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This review contains spoilers. Tread lightly but do tread. 

Language : English | Running Time : 134 Minutes | Director :  Sriram Raghavan

Sriram Raghavan’s “Badlapur” starts off looking like he has been watching too much of Haneke’s “Caché” or Hitchcock’s “Rope” and it very well might be the shot of the year or atleast the best opening sequence in an Indian film this year. If in “Rope”, Hitchcock opens the film with a shot from the window, the viewpoint of a man looking down at the street opposite him and in “Caché”, Haneke shows us the vantage point of a street camera, in “Badlapur” Sriram Raghavan goes one further and makes the street scene seem like we are bystanders. The long shot gathers the workings of an ordinary Pune morning where two men bring down the shutters of a building, a woman is buying flowers with her child in hand, a guy is selling his wares and a cop is on his beat. Traffic is moving along on MG Road, Pune. All the while, we feel like bystanders who might be waiting for the bus or drinking tea from the neighbourhood tea vendor’s stall. There’s action but the enormity of the scene doesn’t register, not until a woman, Misha(Yami Gautham), is jumped and her car is used as a getaway vehicle by two bank robbers, Laik(Nawzuddin Siddique) and Harman(Vinay Pathak). In both “Caché” and “Rope”, the scene is supposed to show us the character’s eye, asking us to identify with the setting but in “Badlapur”, the sudden burst of action takes us by surprise, draws us in and rather than tell, Sriram Raghavan implies that there is something extraordinary taking place. And so we have the posters and the censor certified title of Badlapur always telling us “Don’t miss the beginning”, because here is Sriram’s best scene and one of the most magical of opening scenes I’ve witnessed. It’s beautiful, riveting and pulsating.Continue reading “Badlapur (2015) Movie Review : Dark, Twisted and PMSing Noir Film.”

Director: Sriram Raghavan
Rating: **

“Don’t Miss the Beginning”, the posters of the film ordered. Dutifully, I landed up at the first day first show screening. A Sriram Raghavan film is usually something to look forward to. Ek Hasina Thi and Agent Vinod have their sets of fans and naysayers. But Johnny Gaddaar is universally liked. True to its claim, the film begins with a terrific ‘post-heist’ scene. A casual shot of a road in Pune ends up as a double murder of a mother and child. The sudden shift from calm to violence will have your heart pounding. One of the perpetrators, Vinay Pathak escapes with the loot and the other one, Nawazuddin Siddiqui has no option but to surrender. We learn that the aggrieved father/husband is Varun Dhawan who for once, emotes the way one would emote in real life. Without resorting to theatrics. Nawazuddin denies he had anything to do with the murder and does not divulge details of his partner in crime. He is sentenced to twenty years in prison.

Continue reading “Badlapur Movie Review: Random Acts of Violence”