Blink

Synopsis: Apoorva, working as a back drama artist and part-time editor encounters a kind of hallucination where an old man approaches him to inform a truth regarding his path. Who is the old man and why is he following Apoorva?

I honestly don’t know where to start from, mainly because too much happened during the course of this 146 min Sci-fi thriller. Apoorva is shown initially as someone trying to get his life settled. He tried to attend a few interviews for editor but had to reject because of pay scale issues. Soon, the twists start to unravel and genre shifts to time-travel cum time-loop thriller and writer cum director Srinidhi Bangalore managed to succeed in maintaining the curiosity of the viewers regarding how the world of Apoorva and Arivu converge. Usage of the character of Apoorva’s girlfriend Swapna is worth mentioning.

Cuts were nice overall. Editor tried his best to reduce the complexity of the story. J-cuts of Apoorva’s phone conversion with his mother were notable. Background score mainly did the job of maintaining the tension in portions where Arivu appears. Special mention for the usage of specific colours (Especially Red). One of the melody songs was nice to hear.

Key performance to mention is Dheekshit shetty . He did a superb job in his efforts to unveil mystery and conveyed the frustration of Apoorva. Chaithra Achar was impressive though her character had limited scope.

A section of viewers may find it difficult to sit through this movie mainly because of the plot complexity. Narration could have been made more simplistic to minimize the doubts in the viewer’s mind.

As I have only watched Churuli and Indru netru nalai dealing with similar subjects, this movie was a crazy never-seen-before kind of ride , finishing with few unanswered questions.

Verdict: Worth watching on OTT so that viewers can rewind if and when needed. Try to watch it without losing continuity. Also, hoping for more quality Kannada movies to release via OTT, which can attract wider range of audience.

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The story of things

It’s not common that horror or supernatural dramas offer surprise package to the audience. SonyLiv original Tamil anthology series ‘The story of things’ contains 5 short about how old or replaced things communicates with a person.

First episode ‘Weighing scale’ highlights the journey of a struggling actor and problems happening after an incident.Writer really well portrays the conflict between success and guilt.Background score along with the compelling performance of Bharath helps in building tense moments. The only concern was the unnecessary focus on horror part of the episode title though some of them works well.

Second episode ‘Cellular phone’ revolves around Vannamayil (or VM) and her bonding with her mother. Writer initially establishes the conservative nature of mother character and how Vannamayil got adapted to a scheduled life. Dialogues including a story narration in different scenes smartly adds nuances to the narration. For instance: the tale of a dog fallen in a well. Though the horror element is not very nerve chilling, the director maintains the supernatural ambience really well. The Final emotional breakdown was really touching. Aditi balan did justice to her role as the overthinking ‘VM’.

Probably weaker compared to the others, third episode ‘Compressor’ is about the weird incidents happening for a couple when they buy an old model AC. Director maintains the supernatural element throughout by utilizing silence and the sound of the AC as required. Background score manages to create scary moments and effectively bring in the conflict between the interactions of the couple.Main drawback was that the writer never tried to explain those weird incidents unlike the previous 2. Climax remained wanting more for a finish. Slow burning style may not be acceptable for everyone.

Fourth episode ‘Car’ focuses on ‘Brito’ who experiences incidents similar to his childhood memories and shows why travels back to his old house after years. The main similarity of 2nd and this story is that both portray wrong parenting.Siddique nails his role as the strict and abusive father. Shanthanu Bhagyaraj lends equally good support as Britto who carries the trauma and is scared of cars because of his daunting past His performance adds authenticity to the transformation of the character.Unlike the 3rd one, the Director manages to make a clear indication of the hallucination and supernatural elements in the narration.Climax revelation was smart enough and unexpected.

As we say ‘Save the best for the last’, fifth episode ‘Mirror’ is the best of the lot.Sethu, a guy with suicidal tendency witnesses a life inside an old mirror in his new house.Background score maintains the pleasant feel mostly. Interaction scenes of protagonist and girl are joy to watch and refreshment from the dark mood set by the other stories. Anshitha Anand and Vinoth Kishan share a sweet chemistry between them and that makes the short more enjoyable.Climax, particularly the last 5 min turn around seems a bit confusing but the uniqueness complements the unusual ending.
Final revelation will make viewers wonder how this was actually written and that makes this one an engaging watch.

Watch link: https://www.sonyliv.com/shows/story-of-things-tamil-1700001109/weighing-scale-1000203234

Kathmandu connection

Hindi web series, Kathmandu connection is about the personal and professional journey of DGP Samarth Kaushik and his efforts to find the relation of Sunny sharma with Bombay blast 1993.

It takes us first to the busy life of Shivani, a famous journalist. Shivani gets concerned when she gets anonymous calls back to back. She informs it to Samarth. Samarth starts his investigation on and off his duty and it leads him to more trouble.

After finishing the second episode, viewer would expect a cat and mouse game between Samarth kaushik and Sunny. The writing felt flat and plain without much exciting elements. Execution focuses more on the emotional angle without focusing more on investigation thriller angle. For instance: execution of Samarth’s breakdown scene in the hospital carries a lot of intensity and that makes it memorable in the end .

The real turnaround in this series reveals in the final episode and the twist that shifts the perspective was really amazing. It answers few of the questions regarding the previous episodes. For instance: the Sunny- Shivani romance felt a bit long initially but made sense in the end. Songs and background score were fine enough.
Amit Sial really puts up a strong performance as the grey shaded Samarth who is a dedicated cop but vulnerable father and husband. Shivani is yet another neatly written character, who leads a solo life. Aksha did a decent job as Shivani. Others too were fine with their role. Special mention to the actors who played Samarth’s companion officer Shravan, Shravan’s wife and CBI officer Hitesh.

Though Kathmandu connection isn’t without drawbacks, it is underrated in terms of its quality.(It looks like much of the SonyLiv contents are underrated because they aren’t great in marketing). Just watch it on SonyLiv. It won’t be a waste of time for sure.

Watch link: https://www.sonyliv.com/shows/kathmandu-connection-1700000716

Other recommendations in SonyLiv: Ram singh Charlie, Welcome home (Hindi), Dithee (Marathi), Thaen (Tamil- emotional drama), Kasada tabara (Tamil- hyperlinked stories).

Paava Kadhaigal

Paava kadhaigal is an anthology set around how society prioritize caste, religion and honor over Love .

First one directed by Sudha Kongara is the best of the lot for me. Saravanan (Santhnu) is in love with Suhra but his friend and Suhra’s brother Sathar ( Kalidas) does the intermediate to join them but he loves Saravanan as well. Sudha Kongara weaves a magic of intense emotions and makes the viewer feel for Sathar. Background score plays a key role in attaining it. Kalidas puts up an extraordinary performance in a challenging role.

The second one directed by Vignesh shivan is about twin sisters Aadhilekshmi and Jyoti lekshmi (Anjali). What will happen if their father comes to know that one of them is a lesbian. Vignesh shivan informs about his intention in the opening scene itself. He adds up dialogues to think about and adequate amount of emotions. Though songs were good enough, background score failed to rise up to the occasion. Narrative tone changes to black humour towards the end and that somewhere reduces the final impact of the short. Still, i found this one as a good short.

Third one directed by GVM is all about how a family reacts to an unfortunate incident to one of their daughters. Simran’s strong performance leads this short .Frames were so beautiful.( Hill top shots and Mirror shots).Dialogues hit the right note. Background score gives that tense feel needed for this short. Staging of a pivotal scene was a bit less convincing. In total,it is a hard hitting tale with a good message.
Vetrimaran’s shot narrates the story of reunion of a pregnant Sumathi (Sai pallavi) and her father (Prakash Raj) after she eloped with a lower cast guy and the family suffered a lot due to this.What happens when the family is getting ready for her baby shower ceremony? We got to see a beautiful chemistry between Prakash Raj and Sai pallavi in the beginning.Both the actors score towards the end though my pick of the duo is Sai pallavi who really conveys the pain of the character. Vetrimaran’s writing keeps the characters organic.

The biggest positive of this anthology is that no shorts were terrible or average. Each short bagged a story to say and it succeeded to do so.Few shorts had flaws here and there but keeps the viewer occupied and get carried away with it.

There is a reference to the plot of the final short in the beginning of the third short. As this is an OTT release, viewers can easily note this. So the order of the last 2 shorts could have swapped.

Watch link: https://www.netflix.com/in/title/81341216

Awe!

After Watching this psychological,horror,sci-fi,fantasy thriller,i remained of another telugu film C/o kancharapalem because of the anthology mix and convergence nature. Here,beyond the convergence and the social issue,awe amuses the audience with the layering and tight portrayal of each character.

Awe follows a bunch of characters -egoistic magician,’YouTube’ chef, drug-addict,watchman cum scientist and a biker cum psychiatrist. The tale unfolds in a cafe parallel to the portrayal of mental conflicts of Kajal Agarwal’s character.How one meets other in a conflict and what is the conflict form the crux of the story.

Direction makes the tight script even tighter with apt switching between the stories. and confuses the audience.Taut editing doesn’t let the audience to try to predict the proceedings or climax. rich visuals and bgm creates the mood optimally.Sound design excel in many portions especially horror parts.The only reason i thought of not giving full marks to the movie is the lack of clarity in the statements of Devadarshini’s character .It is negligible compared to the quality of the kind of experiment of Prasanth varma.
I don’t know why is this film named ‘Awe’?

Kajal finally gets a good role and she performs it well too. Nani as fish and Ravi teja as tree (both voice)offer little humor.Regina as the drug-addict too gives earnest performance. Dialogs are nice especially Nithya menon’s character tells about the love between 2 women that itself is a fresh idea.

A marvelous,bit complex unique experiment for movie goers.

Rating:4.0/5