Rarely do we get to watch films where we are constantly reading faces minutely, searching for answers, for clues. We do so here and they all remain dazzlingly ambiguous. None more so than the ever fabulous Irrfan Khan who inhabits the persona of a Sikh, a father, a husband, a soul with incredibly lyrical sagacity. Traumatised and desperate, he possesses and exudes spookiness that’s fundamental to connecting with this qissa.

Bang Bang! is pure Hrithik porn.

A star as big and stunning as Hrithik needs grand outings. So the script of K&D was bought, a gorgeous woman signed, locations short-listed and extras handed out a page each detailing their expressions and lines.

…despite its Adults Only certification, doesn’t spend much time in dingy bedrooms, or with the girls. Though it lectures and breathes heavy sometimes, it’s more interested in the men who run these rackets — men you may see hanging out at a coffee shop, or jogging in your colony park.

Katiyabaaz is a funny, moving and very well-researched documentary that’s definitely worth watch. It’s also deeply reassuring. As the wires of bureaucracy cross with political live-wires, a bulb goes off — Ritu Maheshwari. But that we have such officers gives us some hope.

Pizza has all the horror paraphernalia — dead bodies with axe embedded in their heads, little girls with dark circles calling out papa, chaabi-waale eerie toys, doors that slam shut, phones that are dead. Even a red doll. But it’s all restrained, controlled and not hysterical.

All of Pizza’s scary stuff is spiked with humour, and it’s easy on special effects.

As cinema it is absolutely flat. Talking heads talk and they are often repetitive. Director Nisha Pahuja seems to have no sense of the visual medium that is cinema and that makes her rather informative film boring very soon.

The entire film is a conversation between the two men, with just two more characters appearing. It is beautifully sparse and keeps us more than just interested. We are involved. We begin the viewing cautiously, watching carefully to see if the Indian is a bad guy, or the Pakistani. The film allows our prejudice to take its course and then shows us our own idiocy, through the two other characters who appear.

It is both a terrifying and inspiring story and Kukunoor tells it with almost a schizophrenic cinematic narrative that is grim, claustrophobic and gory one moment, and the next breezy, airy and luminous.

Ragini MMS 2 has the standard plot of film within a film. But it’s been used to great effect and impact here. Has just the right amount of mambo-jambo to carry the conceit of horror films forward.

Queen is a well-meaning, well-mannered film that’s funny and packs in small, elevating, but palatable messages. It challenges nothing. It just shows an Indian girl slowly, gently renegotiating life while remaining true to who she is.