Manjari Gupta

What a bore this movie was, so much so that I couldn’t watch it in its entirety. Skipped through most of it so this is not a real review. But whatever I caught, it was pretty unwatchable. Characters were unlikable, dialogs were meh and logic was thrown out of window. One thing I didn’t understand from the start, where did all the town’s people go when disaster started? Did they evaporate in thin air? I hope there was some answer in the parts that i missed, not holding my breath for it though. Julia Roberts and Ruth were so badly written, they were a pain to watch. Kids were very bland, the ‘Friends’ bit was lengthy and out of place. Ethan hawk’s statement about him being useless without his phone and gps didn’t seem realistic because people don’t admit these kind of things about themselves so quickly. It was more about filmmakers trying to make a larger statement about our society’s dependency on technology, which they couldn’t show effectively so they told us through one of the characters. I would argue he was not useless, even when filmmakers were deliberately trying to portray him as moron. He made it back home despite all road signs being gone, with the most substantial piece of clue about whats happening. But then writers decided to discard it like a trash, not that character’s fault. Mystery unraveled and we were told that probably no one was in charge. This could be an interesting story if we were ‘shown’ how it unfolded instead of being ‘told’ how a conspiracy theorists would frame it (step by step, literally!) They could have at least shown us the local government or authority figures failing and turning on each other so it felt like this could be happening at a larger scale too. Didn’t understand the ending neither do I care. Good things : location was gorgeous and camerawork was great. Acting was good too but no one can care for actors if we can’t care about the characters.

Loved the movie! Starting to realize that you cannot go wrong with a Madhavan movie. His movies are always watchable and his acting is always rocking. The movie had a gripping drama with the mystery element lurking behind it. Writing & direction was quite good and was only elevated by solid performances. The runtime and pacing was perfect, they didn't waste anytime getting to the meat of the story. Could have fleshed out the marriage of our central characters a little more through flashbacks (maybe?) but what we got was good too. The only weak link was the leading actress, she looked pretty & sexy which was the requirement for this role but she wasn't convincing enough to play such a complex character. It could be writing or directing problem but it felt like more of a acting problem. Her role in the hands of more experienced women in Bollywood would have taken this movie to the next level. My friends & I played the casting director game and the verdict was in favor of older actresses. We thought the likes of Vidya Balan, Rani Mukherjee, Sushmita Sen or Samantha would have carried it well. I am sure there must be someone in current generation too. But Khushali did her best, she is new and would love to see her grow. Aparshakti was the MVP of this movie, his lovable idiot bit was a pleasure to watch. He did a lot of heavy lifting in his scenes & these could have been enhance if he had someone as emotable as him to play off against. Madhavan & ACP's scene together were also pretty good, their fight & calming down had a lot of layers, given the complexity of their motivations. Loved the movie all in all. Would look out for director Kookie Gulati's next movie.