn’t sell it. So the family, which also has a daughter, Alexis Rose (Annie Murphy) and a mother, Moira (Catherine O’Hara) move to the motel in Schitt’s Creek. Their current situation is a far cry from their previous life, which was filled with expensive parties and clothes. The entire series follows them on the new adventure and shows how they rebuild their lives and relationships.

The premise of the series is not unheard of (Arrested Development comes to mind, which executes the same plot in a completely opposite story and is a blast) but the rest of it all is totally fresh. The characters are rich, spoiled and are lovable and not relatable at all, unless one is ultra rich. These 4 are utterly clueless on how the real world works and they have to navigate the new waters with only their resourcefulness. It is a huge change they have to make, where they have to adjust with not being the popular and have things come easy. The characters really grow over the seasons. It is heartening to see them really mature into less-pretentious adults and have care about others. Somewhat.

It is a hilarious story about reality check and self-improvement. Not an easy topic to work comedy into, and yet it achieves it. Daniel Levy is the star of the show. He is charming and probably the second least pretentious character after his series (and real life) father Eugene. The first season doesn’t leave the audience wanting too much, but just hang on. It is all more than worth it as the seasons progress. It is not often that series really evolve along with the characters and this show does it beautifully. A shout out to the costume designer Debra Hanson, who has subtly made the Roses look ridiculous and showed the difference in characters. A must watch for some much needed upliftment in these trying times.

Late Night

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https://tmc.io/

Rating: 3.5 out of 5

Starring: Emma Thompson, Mindy Kaling

Streaming on: Amazon Prime

To watch or not to watch: A good watch for a lazy afternoon

Katherine Newbury (Emma Thompson) has been the host of a late night talk show for more than a decade. She has been famous once and regarded as the best in the industry. Now the ratings are declining and the network is planning to replace her with a new comedian. In parallel, she has been called out for hiring a certain demographic – male and Caucasian. In comes Molly Patel (Mindy Kaling) who was working at a chemical plant but somehow ended up in front of the show’s producer and is hired. Molly is new to the industry, naive, straight-shooter and down on her luck. Her fresh outlook gets her noticed and also helps Katherine in her personal and professional life.

The movie is likable. Very. It has good performances in Emma Thompson who is so strong as a person and as the character she plays, it is inspiring all round, and Mindy Kaling who is funny, smart and well, Indian. Hugh Dancy, Reid Scott and John Lithgow are other familiar faces. The movie addresses a lot of fundamental issues in the entertainment industry, like male dominance, nepotism, lack of ethnic diversity, and #MeToo. In a short stand-up clip in the movie, Katherine speaks how the industry discriminates on the basis of age of women, but not of men. It is hard hitting.

It is so refreshing to see a fell good movie which isn’t about romance, nor about a quirky female and an impossibly perfect male protagonist. Both the leading characters are females, and flawed in various degrees in their own different ways. They have genuine human problems which are relatable. The problem is, Late Night tries to do a lot together, such that not everything gets its proper attention. It isn’t a well made movie, but the creators weren’t going for it. Mindy Kaling and Nisha Ganatra (Director) wanted to portray the real struggles, some of which were from personal expereinces.

A good watch on a lazy afternoon for a little pick-me-up.

The Report

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https://www.imdb.com/title/tt8236336/

Rating: 4.5 out of 5

Starring: Adam Driver, Annette Benning, John Hamm

Streaming on: Amazon Prime

To watch or not to watch: A must watch when looking for something intense

The movie is a true story of a US Senate Investigative Committee’s report on the CIA’s interrogation techniques after the 9/11 attacks. The ungainful torture of the suspected terrorists was called “Enhanced Interrogative Techniques” by the CIA and was outsourced to independent contractors, who did not have the qualification to carry out the task. And yet, they got the free hand for many years. After the government changed, interrogation by torture was supposed to stop, but didn’t, thus leading to the investigation. The Committee was led by an idealistic and tenacious Daniel J Jones and his small staff, working in a basement office for about 5 years. They got 6.3 million documents to read which lead to 6,700 pages’ report and about 500 pages summary. Understandably, there was backlash from CIA and the red tape restricted the access directly into the Agency.

Though the premise of the movie doesn’t make it a compelling watch, but it is. Scott Z Burns managed to make the process of reading the documents and the presentation of the report exciting and intriguing. the role of Daniel J Jones, played by Adam Driver, is an inspiring character in and of himself. The investigation, the screenplay of reading of the documents were interspersed by the footage of the interrogation of the suspected terrorists, all playing the emotions of the viewer masterfully.

The acting skills of Adam Driver have never been in question. Coupled with the ideal outlook of Dan Jones, he is truly commendable. The movie doesn’t pull any punches and is transparent about the entire process, including the apathy of the CIA, the plot to cover up the truth and the resistance from the White House to stop the truth from coming out. It is an honest movie, simply made and yet delivers. A must watch.

Maigret

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https://tvtropes.org/

Rating: 4.5 out of 5

Starring: Rowan Atkinson, Leo Staar, Shaun Dingwall

Streaming on: Hotstar

Seasons: 2 seasons, 2 episodes each

To watch or not to watch: a must watch for all fans of whodunnits

Anyone who is a fan of whodunnits, will need to know only a few things:

  1. It stars Rowan Atkinson in the titular role as an serious and intense detective
  2. The series is set in 1960s Paris
  3. The episodes are 90 min long and anthological
  4. The plots are interesting and will keep you guessing
  5. It is extremely refreshing to see Mr. Bean being so serious that he forgets to eat. This will throw the viewer off more than anything else

It is an intelligent series with slight bits of red herrings when it comes to solving the case. The most interesting part of the series are the relationships of Maigret with his constables and his wife. they all have single minded determination towards serving justice and respect each other. Not something commonly portrayed these days.

Unfortunately the series got cancelled after 2 seasons, both the seasons are worth the time.

A must watch for all suspense lovers.

Fleabag

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primevideo.com

Rating: 5 out of 5

Starring: Phoebe Waller-Bridge, Sian Clifford, Olivia Colman

Streaming on: Amazon Prime

Seasons: 2 seasons, 6 episodes each

SPOILERS AHEAD!

Season 1: Fleabag is a screw-up. She doesn’t take anything seriously, making life around her chaotic. She owns a struggling cafe, her best friend recently died (accident or suicide, unclear), her sister (Sian Clifford) is massively successful and married, her father got into a relationship with a woman who hates her after her mother’s death. So life is not going well and she is not helping matters. She gets into physical relationships indiscriminately. She doesn’t like her sister’s husband, but he likes her a bit too much, her and alcohol. Even though her relationship with her sister is rocky, she tells her about the husband coming on to the fleabag. That confrontation fired back and she is forced to look at her life’s choices.

Season 2: Fleabag turns her cafe around with the help of a loan from the bank, hasn’t talked to her sister in a year and has ended the unhealthy relationships. The family comes together for her father’s engagement party, along with the priest (Andrew Scott). He is the one person in the whole world who notices Fleabag talking to the audience. The season tackles with Fleabag’s maturity into a person who is taking her life seriously and dealing with the unpleasantness.

END OF SPOILERS

The whole series is beautiful. It is funny, smart, emotional, profound and overall a blast. It is so clever that other than a few characters, Fleabag’s best friend, her on-again-off-again boyfriend and her sister, no other character has a name. Andrew Scott stole hearts with his new-age priest character (named Priest). The interactions of Fleabag with people around her give the correct emotions we need to feel, frustration, longing, sadness, love. The Priest’s speech in the end is something to go back again and again and get perspective on love. This series is a definite must watch.

Rukh

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IMDb.com

Rating: 3.5 out of 5

Starring: Manoj Bajpayee, Smita Tambe, Kumud Mishra, Adarsh Gaurav

Streaming on: Netflix

Divakar Mathur (Manoj Bajpayee) has died in a car accident. His son Dhruv (Adarsh Gaurav) has returned from his boarding school for the funeral. The death has opened a lot of questions about Divakar’s business, as he had been cheating by his friend and business partner Robin (Kumud Mishra). Divakar owed his employees salaries and the police was inquiring about fraud on his part, all a plot to frame him by Robin. Dhruv had been an angry kid, breaking the legs of his classmate in a quarrel, thus shipped off to a boarding school. He wants to find the real reason for his father’s death and get justice for him.

It is a simple movie with few characters and linear story. The creators did try to make it into a thriller, which it isn’t. At all. It is a quest of a son to get to the bottom of the mess, with people around him protecting him from the truth. All the loops and shock-value scenes are quite necessary. Get over those, and there is a beautiful story about a man’s protecting his people and his values and a son reconciling with the biggest loss a boy can.

Younger

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https://www.amazon.com/Younger-Season-2/dp/B019MZID16


To watch or not to watch: Definite watch for a night in

Starring: Sutton Foster, Hillary Duff, Debi Mazar, Miriam Shor

Streaming on: Hotstar.com

Liza’s husband has left her with a teenage daughter and a need to find a job to support them. at 40, the job market proves difficult for Liza and at the suggestion for her best friend Maggie (Debi Mazar), she pretends to be 26. This lands her a job at a publishing house as an assistant to Diana Trout (Miriam Shor) and becomes friends with Kelsey Peters (Hillary Duff).  She has everyone fooled including Josh, the sexy tattoo artist she dates.

The series follows the career and exploits of Liza as she is always in a whirlwind of her “real” life and “young” life. There is much for her to learn to keep up with the millennials and not get caught in her lie. This is a massive thing she keeps from the people close to her and this adds to all the drama in the publishing world.

It is a guilty pleasure which is superbly written. All episodes end on a cliffhanger and the viewer can’t help but binge to find out what’s going on in Liza’s life. The characters lead a busy life with endless parties, book-readings, dinners and what-nots. There are 7 seasons announced till now with each season having single-digit number of episodes. Only seasons 6 and 7 have more than 10 episodes (yay!). The series is very fast paced and has amazing soundtracks. Though it does get a bit slow in season 3, it picks back up. Season 6 is a bit of a downer, where there aren’t as many twists in the characters’ personal lives (the thing which keeps the viewers glued to the screen with popcorn).

In addition to the main storyline, there are many issues addressed like feminism, sex, drug use/abuse, LGBTQIA and the rapidly changing society – accepting people with any and all life choices. Indirectly, it also targets the changing career choices of millennials,

All in all, a good watch for a quiet night in with ice cream or popcorn.

CRIMINAL JUSTICE

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headlinesoftoday.com

To watch or not to watch: Better watch the original BBC Criminal Justice or the American series The Night Of

Starring: Vikrant Massey, Pankaj Tripathi, Jackie Shroff, Mita Vashist

An innocent man Aditya (Vikrant Massey) is in the wrong place at the wrong time. He is regular college student, looking to get to a party by driving his father’s cab. A pretty, rich girl gets into his cab looking to hire and asks him to take her from one location to another and was obviously on drugs. Because of the delay, he misses his party and the girl invites him over to her place, where they drink alcohol, do drugs and have sex. Aditya wakes up in the middle of the night and finds the girl stabbed to death. He remembers nothing and tries to flee the scene of the crime with the murder weapon in hand. Ensues a long legal battle, Madhav Misra (Pankaj Tripathi) being the constant as legal help on the outside, even though he is way out of his depth in this case. Aditya also becomes street smart in the jail with Mustafa’s (Jackie Shroff) help, who runs a gang in the jail. The whole experience strips Aditya of his innocence and takes his family through emotional, financial and societal roller coaster.

The series is a play-by-play adaptation of The Night Of starring Riz Ahmed and John Tuturro, which is in turn an adaptation of the BBC series called Criminal Justice.

It is a 10 episode series which could have just as easily been wrapped up in 5; it is unnecessarily stretched. Pankaj Tripathi outshines everyone as always, playing the role of a down-on-his-luck lawyer with the heart of gold with élan. He is eccentric with little social skills and gives comic relief along with intensity seamlessly. Vikrant Massey is believable as a wronged college student and the character arc throughout the series is heartwarming. Jackie Shroff is given a lot of screen time to appease the star of yesteryear and is the only actor the series could have done without. If someone is watching the series, they can simply skip the parts with him in them.

There is nothing exceptional or attention grabbing in the direction or cinematography – it is primarily about acting and secondarily about the plot. It could have been much better if the social issues like the drug abuse amongst youngsters and class discrimination had been woven into the story line and made part of the reason of accusation, but they lost a lot of opportunity to make the series stand for something and be more than just storytelling. Viewers can easily swap Criminal Justice with The Night Of, which is also on Hotstar.