Harsh Vardhan

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I enjoyed the movie very much. Was a well made biopic which gave good insights into the life and struggles of one of India's first female combat IAF pilots: Gunjan Saxena. The movie leaves an emotional impact, especially the way the father-daughter emotional bond has been portrayed. Throughout the movie, Gunjan Saxena is shown fighting a war against a casual sexist attitude of both the society as well as the Defence Forces who believe that women cannot become pilots. Everyone apart from Gunjan's father is shown to dismiss Gunjan's dreams of becoming an IAF pilot. While some people had criticized the trailer of the movie, saying that it showed the IAF in bad light, I think any female who enters a male bastion has to deal with some existing prejudices against females. While the movie might have shown some excessive discrimination, I guess the first batch of female pilots, would surely not have had it easy. Acting wise..Janhvi Kapoor does a decent job...she cannot be called very good as she fumbles in very emotional scenes. Pankaj Tripathi is the star of the movie who holds the movie together even though he does not have much screentime compared to Janhvi. Angsd Bedi as a potective but slightly sexist brother and Ayesha Raza Mishra as a conservative mother are also good. Vineet Kumar Singh and Manav Vij as Gunjan's superiors having opposite mindsets have also done a good job. The direction of this movie is top notch. The movie maintains a tight grip on its main plot and never deviates even a bit. A special mention needs to be made of debutant director Sharan Sharma and writer Nikhil Mehrotra. The movie is neither over emotional or jingoistic. It maintains a very good balance of emotions, which tugs at your heartstrings. Overall this is a must watch.

Gunjan Saxena: The Kargil Girl

18 likes

Wow, a great Indian web series. It is an interesting watch with concepts of psychiatry and mythology mixed in just the right proportions to make up for an intriguing watch. While Abhishek as Avinash Sabharwal (who plays a psychiatrist), has the most meaty role in the series, Amit Sadh also has an extremely important role to play as an action oriented cop who suffers from a guilt trip. Nitya Menen who plays Abha Sabarwal (the wife of Avinash Sabharwal), does not have a very well written role but still she manages to make an impact in a small role. The other main character is Ivana Kaur who plays the cute 6 year old daughter of the Sabharwal couple. Her cute act will bring a smile to your face whenever you see her inspite of the fact that she gets kidnapped in the v beginning of the show. While the show starts off on a great note the interest level is at its peak in the 1st 4 episodes. However the biggest drawback of the show was that it reveals the most important secret almost midway into the show. Once you get to know that secret, it simply becomes a cat and mouse game and the thrill level is lowered to a huge extent. The show has some interesting sub plots like the camaredie among the crime branch officers is worth watching. Also the brief interations between Kabir and Meghna (the girl who gets crippled due to a mistake of Kabir). Their soft romance has been handled very subtly and it does not go overboard. However the chemistry between Avinash & Abha as a husband & wife who share the grief of their daughter being kidnapped, has not been handled as well. The almost detached way in which they carry out the mind numbing tasks given to them by their daughter's kidnapper is somewhat of a letdown. However overall it's a good web series with good thrills, however the timing of the big secret reveal is not correct. That dampens the spirit to an extent.

43 likes

Very good concept but the execution is faulty. The first half is excellent. You feel the thrill due to the tight direction and screenplay. However the 2nd half according to me is a let down. The director seems to lose her way somewhat and the audience is left puzzled with too many things happening all at once, some of which make no sense at all. The mystery created in the v beginning of the movie is an interesting one. As the story unravels you start connecting some dots while some dots still remain unconnected.However somewhere in the second half the movie seems to drag at points trying to create suspense by creating multiple subplots which seems unnecessary. However overall it's a nice attempt and takes an interesting stance on the #metoo movement.

Guilty

10 likes

Mardaani 2

Well directed..well acted and a story that needs to be seen and heard by everyone. Ok it was not as good as a No One Killed Jessica (in a similar genre). As everyone knew the story of Lakshmi Agarwal, so there was no scope of suspense in this story. But the thing I liked about the movie was that in spite of dealing with such a serious issue, the movie had a perfect mixture of light and heavy emotional moments which is v necessary to connect with the audience. It was not a sob fest but rather focused on the fact that even an acid attack survivor can lead a normal life, fall in love, party with colleagues and fight for the greater good. Vikrant Massey and Madhurjeet Sarghi have done complete justice to their roles and leave an impact almost similar to that of Deepika Padukone. The direction of Meghna Gulzar is very nuanced and each moment has been well thought of before finalizing it for the movie. The reaction of Malti, her parents and the society in general is very well scripted as to how they deal with the situation at hand.

Chhapaak

20 likes