Sneha Jaiswal's Blog, page 230

Maaran Trailer Review – Dhanush Is Kent Without A Cape

Disney+ Hotstar dropped the trailer for Dhanush starrer ‘Maaran’ and it looks fun as hell, even if unrealistic. But who cares? We want to be the kind of butt-kicking investigative reporter he gets to play in the upcoming 2022 Tamil movie. He gets to be on the cover of multiple magazines for crying out loud! When was the last time you saw a Indian print journalist on the cover page of anything huh?

Director by Karthick Naren, the film will be premiering on March 11th on the streaming site. The plot is pretty straightforward – Dhanush plays a badass investigative journalist Maaran who believes in publishing the truth and taking the system head-on. When he exposes a scam, it rattles those in power, who in turn to try to silence him. But it’s a Dhanush film, so you know he is not going to go down without fight. Maaran gets to beat a lot of goons in style, there was an exciting metaphorical action sequence of the journo jabbing the bad guys with a pen. A nod to the classic quote ‘the pen is mightier than the sword’. Maaran is basically like Clark Kent, without the need of a superhero alter-ego. The teaser looks like a complete commercial crowd-pleaser.

Heck, with all the media bashing we’ve keep seeing in most Indian series and movies, maybe Dhanush playing hero scribe will be both super-entertaining and may even help redeem the image of news reporters. Fans cannot wait for this one.

The Fame Game Review – Like A Bollywood Christie Mystery

By Sneha Jaiswal (Twitter | Instagram) [Scroll to the bottom for an video version of the same review]

Just like its teaser, the 2022 Netflix series starts with dozens of paps clicking away pictures of top Bollywood actor Anamika (Madhuri Dixit), as she steps out of her car for a red-carpet event, dressed in a resplendent red dress, matched with a dazzling smile. A nostalgic tune on the sitar mixed with just a hint of mystery plays in the background, as Anamika talks about how she is blessed to have all her fame, along with a loving family. The same night she goes missing, and the police investigation unravels the secrets of a complex unhappy family drowning under the pressures of being under constant limelight.

So what’s happened with Anamika? Was she kidnapped? Murdered? Or did she run away on her own? Created by Sri Rao, it becomes apparent in the first few minutes that the series is going to heavily rely on Madhuri Dixit’s charisma to carry the story forward. The diva who is headlining a OTT series for the first time, doesn’t disappoint. However, as the show progresses, the younger stars who play her kids, equally shoulder the responsibility of keeping things interesting. Lakshvir Singh Saran and Muskaan Jaaferi play Madhuri’s children Avinash and Amara, delivering poignant performances. Their talent shines in some of their more intense emotional scenes, that are usually challenging for other young stars.

Sanjay Kapoor as Dixit’s onscreen husband is completely unlikable as the guy who gets to marry a superstar and blow her money, which is a compliment to Kapoor, because he plays the negative part with a rogue elaan. Suhasini Mulay as an emotionally abusive matriarch of the family, who practically forced her daughter into showbiz, gets some of the nastiest lines, which she delivers with deadpan aloofness. Manav Kaul as superstar Manish Khanna, felt like a weak link in the show, because even though he is a good actor, he just doesn’t seem convincing as one of the biggest stars in the industry. Anamaika and Manish Khanna are portrayed as a legendary onscreen couple, like a Shahrukh Khan and Kajol, the kind of pairing audience is willing to pay good money for, even 20 years later, but Kaul unfortunately doesn’t exude that big screen persona.

What Sri Rao does to keep things interesting is that he plants a lot of red-herrings throughout the story, basically, he peppers the plot-line with deceptive characters that will make viewers suspect them for Anamika’s disappearance. By the first half of the second-episode some viewers will be pretty sure who the culprit was going to be, but that didn’t turn out to be the answer. Which was good, because it would have made the show extremely predictable and disappointing. But ‘The Fame Game’ is a lot like a Agatha Christie mystery, where there are multiple suspects, but the setting is completely Bollywood themed, with some cliche characters, old-school sentiments and heavy dialogues. There was a ‘Darr’ (the 1993 SRK-Juhi Chawla thriller) like stalker sub-plot, which was creepy & cringe-y, on the lines of “I would rather fast-forward these bits”.

That’s not say that the story isn’t modern, instead it’s an awkward mix of tropes from the 1990s, along with some refreshing representation of present day problems and themes. For example, one one hand the makers show an out and proud gay cop leading the investigation into the actor’s disappearance, on the other hand you have a hetero cop spewing regressive lines like “if I were a man who lived off my wife’s earning, I would kill myself”. It’s as bad as implying women who live on their husband’s earnings should off themselves. And then there’s the who sub-plot about how a top super-star is nothing but a puppet in the hands of her manipulative mother & husband, both of who constantly gaslight her about her worth. It gets quite frustrating to watch at points, to see a supposedly famous successful woman slowly suffocating in her own house.

Overall, ‘The Fame Game’ is worth a one-time watch, especially if you are a Madhuri fan, you will probably fall in love with her again. Just like her character Anamika, Madhuri does light up the screen with her smile. Her performance falters a little is some scenes, especially the ones with her daughter scenes, they feel more like an inspirational coach speaking to a student than a woman to her child. It’s hard to decide if the actors lack a connection or if it’s the cold preachy dialogues, but going by Madhuri’s convincing performances in better written scenes, it’s probably the latter. Madhuri and Lakshvir Singh Saran make a great onscreen mother-son, you can feel the tenderness and concern in the moments where Anamika is trying to get her son to confide his problems.

The show is 8 episodes long and the climax is strongly foreshadowed in episode 7, which turns out to be a pretty good twist, but by the last episode, Sri Rao throws in another ‘last-minute’ kind of twist that changes the table again. And while I wasn’t a fan of the ending, because it wasn’t in sync with the characterization of a protagonist, it fits in with the title of the series – ‘The Fame Game’.

It’s a 7/10 from me.

Has ‘All Of Us Are Dead’ Ushered An Era of Zombie-Vampires? #Halbies

I have been waiting a few weeks to write this piece because it would mean including a lot of spoilers from the Netflix zombie show ‘All Of Us Are Dead’. But now that it’s been some time since season 1 came out, guess all those who would’ve been potentially pissed over spoilers, might have already seen the series by now.

The primary plot focuses on a group of high-school students trying to survive a zombie apocalypse, hoping they would be rescued by the military eventually. As soon as I was done seeing the first season, I couldn’t help but think of how the Korean show is probably steering towards a new era of the ‘zombie-vampire’. Let me explain…

In the series, a virus spreads through the population that turns them into rabid thoughtless human-eating beings. They are quick on their feet, but their vision is impaired, so they rely on sounds to follow people. However, in a major twist, some of those affected by the virus manage to retain their intelligence, so they can see, talk & emote like their regular selves, but develop a strong affinity for human flesh. A character in the show hilariously refers to them as ‘halbies’ – short for half human and half zombie.

In a bizarre but convenient explanation, a character in Episode 9 explains to the military how the ‘halbies’ can be asymptomatic and show know signs of being infected. “She tests both negative and positive, depending on when we test her,” a military medical person say. The virus is said to have mutated in these cases, ‘hiding in the RNA of cells’ and can be detected only when it manifests, so the affected don’t display external signs when it’s dormant.

That’s why one of the primary protagonists – Namra – who turns into a halbie, looks normal even after being bitten by a zombie. However there are times when her eyes go blood-shot red and she gets a strong urge to bite off her crush’s face. She fights back the animal instincts and continues to be with the main group of human-students trying to survive and with her enhanced half-zombie senses, she is able to help reduce the chances of her friends dying.

The series ends with the high-school students finally making it to the Quarantine Zone, while Namra hangs back, fearing detection. So she stays back in the bombed district, while her friends go on to live in the military run quarantine camp at the border. Three months later, the zombie breakout is said to be largely contained, but residents from the ground-zero district remain in quarantine due to fears over the unpredictable nature of the zombie-virus. The high-school students who survived decide to go back to their school and see if Namra is doing okay.

So season 1 ends with a cliffhanger, where the teenagers go back to the terrace of their school, and Namra jumps to the roof like a super-human. There’s a mildly emotional reunion and Namra explains she had been doing just fine, hanging out with other halbies like her. In a cryptic claim, she says she still has a lot of things to do. She then says “they’re back, I’ll be back soon” and jumps off the roof. Everybody looks bewildered and scared as she practically flies off. End credits.

Namra jumps off Everybody goes ‘WTF?’

Who is back? And what does Namra intend to do when she is back? Did she lure them back into the city so that they could be served as easy dinner for her halbie friends? Even if that’s not her intention, will her new friends resist the urge to eat up her old pack? Or are they planning to see and build a strong halbie army of their own? After all, the pack that survives made a damn good team. There are a multiple possibilities that can be explored in the next season.

The smartest thing for these halbies to do would be to blend in, live like the great old vampires from classic Gothic fiction or like those from the more modern comic-series ‘American Vampire’ by Scott Snyder. All they have to do is pretend to be completely human, lure their victims, eat them and ensure nothing is left of them. Because it’s made pretty clear that there is no guarantee that a halbie’s bite will turn the victim into one too.

At this stage of the series, we don’t yet know if these half-humans would enjoy eternal youth or near immortality like vampires. We do know this, they are stronger, faster and heal like wolverine, so they already have an advantage over the rest of the species. So the halbies from ‘All Of Us Are Dead’ simply have to take notes from another Netflix show ‘Castlevania’, where vampires have infiltrated the human world, living largely normal lives to avoid being slayed, feeding on animal blood, reserving human killings for special occasions. That’s not to say the Castlevania vampires keep a low profiles… nope… most of them a rich folks living in fancy castles and a lot of them are royalty/regional leaders and generals (the show is set in the 15th century). Or there is the more recent Korean vampire-themed 2021 show set in present day, “The Sweet Blood”, where vampires carry around animal blood in flasks.

So if Namra and her gang play their cards right, there might become the new bosses of the world. They could go on to become mayors, police chiefs, business heads, billionaires or even the head of the nation, who knows…. and so, there will be a dawn of the Zombie-Vampire era in Korea. Or rest of the world.

By Sneha Jaiswal (Twitter | Instagram)

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Ep 66: 5 Things That Keep ‘All Of Us Are Dead’ Alive

Two Distant Strangers – Two Ways To Look At It

Inspired by George Floyd’s murder, the short film ‘Two Distant Strangers’ (it’s on Netflix) looks at the life of a young African-American man stuck in a time-loop – he constantly relives the day a cop kills him.

Travon Free has written and co-direct the 32-minute long story with Martin Desmond Roe. It stars Joe Bada$$ as Carter, a young designer who just wants to get home to his dog after a date-night out, but is shot by a cop called Merk on his way. After he dies, he wakes up the same morning again, and again, and again. Each time he attempts to outrun or outsmart Merk… but each one ends in his death, even if in a different manner.

Actor Andrew Howard was pretty much the perfect pick for ‘bad cop’ Merk, he just gives off such a killer vibe in the uniform. If somebody needed to cast an intimidating looking Russian assassin, Howard would be an easy pick for the part. And if his IMDB pictures are anything to go by, he has probably already played something similar.

The film is crisp, pacy and dives into the conflict without much ado. One scene is eerily similar to the manner in which Floyd died, complete with the expression “I can’t breathe”, so for a second it feels like the makers are trying to make a mockery of the tragedy. Because imitation of real life events can be interpreted in multiple ways. For some, the scene may be in bad taste, for others it is a graphic repetition necessary to remind viewers of the kind of asphyxiating discrimination African-Americans face on a daily basis. Carter becomes a symbol for each young person finding themselves at the wrong side of the gun for no apparent fault of theirs. During one of Carter’s many deaths, his pool of blood takes the shape of Africa. Many viewers might miss the symbolism, so here’s a still from the short.

For the ending, the directors go in for an unconventional open-ended climax, without resolving the time-loop conundrum, leaving the viewers with a cliffhanger open to interpretation. And while one can imagine a thousand possible endings, there are largely only two ways to look at the message of the film – one is the easier pessimistic take that the white cop is always going to be an animal baying for the blood of an innocent black person, that no matter what you do, nothing’s going to change. The other more metaphorical & positive way to look at it is from the lens of hope – even when one feels trapped in a system of injustice, waking up every day to the same terrible sequence of events, you have to get out of that bed and fight back, until some day… things change.

There have been allegations that the movie has been plagiarized from ‘Groundhog Day For A Black Man’, a four minute short written & directed by Cynthia Kao. After watching and forming my opinions about ‘Two Distant Strangers’, I went on YouTube and saw Kao’s film, and it’s easy to see that Travon Free has definitely taken off the idea for his production from there. In just 4 minutes, Kao’s story packs more punch, is wittier, funnier and has a more positive open-ended climax.

Watch both films.

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Ep 66: 5 Things That Keep ‘All Of Us Are Dead’ Alive

Kissable Lips Review – Fleeting Fluff Piece

With eight episodes that are just ten minutes long or even less, the 2022 Korean mini-series ‘Kissable Lips’ is fleetingly fluffy. Actor Kim Ji Woong is 500-year-old dying vampire Jun Ho masquerading as a college student. To survive, he needs to find a ‘pure-blooded’ human, make them fall in love with him, so drinking their blood would turn him into a human too. Unless the English captions were wrong, that’s the plot of the story.

Luckily for Jun Ho, he stumbles upon Min Hyun on campus, a cute pure-blood. But as the two spend time with each other and grow close, Jun Ho is faced with a moral dilemma and mistakes of his past. While the basic plot is interesting on paper, the series just doesn’t have the time to let the characters grow. So it ends up looking like a quick high-school play about two good looking people frolicking around. It’s hard to comment on all the vampire folklore included in the story, because it’s all made up, so applying any sort of logic would be futile. For example, the vampires in the show can play basketball under the blazing sun and they won’t even get tanned, forget burn to their literal deaths.

Kim Ji Woong has a broody handsome face that fits perfectly well with the kind of vampire image ‘Twilight’ fans would expect. In-fact, this is the second time he is playing a vampire lead in a series, he had the same kind of role, just slightly darker, in the 2021 mini-series ‘The Sweet Blood’, which has an eerily similar plot. Actor Yoon Seo Bin who plays pure-blood Min Hyun, looks like an adorable human panda, but cannot emote well or maybe it’s because his character is so naive that his part feels dumb. And while it’s easy to digest that two obviously attractive looking people are quick to fall in love with each other, all the tension & drama that ensues is awkward to watch, because their relationship feels like a one day dating app hook-up turning into a marriage proposal.

‘Kissable Lips’ is made for teenagers looking for some fluffy brainless romance to watch in their free time. The lead couple looks amazing together, too bad the story is too shallow, because despite an emotional climax, most viewers wouldn’t feel a thing, except maybe relief that the show is finally over.

It’s a 5/10 from me.

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Ep 66: 5 Things That Keep ‘All Of Us Are Dead’ Alive

Kimi Review – An Absurdly Fluid Minimalist Thriller

The trailer of the 2022 thriller ‘Kimi’ lets viewers know the film is about an agoraphobic tech worker who discovers evidence of a violent crime while going through a data stream. Now it’s up to her to bring the crime to light, but first – she’ll have to overcome the darkness of her own fears.

Directed by Steven Sonderbergh, the plot takes time to build-up, because the runtime is under 90 minutes, so a lot of us expect the conflict to begin in the first few minutes. Zoe Kravitz plays the blue-haired Angela Childs, a young woman who lives in a rather spacious Seattle flat and is afraid of stepping out of its safe confines. We see her have conversations with her mother, neighbor, potential boyfriend, dentist and a passive-aggressive therapist. But the back-story of why the protagonist suffers from Agoraphobia is conspicuously missing, except for a brief foggy explanation that doesn’t really help much. With little known about Angela, she isn’t exactly very likable, but Kravitz nails the part. The actors playing the antagonists however are forgettable.

Angela works for a tech start-up that develops a smart virtual Alexa like assistant called ‘Kimi’. Sonderbergh cleverly mirrors modern fears surrounding such tech, touching upon the much debated question – ‘are they always listening?’. Visually, the movie is slick, and we don’t get an overdose of depressing dark tones that hang over thrillers. In-fact, some parts of Kimi look like an absurd fantasy play, especially due to the interesting choice of background score during a particular chase scene.

What really strikes you about this film is just how simple, minimalist the thriller is, and yet packs in as many themes as it can – mental health, therapy, strained family ties, fake social-media feeds, sexual assault, violent crime, problematic big tech firms, stalking, #MeToo, skewed justice system, bureaucracy and what not. So despite a near perfect pace, with things flowing smoothly, the story feels underwhelming by the end. Sonderbergh has fun with the script written by David Koep, by bending genres and playing with stylistic elements. Some stuff is straight out of comic-books, like villains popping up out of nowhere or hackers living with their moms (or grandmom?) wreaking havoc remotely.

There are two climactic twists, one that’s quite problematic because it glorifies creepy behavior, but the other one about Angela fighting back the bad guys was pretty gratifying. Don’t we all love a ‘wronged victim to hero’ plot?

It’s a 6.5/10 from me.

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Ep 66: 5 Things That Keep ‘All Of Us Are Dead’ Alive

Ali Wong: Don Wong – TV Special Review

Like all sorts of celebrities, Ali Wong found new fans in the middle of the Covid19 pandemic, during the first lockdown, when we all didn’t have an option but to watch something at home if we wanted to ‘chill’, and those additional admirers include me. Her uncensored honesty about the hardships of pregnancy, delivery and being a new mom in the 2018 TV special ‘Hard Knock Wife’ had me in splits. Cut to 2022, Wong still makes a few mom jokes in her new special, but moves a step ahead and talks of the monotony of modern monogamy, her hilarious colonoscopy and of-course – her extra special hubby.

Dressed in a cute read leopard print dress with matching red-glasses, Wong takes some time to get to the good punches, so the first 10-15 minutes or so aren’t as hilarious as fans may expect it to be. She starts off with what feels more of a rant, about the problems of finding a good man when you are a rich successful woman; then moves on to how male stand-up comics have so much more incentive to do what they do. Wong’s best bit in this special is perhaps when she talks about how she dreams of cheating on her husband every five minutes, going on to hilariously explain why she’d probably never act on it. Probably.

Wong’s ability to mix slight theatrics, with dramatic pauses at the right moments, with wild/inappropriate gestures will have viewers in splits. Especially women, because her content his high on ‘male vs female’ issue, like how men are often rewarded for cheating, but wives will be banished into the kingdom of shame. She then goes on to elucidate about her desire of wanting it all, a ‘side piece’ along with a family and career to applause from the audience.

Akin to the previous TV specials, Wong doesn’t shy away from using a lot of personal material, which she blends with clever puns and explicit 18+ jokes. But it’s not all about sex, marriage and feminism, there’s a hilarious section on her getting a colonoscopy, where Wong recalls the doctor telling – “Ali, you are full of shit”. Depending on the kind of humor you prefer, you’d either be grossed out by some jokes or have a hard time controlling your laughter.

Watch it with some friends. Maybe avoid eating if you have an over-active imagination.

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Ep 66: 5 Things That Keep ‘All Of Us Are Dead’ Alive

Heart Shot – Short Film Review

By Sneha Jaiswal (Twitter | Instagram)

“Adrenaline Rush”, “Explosive”, “Exciting” – these are the tags someone at Netflix chose to describe the 2022 short film ‘Heart Shot’. The 19-minute long movie has been directed by Marielle Woods, who has also co-written the script with Lauren Ludwig.

The first few minutes just don’t fit in with the description, although it does keep your curiosity up about what’s going to happen next. Actors Elena Heuze and Nia Sondaya plays girlfriends Nikki and Samantha respectively, two teenagers who want to have a future together but Nikki’s dark past complicates things for them. So what starts off like a cute but sweet looking romantic tale, does take a sudden ‘exciting’ turn, but it is far from explosive.

The twist towards the end is interesting, yes, but it’s just so random and disjointed, that the viewer is left exclaiming “huh?”. And then you rationalize your decision to stream the short by saying “oh well, not bad for a 19 minute film”. Which is true, it’s a forgettable flick that you can watch during your snack break, without worrying about streaming something larger and then reluctantly pausing it to go back to work and more constructive things in life.

The lead actors don’t seem to be very comfortable with each other and the script just doesn’t give them much. The climax is made chaotic by some weird-ass background music, which sounds like a combination of people trying to breathe after running. Otherwise, the movie is shot quite well, the production quality is great, but the 19 minutes have a “prologue” vibe to them, as if it were a really long trailer for a series. It feels incomplete.

But not a bad pick for a 20 minute break. It’s a 5/10 from me.

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Ep 69: The Dangers of Smoking In Bed – Spoiler-free Book Review

Demon Slayer Entertainment District Arc Review

Demon Slayer’s new season ‘Entertainment District Arc’ promised to be a fun ride, with the first episode setting ground for the story to unfold in Tokyo’s Yoshiwara, which is home to the city’s pleasure industry.

Plot Overview – The three young demon-slayers Tanjiro, Zenitsu, and Inosuke are led by the flamboyant Hashira (a high ranking slayer) Tengen Uzui to the entertainment district to sniff out demons hiding in the brothels. The three boys go undercover dressed as girls into different brothels to help find Tengen’s partners and also uncover monsters passing off as courtesans.

The first few episodes are quite entertaining, with the boys trying their best to pass off as demure girls, while being on their toes. Some of it was pretty hilarious. The makers do a great job of explaining how things work in the pleasure district, giving viewers a quick lesson on the different ranks of courtesans and the inner workings of brothels. A lot of the details in this episode is inspired by the real Yoshiwara, which used to be a licensed red-light district, and continues to be home to establishments that deal in the sex-trade.

Just like the previous season, team Ufotable (the studio) does a fantastic job with the animation, conjuring up a fascinating historical slice of Yoshiwara, complete with all sorts of courtesans, colorful night processions, traditional painting and some rhythmic periodic music playing in the background now and then. There isn’t much to complain about in the art department, however some more variations in secondary character faces would’ve been nice.

Just like Mugen Train, the primary trio & Tengen have to fight one high-ranking demon called Daki, who is just as ruthless and formidable as older villains. The first confrontation comes in episode 4 and the face-off between the slayers and Daki goes on till the end of the show and was a little too prolonged. While there are some fun action sequences, it wasn’t as thrilling as the battle in Mugen Train. For a 11-episode season, some of us were hoping there would be more demons and twists in the tale. An intriguing cameo of the demon-leader Kibutsuji in a new form in the first episode is never followed up, so that was another let-down. Nezuko’s character see some growth, quite literally, but like expected – she gets to come on screen only during dire circumstances.

The biggest problem with ‘Entertainment District Arc’ is that the characters OVER-EXPLAIN & overthink everything. Instead of going by the classic rule of ‘show, don’t tell’, we get an overload of unnecessary narration, even though the scenes are self-explanatory. For example, if Tanjiro gets injured in a scene and his fingers start to bleed, Tanjiro will have an internal dialogue on the lines of = “Oh no, the demon injured me, I have hurt my fingers, my fingers are bleeding and it hurts a lot, this is not good, I need to stop my fingers from bleeding and worry about fighting the demon”. It’s like they are narrating the episodes for 8-year-old kids, but funnily, the series has a 16+ rating.

For fans, ‘Demon Slayer’ continues to be a good distraction, but the writers really need to up their game with the villains and fight sequences. This should have been a 5 episode long affair. It’s a 6.5/10 from me.

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Ep 69: The Dangers of Smoking In Bed – Spoiler-free Book Review

The Dangers of Smoking In Bed – Book Review

We take a spoiler-look at the contemporary horror fiction book ‘The Dangers of Smoking in Bed’ by Mariana Enriquez in the latest podcast episode of Abstract AF. It was shortlisted for the 2021 International Booker Prize.

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