Shefali Bhushan has definitely got an enjoyable winner on her cards with ‘Jugni’. It’s light may not dazzle you, but it sure is a shiny little blob gently floating along the path on a cold wintry night! 

There is less melodrama here than your average tinseltown diet. Many scenes, in fact, make you feel patriotic, even if you are not generally prone to such feelings. The human strength, especially in numbers, is what stands out at the end. The art-lover in you may still lament that the film could have been more restrained, but to find a mainstream Bollywood film that still manages to tell a powerful tale while pleasing the audience is good enough! It may not be an Argo, but Airlift is surely a must-watch. 

Chauranga makes an engrossing watch, although one wishes there was more to its story.

While using chess as a backdrop is quite an interesting idea, one wishes the writers and the director made good moves and clocked themselves too. Overall, the film is neatly shot (Sanu Varghese) and paced (Vidhu Vinod Chopra, Abhijat Joshi). But that simply does not work its charms. The ‘leave your brains behind’ policy may work for this film; if you don’t question it, you may enjoy it! 

The only thing good about the film are the refurbished car-chairs that are strewn around Raj’s garage. So, you could check that out if you are really keen. But, as long as you trust my word, I would say skip Dilwale, and go for Bajirao Mastani, instead.

Bajirao Mastani is a must-watch, but set the right expectations before you go in! Don’t look for a complete meal, or even one to fill you up. Go there much so that you remember the feast by the number of exotic dishes, although in the middle of the night, you may still feel a little under-fed and hunt for a snack!

The film is good in parts, meh in others and has its share of fun moments, especially when ‘the neighbour’ (Anuj Choudhry) is objectified by all the women, while he washes his car, shirtless. But every sequence ends up with a “we-are-trying-to-do-something-important-here” tone and spoils all the fun. After the end credits have rolled to a song that I’ve already forgotten, I can’t make up mind if I liked the film or not.

Although he charmingly weaves in a lot of elements to break the mold in Indian cinema, there are still elements that struggle to keep it mainstream – the search for romance needed fulfillment, the pain- an antidote. Had he released Tamasha after having made it as art for art’s sake, we probably would have seen a great film.