Author: Rad

Puzhu – Impressive psychological drama with a political commentary

Official Trailer: Puzhu is a psychological thriller beautifully imagined in a home invasion genre. Better way to say, it is the invasion of the mind. Kuttan, portrayed by Mamootty, the brahmin protagonist feels his territory is being violated when his sister, Bharathy, portrayed by Parvathy Thiruvothu, moves in with her husband, Kuttappan, portrayed by Appunni Sasi, in the same apartment complex. Kuttan feels the environment is polluted by their moving

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KGF: Chapter 1 & 2 – Salaam Rocky Bhai

Official Trailer: KGF: Chapter 2: KGF: Chapter 1: [SPOILERS AHEAD…] “You don’t become a Don by killing 10 people” Above is the question posed to Rocky by one of the henchmen of Don Shetty of Bombay. We don’t hear the comeback from Rocky immediately. We hear it once Rocky proves why Shetty must fear him. And then we get the retort I didn’t become a Don by killing 10 random

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All of us are Dead – Zombies are the Winners

Official Trailer: The Strong Are Now Ripping Apart the Weak. It Happens All The Time When Hollywood ran out of ideas with Zombie Genre, Train to Busan movie came along which reimagined Zombies, brought them alive on a train and gave us a nail-baiting thriller ride. Train to Busan felt like Mad Max: Fury Road on a train. By the time the climax arrived in Train to Busan I was

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Squid Game – Writer is the Winner

Official Trailer: Here, the players get to play a fair game under the same conditions. These people suffered with inequality and discrimination out in the world How do you take a simple children’s game and turn in to a game for adults with deadly consequence? If you win the series of games, you get to win and keep billions of dollars. The setup is designed by rich people to have

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Freedom Fight – Ringside view on what Freedom means from different perspectives

Official Trailer: So far there are very few anthologies where all the stories worked. After Sillu Karupatti, all the five stories fare better, cross the above average bar, giving something fresh in Freedom Fight. The impact of each story comes out different. Ration and Old Age Home are subtle and leaves the interpretation to the audience. Geethu Unchained conveys the freedom aspect in a straightforward manner, nothing overdone but no

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Veyilmarangal – Trees under the Sun – A Biting Reality narrated with an excellent craft

Official Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2KqZoyBQo7c We would have come across security guards in malls, corporates, gated communities. We would have come across delivery boys. We would have seen cleaners in hotels. We know most of them have moved from other places. Migrants from far away states. Unlike us who migrate to dreamlands for a better living, this segment of population moves out of their native villages to get a job, any job,

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Vertigo and How I kicked the Aliens Out of My Head

Disclosure: This article also published within the organization I work for. Posted here with permission from organization. Invasion of the Body Snatchers: I still remember it vividly. It all started Sep 1, 2021, early morning. I get up to use the washroom, comeback and lie on the bed. As my head hit the pillow, ceiling started rotating, don’t exactly remember clockwise or anti-clockwise. It lasted for around 10-15 seconds. Got

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Bhoothakaalam – A textbook approach on how to generate scares effortlessly

Official Trailer: It is hard to slot Bhoothakaalam into a genre, a horror, or a psychological thriller. Or is it a psychological-drama-horror-thriller? You can infer the title as the past or the ghosts from the past. Like the series The Haunting of Hill House, do the ghosts lurk in their minds or are they really lurking in the shadows of the house. From the first frame, director, Rahul Sadasivan, skillfully

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Putham Puthu Kaalai: Vidiyatha – 1 dud, 1 miss, 3 OK types

Official Trailer: How do you make someone to watch the 5-story anthology? Start with one of the worst in the pack. Set the bar low. Then hope relativity kicks in. Even so-so later episodes look better due to the priming by the first one. That is how Putham Puthu Kaalai: Vidiyatha comes across. In first Putham Puthu Kaalai from 2020, stories were set during first wave. This one I think

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Fast Cuts – The Power of the Dog, Don’t Look Up

The Power of the Dog: Bronco Henry told me that a man was made by patience and the odds against him Official Trailer: The Power of the Dog falls in the bucket of movies where I fell on the other side of the critics. Critics loved it…but I found the movie a good watch but not on par with director Jane Campion’s earlier outing The Piano (1993). Movie does have

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