kushal-2 Reviews

Shri Swapankumarer Badami Hyenar Kobole (2024)

Bengali pulp fiction

[8/10 · 13 January 2024]

Oh I am so happy and nostalgic. I found myself whistling inside the cinema hall after decades, at the entry of Deepak Chatterjee! I forgot I turned 50 a few months ago.

This movie could have been a tad shorter, shorn off some excess.. but that said, it is an ode to first Universe of bengali pulp literature, the page turners of my and my elder bro's childhood.....the collective magical times of that generation.

Smartly crafted, intelligently scripted, passionately acted, luridly costumed....it shamelessly shuts up logic and unleashes a tale of such fun and over-the-top ness.. that we are reminded that it takes a genius to play the fool.

There are touches of nonlinear time flows, magic realism, subtle digs and sarcasms...references to cult movies...but these are plastic words and let me stop here.. simply go and dive into it.

Kakababur Protyaborton (2022)

Please don't do any more Kakababu movies

[3/10 · 2 September 2022]

The 3 is just for the animal footages, though I could have seen them on any infotainment channel. The brand promos are really painful, the dialogues based on another series' character are in poor taste, the acting mostly bad all across the cast. I must specially mention Anirban Chakraborty... now that I have seen him in several roles, it seems the expressions are always the same. And the person who played Santu. Believe me, I have grown up reading Kakababu stories from the time Anandamela magazine was small in size. The Santu portrayed by him is nowhere close to the image I have and if I go by the popular sentiment from many other reviewers here, I seem to be in sync.

There is hardly any story. And the lyrics.... seriously?

Tirandaj Shabor (2022)

The best Shabor yet?

[9/10 · 30 August 2022]

Probably the best Shabor movie, that is saying something, they are all pretty decent. Shaswata is brilliant, all other actors did really well, the script and pacing is tight... can't find much fault with it. Arindam Sil has again nabbed it. Cinematography, music, editing... ticks all the boxes. Whodunit is a difficult genre to master and there is no dearth of good characters and directors in Bengal who are regularly adding to the archives. But the Shabor stories have found their own place of pride... we await them.

I sincerely pray that Shirshendu babu goes on penning more Shabor thrillers and Arindam Sil and the team continues adapting them. These are for keeps.

Lokkhi Chele (An Angel's Kiss) (2022)

Relevant message

[7/10 · 26 August 2022]

As with most Kaushik Ganguly's films, this too is based on a social issue and well crafted. The mindsets portrayed are difficult to uproot, but the film clearly tells us which path to walk.

The script has some flaws and is a tad too sentimental, but is mostly well paced and acted. Special mention for Churni Ganguly, Ambarish Bhattacharya. Music is good.

Feludar Goyendagiri (2022)

Not good, lacking in many aspects

[5/10 · 5 July 2022]

I shall not compare the casting with the original actors in Ray's own classics, but Tota Roy Chowdhury could not do justice to the character of Feluda. He is a good actor otherwise but somehow looked really out of place here. I could find traces of ideosyncracies of a character he played in a recent mega TV serial.

Lalmohan babu is not a buffoon, he is a foil to Feluda's alpha presence. But here the script rendered him into one.

The script was stretched to fit the 6 episodes.

There was hardly any thrill and build up of anticipation.

The director is a capable one.. I am surprised that he came out with this.

Feluda holds a very special place in our hearts, please do not do this to his adventures.

The Eken (2022)

simple good fun

[8/10 · 14 April 2022]

We are fans of the Eken tribe on Hoichoi, my wife and me... so wanted to watch the first big screen adaptation as soon as possible.

Was not disappointed.. in fact enjoyed it mostly.. missed the Bapi and Promotho of the small screen, but the ones cast were rather acceptable. The storyline was good, a little too many victims to my taste. The locale was nicely portrayed on camera.. the Ekenisms mostly funny. The outcome was predictable but still kept up the suspense. The quientessential Eken is more cerebral in my opinion.. maybe the actions were for the sake of the big screen. Overall a nice movie with room for improvement.. shall look forward to the next episode.

Meghnadbodh Rohoshyo (2017)

Not very thrilling for a thriller

[5/10 · 6 August 2017]

If this was meant to be a thriller I must say I was not too thrilled. Well definitely better directed than most of what gets churned out from the Bengali movie industry, it failed to live up to my expectations. And if I add the general gleanings from the conversations while the crowd broke up after the screening, I would say it disappointed many. Because this was meant to be a thriller I will not spill the beans, but the script could have been much better. There are so many characters who were unnecessary and only added to the flab the script could have done without. The movie was just too long and felt long. The film did not have a proper closure. If the director planned to leave it to the audience to complete it for themselves, I must say that for me it was more of a failure than an intellectual twist. Talking of intellectual overtures, the film is overdone with them, so much that it starts to jar. The investigating cops, with the sidekick habitually mispronouncing English words, were too similar to a duo from another franchisee, and in my opinion was in bad taste. Acting ranged from rather good from Sabyasachi and Gargi to acceptable in Abir and many of the minor characters to wanting in others. Music by Debajyoti Mishra was mostly good. Meghnadbadh Rahashya is definitely worth a watch. But if you go in expecting something very good, I am afraid you might be disappointed.

Fish, Sweets & More (2013)

very nice, impressed

[8/10 · 13 January 2017]

Just watched it on YouTube, it's a really nice movie. Great script, good pace, wonderful acting, crisp storytelling, good camera and music...and Kolkata as a backdrop.

I must say I was pleasantly surprised at the quality. There is a palpable sense of intelligence and sensibility in it that pushes it beyond the ordinary. It's a simple story of life and times of people like you and me, but then to quote Da Vinci - "simplicity is the ultimate sophistication". Don't miss it if you enjoy the works of Hrishikesh Mukeherjee, Basu Chatterjee and like..it is similar stuff, just more contemporary.

Letters from Iwo Jima (2006)

the mirror of all wars

[10/10 · 6 March 2009]

I am neither an American nor a Japanese. I was born in a time when the world war 2 was already a surreal memory, etched in B&W photographs, something that happened almost a '..long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away...'. and the peeps i had of it in films over the years almost always wanted me to take sides, which i mostly did.

Letters from Iwo Jima was not about winners or losers. for a change it showed humans against the backdrop of a war the like of which, lets pray, will never darken our lives ever again. humans who look not a bit like me, from either side of the dead. but so much like me, you, everybody from all times, imprisoned by circumstances, doomed to die in war or peace, nowhere to hide but full of dreams, hopes, desperation...

it made me feel so proud.

and so sad. so very sad.

Thank you Mr. Eastwood.

WALL·E (2008)

Wall 2 wall magic!

[10/10 · 4 September 2008]

It was only after the screen went blank that I rose from my seat at the theater, even the credits were so beautiful! Take a bow Pixar, WALL E is now the benchmark in animation movies.

If a great film is everyone's mirror, a story beyond the confines of time, space and language, complete with brilliant cinematic creativity, then WALL E is as close as can be to that peak.

See it to believe in simplicity, to believe in love, beauty and each other, to go digging back through the layers that have piled up on your heart over the years and touch that seam of glow that words fail to describe...and see it to feel ashamed of our heartless attitude towards this unique blue planet.

But above everything see it to feel proud of WALL E and Eve and all their friends, bots and human, that here is great hope when we listen to our hearts.

Thank you WALL E and all you beings from our future, for weaving us a dream to believe in.

Anand (1971)

Are we forgetting to make films like anand?

[10/10 · 1 September 2005]

a masterpiece, though is better appreciated if you've had an Indian upbringing, especially in the kind of life we used to live in the last century. but that should not stop anybody's heart from being moistened by Anand - its that kind of a film which makes you feel that cloudy ball in your throat, a feeling we hardly have today.

i never saw Anand on big screen, i.e. a theater, didn't get a chance to. but seen it countless number of times i have, each leaving me haunted by that epic last scene, and each letting me discover another gleam in its brilliance.

A great story, in fact that storyness of it struck me first, its difficult to come across a character like Anand's (Rajesh Khanna)in real life, laughing his way to the end. it is for souring such larger-than-lifeness one sees cinemas at times. Amitabh as Dr. Bhaskar with wells of life just under his brooding exterior, was a giveaway at such an early stage of his career that he was destined for a place much beyond the ordinary.

Hrishikesh Mukherjee crafted it to perfection. Salil chowdhury excelled with some of the most melodious tunes ever and the co actors could reach the lofty heights the film dared them to.

but finally it was Rajesh Khanna. yes a shade melodramatic, a touch idiosyncratic may be but you can't deny the vivacity with which he demands your attention, slowly takes over your heart and you don't want him to die and when he does your tears tell you that you just been watching a film.

yeah some films can make you do that. not a tear jerker, but a weller-up of them. its not good in a way though, 'cause it makes you search for such standards ever since, and the disappointment is bitter. but then there's always the DVD and the remote!

Mangal Pandey (2005)

Is this what we waited for 4 years?

[2/10 · 1 September 2005]

I should have voted 1 for awful, but did not on account of my indebtedness to Aamir Khan for what he did before this.

Surely not what I paid my money for. to think of they charge you for the crispier and coke over the ticket price and then give you vouchers saying free! thank god for that on second thoughts as they were probably the only things I had for support to endure the celluloid ordeal before me.

Of course i admit a cinema, as a medium of independent visual art, ought not have linear correlation with history (otherwise known as recoded facts) but at least we should have been forewarned about this! Why is the movie called Mangal Pandey? It should have been called Gordon and none would have been wiser.

What did the movie try to be? a costume drama? an effort to invoke patriotism? a record of history? a mêlée of incongruous song and dance sequences that left us stunned? a didactic attempt on the cleansing effect the Raj had on the caste system of India? all? none?

well i am sorry to trouble you with so many question marks, but to be honest they still linger on my mind, days after I emerged jaded from the theater. How on earth did a person as Aamir Khan, who comes across to me as somebody who's got his marbles in place, have so much invested into this film?

Lets not talk about the hills in Barrackpore, a place in the flat- as-a-TV gangetic plains of Bengal, the immortal Tom Alter as the iconic 'Gore log' of Hindi films still at 2005, Amisha Patel in a you-blink-she's-gone role, and finally the music. even talking about it is a gesture it does not deserve. may be on cassettes, but not here.

waste of time. if you have a special corner still left for a person called Aamir Khan, you won't miss anything if you give this a wide berth to oblivion.

Permission (1987)

a bend in the road to the best romantic film ever

[10/10 · 10 May 2005]

ijaazat is gulzar at its best. the film takes off from the moist surreal world of dripping branches with panchamda's out of this world music right into the heart of the characters. this kind of love we have left behind in the last century, when the world was slower, the skies more blue and there was still some magic left in the affairs of the heart. thoroughly enjoyble, be prepared to give in to feelings you never knew to exist within you. nasiruddin, rekha are in the performances of their lives and anuradha, you can't help falling in love with her. the music deserves special mention, panchamda finally created something to allow aashaji to come out of the legendary shadows of her sister.