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More Than Just Violence, Kill Is an Action-Packed Ride That Entertains!

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  By Avik Basak   “The most violent Indian movie ever made.” Yes, that is the line the makers used to promote the latest Bollywood action-thriller, Kill . Well, no matter how disgusted you feel with the word “violence”, for the promotion of a film, it can do wonders. On top of that, there is the news of its rights being already bagged by Lionsgate Films, the makers of John Wick , for an English-language Hollywood remake. When such validation is coming from, probably one of the world’s leading authorities in action films in recent times, you have to pay attention.   So, how is Kill as a film? Does it live up to the billing of being the “most violent film” that Indian cinema has ever produced? If you are wondering about the answer to that, I have a counter question for you- Is it enough for a film to be just violent to make it worthy of a watch? To be honest, Kill is much more than just a violent film and offers a lot to the connoisseurs of action flicks. The best par...
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A Bit Overlong but Maidaan Is One of the Finest Sports Dramas Made in India to Date

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  By Avik Basak     When I was a kid, I used to wonder why the elders in my family were so obsessed with Indian football when the quality was not nearly as good as European teams. I also used to hear about India’s glorious triumph at the Asian Games which seemed like a far cry to repeat considering the situation of the team at the moment. Well, if you can relate to this, then Amit Ravindernath Sharma’s Maidaan is the perfect film to take you on a ride back in time to what was known as the golden era of Indian football.   The problem we always see in Indian sports dramas, especially biopics, such as Dangal or Chak De! India is that those are filled with an overdose of patriotism. Don’t get me wrong, I am not discounting these popular films as bad or even mediocre as I myself enjoy them a lot. However, we rarely see more focus on the journey, the technical aspects of the sport or the strategy that helps the team or the person reach the final goal rather than wha...
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Swatantra Veer Savarkar: Hooda’s Magnum Opus is a Perfect Tribute to the Unsung Warrior of Our Freedom Struggle

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  By Avik Basak     After watching the final trailer of Swatantra Veer Savarkar that came out a few weeks before the film’s release, I told a friend of mine that I got this feeling that this film could be for Randeep Hooda what Citizen Kane (1941) was for Orson Welles. I simply made the comment because Welles too, despite being an acclaimed actor (primarily on stage) at that point in his career, was untested as a writer-director to helm a film of that magnitude just like Hooda was in this case. Citizen Kane later went on to become one of the classics of all time and turned out to be Welles’ magnum opus. Can Swatantra Veer Savarkar truly be considered as Hooda’s magnum opus in the same sense? We will come to that later.     At the core of the film, is the bonding between the Savarkar family, especially between the three brothers. It is a connection they have developed right from their childhood, due to what they have gone through just to survive. Hooda in...
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