Just another cinephile

Courtroom dramas are a staple in cinema. Time and time again, viewers have expressed great interest in watching law play out like a game on the screen. However, the most popular courtroom dramas present the set of truths to the audience before they are manipulated to appease the law. Justine Triet’s “Anatomy of a fall” is a courtroom drama, which flips this cliché.  The most interesting aspect of the film lies in how it manages to mask the truth throughout the film. The event is placed right at the start and everything that the audience learns about what happened leading up to it is along with the court itself. The evidence is presented for the audience to make judgements along with the court. The trial is a rather sensational one, only if the murder is proved. Thus, the media and the court focuses on the absurd evidence that it is able to find as proof of motive. The rather clever title foreshadows the hare-brained investigation by the judicial system. A man has fallen from the to...

Kiran Rao’s impressive yet simplistic “Lapaataa Ladies” is an attempt to break down feminist ideas into its most basic principles. The film uses long standing bollywood cliches in an effective manner to convey its central ideas to the audience. These cliches are borrowed from the now overused “small-town film” playbook. This can vary from incompetent policemen, uneducated dwellers of the village, a misogynistic older generation and long shots of agricultural fields. The film never shies away from its familiarity and instead uses it to strengthen its messaging.  The film tells the story of two newlywed women who are accidentally interchanged. The interchange happens due to the “ghoonghat”, a tradition in the country which is used to conceal the identity of women. The interchanged brides are both given polar opposite characteristics. One woman has seen this mishap as an excuse to break free from the patriarchal norms that the society tries to coerce her into. The other woman begi...

“Because, fame encompasses judgment, right?” A person’s sense of humor is an amalgamation of very personal life experiences. It encompasses life itself and sugarcoats it to be softer to look back on. Hence, to be a comedian is to show the world the biggest part of your personality. To then be rejected as a comedian in front of the world is to be rejected as a person itself. Facing rejection as a comedian can be the most vulnerable moment of an artist’s life. To be looked at with admiration through the person’s humor is mostly what a comedian craves and hence any gaze from that direction is welcomed without any prejudice which can sometimes lead to the most terrible choices.   In this instance, the stand up comic is the show’s leading star Richard Gadd who is also its writer and creator. It is a retelling of his personal experience of being stalked by a woman during his initial days as a comic. The show not only delves deep into this harrowingly fearsome experience but also ...

  Toxic ideas of masculinity have always had some elements of violence hidden inside. It is considered that the physical strength of a man is essential to determine his self-worth and the proof comes from acts of violence. In Girish Karnad’s 1979 film, “Ondanondu Kaladalli” he explores the terrifying connection between these two elements of a man’s world. The film is an ode to Japanese Samurai films, while also being a critique of both the ruins that affliction of violence brings and the legacy of destruction that it leaves behind. Two brothers are at loggerheads with each other to claim ownership over a large stretch of land. The protagonist is hired to lead the battle for one of these brothers against a formidable opponent who has created a reign of terror favoring the other side. A violent saga between these two sides ensues leaving one of them to emerge as the stronger side and thus, ownership. The man who expected to be rewarded for his victory is disposed of without even re...