We all look for inspiration from popular culture in times of distress and Bollywood has told many coming-of-age stories, where underdogs make it big. While most underdog stories are too grand to fathom, Udaan’s simplicity struck cord with teenagers and young adults instantly. The film doesn’t attempt to conceal anything behind its small-town setting and […]

Inspired by the true story of a notorious thief named ‘Bunty’, Dibakar Banerjee’s second film ‘Oye Lucky! Lucky Oye!’ is as quirky as its name. It comes across as a witty comedy, with colloquial dialogues, peppy music, and a few elements of mainstream Bollywood films, but in reality, it is a dark, satirical take on

Frustrated with the administration’s failure to bring terrorists to swift justice, a common man takes matters into his own hands and holds the government agencies at ransom. Everything about ‘A Wednesday’, the plot, execution, and performance, is simple and straightforward. The film stood out as a unique offering from an unknown director and sent out

Countless dreams blink and vanish in a country which is becoming increasingly competitive at every stage of life. Taare Zameen Par aimed to attack the problem at the very beginning of this cycle, when the dreams are the loudest. The lead character Ishaan (Darsheel Safary) is depicted as a symbol for today’s childhood. His mind

‘Chak de!’ is essentially a love story starring Shah Rukh Khan, only the beloved is India. India has immense passion and potential for sports, which was channelled through cinema for the first time by this Shimit Amin film. It was the first film to draw attention towards the state and relevance of other sports in

Rang de Basanti exemplifies modern India’s understanding of patriotism and it promotes the sentiment in the most energetic way possible. The only way you can get the youth to talk about the true meaning of patriotism is by igniting the passion that drives it and that is what the director achieved with this film, forcing

The portrayal of cops in Bollywood had always been in shades of Black or White, barring Govind Nihalani’s Ardh Satya (1983), before Ab Tak Chappan changed the scenario. The film follows the life of a crime branch inspector and encounter specialist Sadhu Agashe (Nana Patekar), famous for his 56 kills. There are no emotional, patriotic

Adopted from a book by the same name on the true events of 1993 Mumbai bomb blasts, Black Friday is a riveting piece of cinema. The film narrates the cause, the process, and the aftermath of the bombings in such detail and honesty that it can easily be confused with a documentary. It comes with