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Baradwaj Rangan

Movies reviews only.

Twenty-one years, and counting…

Posted on January 30, 2024

And it’s 21 years, folks! Or as a friend told me, “Imagine all the useful things you could have done with your life if you’d not had to watch all those bad movies.” Heh, yes, perspective and all that — but I would not have it any other way. Thank you, thank you, thank you all!

The picture below, I hope, is an accurate representation of me while reviewing the debut film of Ananya Panday’s kid, much to the delight of some commenters here.

When I completed 15 years, I wrote a piece. Read the full article on Film Companion, here: http://www.filmcompanion.in/southern-lights-baradwaj-rangan-on-fifteen-years-as-critic/

In which I look back at the time I started out as a film critic, 15 years ago, what it’s like now, and a few things in between.

O n January 30, 2003, my first review was published – that makes it 15 years this week. The film was Dum , made when Vivek Oberoi was a thing, when Yana Gupta was a thing. (Remember Babuji zara dheere chalo ?) Unlike today, when online is the place to be in order to get noticed, it wasn’t such a sure thing then. I put my articles and reviews on my blog, mostly as a sort of portfolio, and things just happened. Through no planning of mine, I became one of the first “internet generation” critics, along with writers like Raja Sen and Jai Arjun Singh. The critics before us had established themselves through the print medium. They were the big names in the newspapers and magazines. We were among the first who developed a following largely through the online community.

This isn’t a nostalgia piece – though I’d say I’m entitled to one. It’s just that I got thinking about how different the scene is today. My first review was published in The Economic Times – Madras Plus supplement. (The other writer on the cinema beat was Samanth Subramanian, who, eventually, ditched plans of being a film critic and went on to greater international glories .) But it was at The New Sunday Express that I began to be widely read. I’d watch a film on Friday, jot down thoughts that evening, write the review all of Saturday, and send it in by Saturday evening, so it could appear on the Sunday paper.

My job description is the same today (except that I review many more non-Tamil, non-Hindi films), but the way I do it couldn’t be more different. I watch a movie, jot down thoughts soon after, write the review and send it in, all in a matter of hours. We’ve heard the saying, “Journalism is literature in a hurry.” Today, it’s more than that. It’s literature with a ticking clock and a gun to the head. I feel lucky I was able to make a mark in slower times. I don’t know what I’d do if I were starting out today, with the constant awareness of eyeballs and clicks, the constant pressure to be the first one out with the review.

Continued at the link above.

Copyright ©2018 Film Companion.

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Rahini David

February 1, 2018

My puns aren’t for all tastes, but I stand by them. They were great. I loved them.

It’s fun going through old reviews. Yep. This is my all time favorite.

“When Rajini took eons after the collapse of Baba to decide on his next project, it appeared he was really concerned about what he’€™d play next,€“ but who’d have guessed he’€™d play Parthiban? Parthiban, in case you haven’€™t been following a certain kind of Tamil film, has perfected quite a comic routine with frequent costar Vadivelu, the kind that makes you smile simply by seeing them appear together, even before they’ve uttered a single line. That’€™s what Rajini is made to do in Chandramukhi”

And congratulations. 🙂

Like Liked by 5 people

congrats! brangan, so i have been reading you for 15 years now

i dont remember the exact moment when i became aware of your voice – which is definitely a distinct voice in the sea of reviews that i was reading at the time in several newspapers and magazines.

was it the Kamal piece that you wrote right after the flopping of anbe sivam? ,-where you compared it with super successful dhool and how and why it flopped – and state of Kamal’s career at the time which mirrored my thoughts exactly – i hope you wrote that

Or was it the review of a riya sen film – think it was Qayamat, where you described Riya’s expressions and body language in a song sequence being, as if she is subjected to a favorite bedroom activity whose name rhymes with moral checks ( – which i am damn sure you wrote it , now that i am familiar with your voice 🙂 )

Anyway , it was one of those moments that hooked me on to you and i have stayed with you ever since. it been a long journey with you brangan – practically growing from a boy into a man with your reviews – and enjoyed every moment of it ,and hopefully, there will be many many more years of togetherness 🙂

I can totally relate to the part where you said now you have to think about including the names of stars in the headline. I used to write regularly on cricket for a cricket website and I had come up with an article which argued that looking at just the 99.94 avg to crown Bradman the greatest ever is flawed. The editor changed my headline completely such that its implication was that Sachin is greater than Bradman. The small bunch of regular readers that I did have we’re aghast and I explained to them that it was not my headline. The editor came to know about this and was like how dare you, you can’t discuss all this in public. 😀

Loved the HR-Darth Vader comparison! 😀

Like Liked by 1 person

I don’t really remember how I found your blog. Through another blog called Passion For Cinema, I guess. Anyway, it’s been, and continues to be, a wonderful and enriching ride for us readers. Congrats!

Aap ka suroor is one of my favorites, the entire review is such a joy ride!😄

Congrats on the 15th anniversary. sheesh, main pointaye vittuten.

Congrats on completing 15 years da, you have come a long way since your bold decision. Remember, this is still only the beginning….you are here to stay, for a long long time! Best wishes! And if I may borrow the famous Onida tag line….Critic’s envy, a friend’s pride!

Like Liked by 2 people

Many Congratulations, BR 👍🏼Have been following your reviews on this blog for 7 years then ☺ The first review of yours I read over here was Band Baaja Baraat , and I was hooked. ☺ I still remember being bowled over by those lines of yours, about Shruti’s angst when she realizes Bittu doesn’t reciprocate her feelings for him.

@BR..Honestly..You are really one Unique Writer. Many Create Blogs to make their voice heard. But I guess yours is the only blog that gives others to Express their voice. This space is like sapling field for any writers . What I like more than you reviews is that Almost “Rajput” Ritual of reading every comments and involving yourself into each and every thread. For me, I see you as someones who inspires 100’s if not 1000’s of people to write something and express their ideas and thought. In this digital age where reading and writing is becoming almost extinct, thats really something. Congratulations and Continue to inspire both the born and unborn Writers.. 🙂

silverambrosia

I loved many of the puns as well. ‘Ghost ghost na raha’ haha! To say that you’re a fantastic and wonderfully witty writer is stating the obvious. Thank you for the many laughs and thought provoking pieces you’ve given us over the years 😃

Ratish Ravindran

Congratulations BR!

Like all legends in their chosen field you have managed to reinvent yourself and adapt to changing times. I am sure you will be the first one to embrace Artificial Intelligence (AI) augmented media and Live streaming videos in future for film reviews.

Wishing you many more years as a film critic. Though i hope that your next avatar is that of a filmmaker – à la Truffaut.

The first time I remembered reading your reviews was when you were with the Indian Express ( the Sunday supplement carried your reviews if I’m not wrong). It had a cartoon of you next to your articles. I was probably in the 7th or 8th grade back then, and I could never really comprehend your reviews, but I remember thinking that you were really catty and that no movie could impress you 😀 Cut to 2013, I discovered your blog and devoured pretty much all your reviews. My favourite reviews of bad films are All in all azhagu raja and Alex Pandian. You were Savage! Congratulations BR!

Congratz :)))

Congratulations BR! Keep rocking. I think at some point you should think about organizing meets up for your readers to get together with you in person, discuss and debate movies.

But I cannot deny that my current job with Film Companion is amazing, because earlier I was in newspapers where cinema was one of the many things covered while, here, it’s all about cinema. From someone who used to write in the print media and then put up those articles online, I am now employed by a publication that’s entirely online. It’s the future, I hear.

I found the ending of this write up a little abrupt. I’d have been really interested to know in more detail about how the film companion job is more interesting than the one with the paper.

I happened to discover today a term for people who have a huge blog following : “Influencer”.

View at Medium.com

Congratulations BR. May you keep writing more and more. I am already an addict for your writings (Reviews and what not!).

You are my favourite movie critic when it comes to Indian movies (not that your takes on other movies are any less..) I’m happy that a film reviewer like you holds court in India (with the proclamations of course free to fly into and ensconce in any part of the world, which they have indubitably done over the years). I have been reading your reviews for close to a decade now, and it is gratifying that your style and technique haven’t been sacrificed at the altar of useless editors. I particularly liked the way you reviewed Varma’s “Sarkar 3” – the movie was different and called for a different kind of a review – and you provided exactly that. Many other critics responded with anger, but there was no anger in your review, only a wise, even wizened amusement. It is so hard to write a movie review without the proforma-format and you practise that art so well. You mentioned Roger Ebert (Oh God, I miss him so much) being business-like in his write-ups but even in his limited-word-count reviews from the 1970s he could be so free flowing – I think that’s what audiences liked so much about him. His review of “Taal” is a tangential masterpiece. And for me, a lot of what he represents lives on in your writings (not flattering you, there’s no need to) – there’s the same personalized perspective and often a stunning humanist insight which I had overlooked in the movie. Here’s wishing an outstanding writer and reviewer like you decades more of illuminating writing. Thank you for being there… Tc

Anuja Chandramouli

Congrats BR! Since we are remembering old reviews how about this one: It was from the Unnale Unnale about Sada’s perpetual expression throughout the film seeming to indicate that she had walked into a particular nasty cloud of flatulence #Rofl 😂😂

Wishing you the very best!! Shine on saar!

Hi BR, congratulations on the super journey so far… I have been a regular reader from your Indian Express days, The Hindu, bitty ruminations, bullet point reviews, your foray into video, your books…

Look forward to reading more from you (as I have said earlier, the badder the movie the better your review :-))

Thank you all, dear readers.

And especially to Ramki Bellur, for the coin he designed for the occasion 🙂

Have put it up in this post.

Like Liked by 4 people

Vivek narain

An adventurer lives on impulse, riding the crest of life only because he takes the wave in the split second where others hesitate. ~L.Charteris. That Darth Vader reference remimds me of the ‘mandela effect’ discussions where we had this contentious issue of the line: Luke I am your father vs No I am your father. Wonder what you remember.

Anu Warrier

I stumbled upon your blog some time in the mid-to-late 2000s. I think you were blogging on Desi something or the other? I remember going through your archives, devouring every word you wrote.

Despite our very stark disagreements on some topics, and my vocal reservations about some of your recent moves, I have enjoyed your writing, and it is that that brings me back, again and again.

I must also thank you for providing a platform where a bunch of disparate people can passionately debate, discuss, argue over films and related topics.

Rock on! Wishing you all the very best.

Hearty congrats on your fabulous journey so far. And best wishes for the future journey too.

Congrats BR!

The first article that I came across is this one

Interview: Bombay Jayashri

And it is still one of my favorites.

And Ramki Bellur rocks!

Arun Pradeep

Congrats BR! You’re a godsend for the Tamil movie industry (I think critics, especially a major critic like you, are part of the industry) and we’re lucky we have you. While it would be wrong to label you a Tamil film critic, as your writing covers a much wider range, we’re super glad someone like you wrties on Tamil films. Like Mammooty would say, “Unakku avangellam irukkaanga. Enakku nee mattum thaana da irukka!” 😛

Vidya Ramesh

Congratulations on the 15 yrs BR..your words have kept so many of us company on so many days ,thank you for being you! My favourite one is the Zanjeer review. I read it repeatedly over a week and loved it everytime! And the loosu ponnu bits..from I don’t know which movie though. They were hilarious.

So my main takeaway from this piece is that you’re old and by association as a long-time reader, so am I. Thanks, Sunshine! Anyway, congratulations and…thank you. Fifteen years on, nothing quite equals reading your writing on a motion picture.

Greetings BR! I loved your review. I read your review to understand cinema better, to improve my (reading) comprehension, to improve my writing (in a structured away and also densely) and of course to save money by avoiding some movies

Congratulations, BR! I am not a movie buff but your awesome writing and interactive comments section have kept me hooked for several years now. Wishing you many more successes and may you never stop writing. Cheers!

February 2, 2018

A few years back I read a fantastic long form essay about Vikram on The Caravan. I raved about that article to everyone, but did not know who the author was and didn’t bother to check 😛

Thankfully a couple of months later while talking to a friend about Dhobhi Ghat, he pointed me to your review. I enjoyed your writing and review as much as the movie: hearing a quartet and extrapolating in one’s mind as to how an orchestra would sound. I have stuck around ever since then.

Wishing you many more years of writing about films and hopefully for films 😉

I used to frequent on IMDB and read people like Roger Ebert, AO Scott and Wesley Morris for my movie fix. Alhough I knew about Mani Ratnam and watched so much Indian cinema in Hindi, Bengali, Telugu, Tamil, Kannada and Malayalam, I read the beginning of CWMR and was stunned. I realized my knowledge of Mani Ratnam was so miniscule compared to you because I wasn’t there at the time though I could relate to it. I didn’t even know about your blog until I read your review of OK Kanmani 2 years back.

From that point onwards, I can proudly say I am hooked on BR. I have read almost all your reviews from 2003 to today and I find them to be educative, enlightening, hilarious and full of love for movies. I don’t think I am even 1% close to you in knowledge and writing about movies.

Thanks for improving my vocabulary and my Indian cinema history and knowledge. And I would like to thank you for introducing me to a brilliant community of readers whose perspective on life, history, movies, music and the rest have shaped me into becoming more tolerant and less judgmental of others. Unlike many people here, this blog has made me less nostalgic, because to me there is no perfect period for Indian cinema and music; each decade (whether it’s the 40s, 50s, 60s until today) has its greatness and shittiness intertwined.

Congratulations on the 15 years and I wish you all the success! Please keep up the great work!

After going through the comments, I got a bit curious as to when did I first visit your blog (not sure whether it was wordpress then). As per my Google web history, it was April 27, 2010 that I google searched your name for the first time.

This is one link (it doesnt work now) I visited around that time:

https://www.bitsaa.org/news/20414/2007-Baradwaj-Rangan-Baddy-bags-National-Film-Awards-for-Best-Film-Cri.htm

Bravo, B Man! Like the best Porn Stars (male), you’ve demonstrated awe-inspiring vigor, stamina and endurance in your chosen field.

Not for you the flaccid prose of hacks who read like all their research came from production notes (This actor very awesome, and his shirt ripping will make audience clap and whistle, meesic ok with 2 nice dance numbers other songs not very good, photography give us nice color and foreign shooting also make the feast for the eye. This movie will do amazing business in A,B and C centres. This movie is paisa vasool).

No sir, you’ve got a raging hard on for penetrative analysis, and while you occasionally tease us with just the tip…of your insight, most times, you’re plunging headlong, with deep thrusts into….a movie’s subtext, it’s motivations, agenda and craft, never stopping until you locate that sweet, sweet spot inside my…brain which then opens up in delightful comprehension as it then goes ” Oh! Oh! Yes! Yes! Dear God! THAT’S what I was looking for. That precise word or sentence to describe what I felt about a particular scene or performance which I was struggling to articulate!”

I’ve had the odd niggle or 2 about you finishing a little early or abruptly, but most times you climax at just the right moment, with a last squirt of punctilious puns and wanton witticisms.

So keep banging away….at that keyboard, dear B, and here’s a toast (my morning Bru held aloft) to another 15 years of always rising to the occasion!

Like Liked by 16 people

KayKay: Every time you drop by, I think of this four-letter word ending with “uck.”

I mean “luck,” of course. I consider myself fortunate that my readers are still around.

Do, uh… come more frequently though. 😀

Like Liked by 10 people

I love when KayKay and BR go at it like raging bulls. It makes for stimulating and arousing… sorry rousing conversation. You boys are the undisputed Kings of Kink! May your reign endure and shower us with all things pleasurable.

@Double Kay and BR, weeping softly (Whether because I’m laughing helplessly or because I’m shocked, shocked! – I leave it to you to decipher.)

It could even be duck or yuck or suck or muck, depends on which friday you are in. There are many, as per white queen, the original proponent of ‘many worlds interpretation’ before Hugh Everett-3 was even born.

Venky Ramachandran

Ah When did I stumble upon this blog? Blogical Conclusion days. Around 2007-8. I had a penchant for long, difficult and lonely words and I had then started to blog online, and lo behold, I came across this damn good writer who flaunted those beautiful ornaments as proudly as a Tambrahm mami showing off her diamond necklace in arupathumoovar. I was clearly gobsmacked, and I remember writing an email with feverish excitement back then that I so badly wanted to meet you whereever you are in Besant Nagar. You were perhaps taken aback and declined the offer, and said something vague like, let’s catch up for drinks sometime. I was writing a Travelogue about Mylapore, back then, and without knowing how bad a writer I was then, you graciously offered to find me an editor.

And then, few years later, I met you in flesh form for that animated film with wolf and some stick figures. Although I had no interest in that film, I landed up there because I learned you were going to have a dialogue about the film with the director. It was a rainy night in Chennai, and I vividly remember how you warmed the cockles of my heart by sending me a message in FB asking if I reached home safely after the discussion.

I was thrilled to every fibre of my being, when I saw your first book with MR, and for a long long time, you have been a household name in my friend and family circles. Even my wife who hates to read writers who use difficult words in sentences has started reading your reviews. My wife and I have regular arguments about whether we pay heed to “baingan”‘s reviews ( that’s how my wife calls you) in our decision to go to all kinds of movies, including many Malayalam ones, which we went to, purely based on your reviews. My dear friend, Prasanth Vijay, whose film Summer of Miracles was screened in MAMI Indian Story section, shared all the photos post-screening in our friends group, just because it had “baingan” in them.

If you happen to visit Hyderabad, you are most welcome home Baddy! I know I’ve occasionally commented here in these spaces. But you have no clue how much your writing journey has meant to me in my self-journey as a writer, as a consultant ( for a brief while, i began to see my phenomenological consulting work analyzing startups and corporations akin to a critic analyzing a film in all its glorious shades and depth), as a cinephile, and now as a story teller. Thank you ! May you write more and more and delight us!!

Like Liked by 3 people

edwardssammy

Hi Baddy saar, you might not recognize me as I very rarely comment here, but I have been following you since 2007. As a teenager who loved ‘No Smoking’, I couldn’t find anyone who didn’t hate the film, except you who loved that movie. Since then I have been reading your reviews every weekend. I would like to thank you from the bottom of my heart for providing merriment throughout these years. Even now, whenever I feel depressed, I read your reviews of the bad movies, my favourite being the ‘Shakalaka Boom Boom’ one, to cheer up.

Once again, congratulations on a wonderful 15 years, and I hope (rather selfishly of course) that I get to read a lot more wonderful pieces by you for a long time to come.

Prabho! Baddy vaal! All aseervaadams!

Bharathi Raja

Congrats BR. I have been a fan of your writing and following this blog like a ritual everyday. Best part is reading the comments after your reviews. You certainly rock in new online avatars with no nonsense honest reviews. Thanks for taking the plunge 15 yrs back as there are lots of silent spectators like me who look forward to your works every single day. Best wishes.

"Original" venkatesh

15 years eh ., Congrats BR.

And i still remember the days when you were blogging with someone else. Do you have all your writings stored somewhere and online ?

Would be fun to go through it.

sridharraman

Wow! Tremendous achievement!

I still remember what hooked me on to you. You were reviewing some movie on Shahjahan starring Kabir Bedi and Zulfi Sayed. And this was your comment on the latter (I paraphrase): “Zulfi Sayed looks so underwhelming that, forget the Taj Mahal, one can’t see him building a two-bedroom flat for his lover.”

Congrats BR 🙂 I have watched many movies after reading your reviews.You help me identify cinema in movies. Keep writing.

It’s one of those “where were you when it happened” moments and you’ve totally earned it brangan, give yourself 3 pats on the back for 15 years of excellence. I think I’ve followed your online work from the very beginning thru myriad site changes until you got here. As fabulous as your writing is I’ve always felt that your singular achievement is nurturing this community of passionate and engaged film lovers. It is entirely to your credit that every voice is respected and allowed to breathe. Here’s to the next fantastic 15!

“May your reign endure and shower us with all things pleasurable”

Oh, my dear Anuja, if I was Kubera I’d shower all of you with gold. Ah yes, I’d drench everyone in my Golden Shower.

“Do, uh… come more frequently though”

I’ll try B, but at my age, it tends to take awhile….what with the crazy hours at the office and all…..

Congratulations Brady urf Badesaab urf Baradwaj !! Can’t believe it has been 15 years since your 1st published review ! Can’t wait for 15 more years of your amazing insights reviewing films. BTW, I loved your puns and wished you would bring them back.

Congrats BR! And thank you. Following your reviews for years. I generally save movies you say were good and after I watch the movie months or years later comeback and read your review in full. Wherever you go please keep updating your wordpress blog. And I must say I quite enjoy your video interviews too.

threeisariot

February 3, 2018

Congrats BR! How to make friends go for a movie with you? Tell them “BR loved it”

Congratulations BR! My fridays are incomplete without reading one of your reviews. Good luck for the next 15 and more…

February 4, 2018

Unlike most that commented here, i am a recent frequenter of you blog after having found it during my Dedh Ishkqa days.

Agree, disagree, or agree to disagree – – your style of writing made me stay.

Congratulations Mr. BR and may you keep writing/regaling/entertaining/engaging/inspiring/enticing long, interesting, at times long -winded discussions for many more years to come.

February 5, 2018

Congrats, BR!

June 12, 2018

Somehow I missed this in spite of it having a trackback on this page.

Good one by Ramki.

Extremely Goody Baddy

October 4, 2018

Congratulations BR..

•Anupama Chopra, Rajeev Masand, Bhardwaj Rangan, and other film critics for a Film Critics Guild

•This noted panel thrives to foster a better understanding of cinema by nurturing qualitative film criticism and elevate the standard of Indian cinema

https://www.republicworld.com/entertainment-news/bollywood-news/heres-all-you-need-to-know-about-the-film-critics-guild

Sutheesh Kumar

Congratulations BR, for the successful fifteen years, getting your own fan website and also for the Film Critics Guild.

January 31, 2019

So it’s now 16 years as a film critic. Hmmmm 🙂

Congratulations BR! Eppo treatu?

BR: Congrats. When did you move to India? Was it 2003.

Anand Raghavan

At a time when reviews were just few and far, and excruciatingly low was the bar, yours’ came as a whiff of fresh air Our hearts offered it a special chair

Congratulations BR.

Congrats. The years roll by but BR saar remains the evergreen source of wonderful reviews.

January 30, 2021

Eighteen years, and counting…

Congratulations, BR 🙂

lakshmi: Thank you so much. I knew you’d remember 🙂

H. Prasanna

@BR Thank you!

Shyamala Harigovind

Congratulations Sir! I fondly remember those days when me and my brother would eagerly wait for your reviews (which used to be published on ‘The Hindu’ supplements), sometimes even after watching ‘first day first show’, wanting to read your take on the movie. 🙂

I watched Piku in a late night show at Bangalore and was somehow clueless. Then my friend, a reader of your blog, shared your review, and I thought you saw the film like no one else did – that’s how my journey began here following this blog.

Since the beginning, I could understand many things about filmmaking, thanks to your and my fellow readers’ writings. For once, I saw a critic who didn’t hate masala cinema or mistaked it for the dull hero-centric crowdpleasers. Someone who wished to see good in every bad film, even if it was the size of a raspberry in a heap full of onions. Also, you seemed to be the only one I know who could fearlessly rip Christopher Nolan’s excesses (still would love to read your thoughts on Tenet, which I believe is one of his most ambitious work till date).

Not to forget the Readers’ write in – There is G Waugh (okay, Jeeva), whose write-ups are so diverse and in contrary to what one usually expects here, Madan who seems to have knowledge on many fields out there, and of course the regulars MANK, Anu, Rahini, Kay, Tonks and Anuja (whose book ‘Yama’s Lieutenant’ I read recently). I used to read all you guys post and comment (even argue) but never replied. Don’t mistake me for a stalker – I simply didn’t had an interest to comment back then.

Last year, however, I have started commenting here regularly. And and looking forward to your reviews and the conversations with my fellow readers and commentators. Congratulations and wishing you the best of the times ahead.

Ruminating Aesthete

I have been reading your essays and reviews since The Hindu days. I never agreed with you on everything, but I have always loved your arguments. It might sound a bit over the top when I say that you have shaped my taste; your essays did have a considerable effect on my outlook. In fiction or nonfiction, the writer’s ambitions are not always apparent. When you read the same author time and again their aspirations are more accessible. This creates another layer to the whole reading experience.

Film essayists, critics, film academicians and historians have an important role in the 21st century; they critique the foremost art form of this era. We live in a time when words are turning into mere precursors for the audio-visual. Establishing oneself as a writer with a huge following, in any genre, is no easy job. BR your achievement’s magnitude is significant: a source of light beckoning all the intent wordsmiths, encouraging us to scale (or to at least try out) literature’s professional ladder.

A good critic conveys his opinion on a piece of art; a great one teases out the sociopolitical contexts that influenced the artist to create art in the first place. You are obviously the latter.

Kannan Baskar

Congratulations BR!!!

Congratulations saar!

18 down, 82 more!

Today, I’d write the headline in a more direct manner: “A spirit enters the world of humans in an evocative love story that succeeds more often than not.” I’d probably end up thinking I need to add the stars’ names in there, so that the review will show up better on a Google search. The headline would become: “Shah Rukh Khan and Rani Mukerji shine in an evocative love story.”

Love your earlier headlines.

An interview with Thamarai was titled “Lotus Notes”

Congratulations BR. Don’t recollect when I stumbled across your blog, I have been reading your reviews in print though, but a regular visitor post the first hit. Thanks to your reviews, got to watch great movies normally I would have missed.

Cathy Cooper

Congratulations BR! I read the first Tamil review of my life on your blog – Singham back in 2010. I loved the review so much that I had to watch the movie. There has been no looking back since then, this is the place I visit for movie reviews, very interesting discourses and of late the readers write in. Thank you for this wonderful platform and wish you many more successes here and in FC. Yours are the only Indian cinema related interviews I ever watch. Nothing personal, I am more of a written word person, but you have converted me almost…Three cheers to a phenomenal writer and a preeminent Indian cinema “influencer”!

Nimmi Rangaswamy

Congratulations BR! such a wonderful journey- I am reminded of what you wrote about Pari – “Kathir gives an extraordinary physical performance, but in close-ups, he takes us into Pari’s soul…” It’s such a feeling to watch a great film and get back to your review for those ‘close-ups into the soul of a movie’- The recent bunch of reviews and interviews on Master are extraordinary- especially for spotlighting Lokesh K… and many many movies actors and makers in the 18 years. Your blog is a master class of movie appreciation! Looking forward to decades of delectable writing…

Congrats BR! That’s some serious staying power. Love all the work you’ve done thus far and looking forward to the next eighteen years! In BR we trust indeed! “I believe in Baddy Rangan” would be my Harvey Dent-esque slogan for you.

Also, is it me or does BR look a bit like Kitty in the coin side profile?

Congratulations, BR. 🙇‍♂️

jewelsofsayuri

I remember grabbing a copy of The Hindu to read your reviews before anyone could touch the paper. I was eager to know not what you think about a film but how you articulate your thoughts. When they stopped publishing your reviews, I was really disappointed until I found your blog via a random search. Ever since then I have been a regular reader (though I may not comment very often). Congratulations and I look forward to many more years of reading your writing.

Venkat Ramanan

January 31, 2021

Congrats on completing 15 years BR sir. Sometimes I love your reviews, sometimes I hate it, no matter what, I always come here to read your opinion. I have learned a lot about cinema from your reviews. Thanks a lot! 🙂

Congratulations BR! I found your blog about 7 or 8 years ago I think, possibly after reading Beth Loves Bollywood and then, not really knowing i was looking for an Indian critic who takes Indian cinema seriously, I went down a few rabbit holes and found this amazing blog. Thanks for all the serious pieces and thanks even more for the not so serious ones. 🙂

Thanks, all. Big hug (the English meaning, not the Hindi one) 🙂

Sir, you’ve single handedly enriched the cinema experience and possibly taught a number of people like me to know how much there is to this medium.

You’ve certainly been resilient! And to choose and stay in this niche area is nothing short of a lifetime achievement 🙂

Congrats, BR, and may your shadow never grow less. 🙂

As a 80’s kid who was into movies from childhood, before you, Kamath or Sen came onto the online scene, the Hindu Friday supplement was our only window for English lang reviews (Vikatan iirc has been a legend in this for decades now but in Tamil)

The movies that released were mostly insipid (nothing really changes I guess) but the Hindu Friday review would usually have 2-3 reviews. Eng, Tamil, Hindi for the most part.

You could then scavange very short reviews from the likes of India Today, Outlook and Debonair at times.

That was it.

And the scene today? Any one movie will have a 100 different reviews.

Congrats, BR! Wish you many more years of writing.

Here’s to another 18 years of inimitable film writing. Congrats BR!

February 1, 2021

I am confused. The post is on FC is from 2018 and the initial comments too. So this is a “repost”…?

February 2, 2021

I remember reading your reviews in Indian Express when I was probably in 6th or 7th grade in school. I couldn’t comprehend much because of my limited vocabulary then. I don’t remember exactly when 8 stumbled upon your blog, but one of my favourite pastimes is going through the archives of all the old interviews and reviews. Gautam menon interviews are my favourite – especially the one where he himself commented and got into an argument with somebody called Vijay (I think) 😁

Sanjay Chaparala

niviblog- Can’t remember where is that post? Could you type the link? Thanks.

February 4, 2021

Hi Brady/Badesaab

Congrats on 15 years as a reviewer. The best reviewer. The comments on this blog, especially for this post, has to be the validation of that. People remembering how and when they started following your blog, remembering their favorite post/review. I do wish you had more time to review the movies like you did earlier. And also, I loved the pun filled headlines from the past ……

Praying for many more years of this.

theeversriram

February 5, 2021

Congratulations 🎉👏 I remember reading you from Indian express days.

Any links to old reviews like Chandramukhi or Anniyan? Don’t think they are in this blog.

@theeversriram, here you go:

Anniyan: https://web.archive.org/web/20050628014314/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/

Chandramukhi: https://baradwajrangan.wordpress.com/2005/04/21/review-mumbai-xpress-chandramukhi/

February 6, 2021

ah, a late visit. As you turn 18+, aptly that A-class exchange with double kay was bang for my buck, or l should say, luck.. With your extended outreach now through social / national media you sure would penetrate more corners of the world and hoist the BR flag across and make us proud. Cheerz.

Thank you, bart. I didn’t expect this at all. But it’s these spurts of encouragement that keep me coming — I mean, going. As I age, I expect to encounter some dysfunction in this profession, but I think a trip to Delhi, via Agra, should fix that. Thanks again.

February 9, 2021

Congratulations BR. I don’t remember how or when (probably circa 2005) I stumbled on to your blog. Probably searching for a specific movie review. I was hooked from the start, went back and read all your older ones and eagerly waited for the next. I was always interested in movies and had forums I enjoyed reading for their specific insights into Hollywood movies. Yours was the first (and still my only) to do that for Indian movies and I’ve been a fan since.

I enjoy your style of writing, command of the language and subject and the humor is on point (at least for me). I’ve also noticed that I tend to agree with your reviews and viewpoints which often makes it a “decider” on if I want to spend time on a movie. Its become such a routine, that while deciding to watch a new movie (online), my wife now asks ” what did your guy have to say about it” !

The comment section has also become a must read and I enjoy all the comments from the usual suspects.

Best wishes for many more years.

January 30, 2023

Congratulations, BR. I hope you have plans for Dispatches From the Wall Corner – Part 2

Ashwin Kumar

Hearty congratulations BR ! Our North Star of film appreciation ❤️ . To many more years…

Many Many Congratulations BR! 20 years gone by so quickly!!! To many many more years of reading fabulous reviews

Congrats on 20 years, BR! To many more years.

hari prasad

Baddy , today I’ve found a lot of your rarest Easy Journal blog posts like your music reviews of Ilayaraja’s Thiruvasagam , Mumbai Express , Anniyan and your pre release Anniyan interview with Shankar , why didn’t you transfer them to WordPress?

Congrats BR on T20 (titillating 20)..

Haven’t seen much of that side of yours, that’s on display in this comments thread.. 😂

Any midcareer blues? Or cruising along to greatness?

abishekspeare

BR is one person who’s been at it for 20 years and still reviews like a non-boomer, always ahead of his time and relevant

I learnt english from him, especially what the word ‘generic’ means, perhaps I could even say i learnt so much about life from him. I’ve grown up with (and in) this blog with amazing and smart people , I started as a 12 year old commenting stuff like “sir what is your favorite film” , now its been ten years and BR hasn’t changed a bit. Everything from his language style to his hair style has been the same

Give us at least 20 more years of this, I want to see 70-year old BR pissed, bashing a bad movie

Jeeva Pitchaimani

I am sure at the end of twice the same period, by 2043 BR will be a national cultural figure and a Padma Shri or a Vibhushan would be something that he would go on to receive at least twice in his lifetime. And by becoming so, he must probably be the first film critic to make headlines and become a household name! I hope we have a Baradwaj Rangan Street or a Ranganabad by 2100 somewhere in India!

tamil thanos

I asked ChatGPT to compose a poem for you on this occasion and I think it did a pretty good job – Oh, film critic of India, your words do delight, Bringing insight and humor, with each review in sight. Twenty years in this profession, so rich and so vast, Your passion for cinema truly built to last.

With each flick you critique, with a pen in your hand, Your words do inspire, a true critic so grand. A master of the art, you bring to life the tale, With thoughtful critique, your words never stale.

A storyteller of sorts, in a world of its own, Bringing laughter and tears, in a world so unknown. From Kollywood to Bollywood, you’ve seen it all, And shared it with us, as you stand tall.

So here’s to 20 years, in this journey so bright, May you continue to inspire, with each review in sight. And may your words bring joy, to film lovers of all, For you are the voice, that echoes through the hall.

tamil thanos: OMFG. Thank you. 🙂

But that is at once so Wordsworth-ian and so… scary!!!! I must try out this thing.

Congratulations on 20 years BR, I’m glad I found your blog. This probably sounds exaggerated, but I really feel like I have grown so much as a person, ever since I stumbled upon this blog. It’s a goldmine of wonderful content and one of my most favourite places on the Internet. That you still remain so committed to your work, constantly try new things (YouTube, Spotify), and most importantly, hold on to your unique voice without once resorting to clickbait and sensationalism is very inspiring. You have changed the face of film journalism in India and I’m sure you will have a huge impact on every upcoming film critic or filmmaker in the years to come. Jai BR!

…. today I’ve found a lot of your rarest Easy Journal blog posts like your music reviews

Hari Prasad: Can you please share the links to these wonderful old posts? Thanks !

About those EasyJournal posts, very old-timers may remember me shifting my blog from one host to another before landing on WordPress.

So when I did a carry-over (an option where the host says all older files will be brought over), I guess some posts got left behind at EasyJournal and Blogspot.

On a related note, this channel has short clips from the Medai event that BR did. Not sure if it’s been posted already.

Yes , give me a minute.

https://groups.google.com/g/rec.arts.movies.local.indian/c/Pf7mhtIby7o/m/zTtXbl1daicJ

Baddy’s thoughts on Shankar’s Boys…

Congrats Brangan on completing 20 years. Totally agree with what you said about Thallumaala in that video. It’s truly original and mind-blowing. the most exhilarating cinematic experience I had last year. Another film to watch is Ajagajantharam- brilliant fight choreography there as well.

Macaulay Perapulla

Happy anniversary BR. Fondly remember some of your easy journal days, followed by blogical conclusion days. You had also one of those review dialogue experiments with Samanth if my memory serves right.

Thank you for showing – reviews can be an earnest inquiry into the dharma of cinema – reviews can be a passionate plea to see cinema as Art

Your writings have made me write better and be a kinder person. It has opened new vistas! Can’t wait to see what new experiments you are going to do this year and coming forward.:)

Congratulations BR , from the days of trying to see what marks a movie has been awarded by Ananda Vikatan to trying to understand if the movie has done what it set out to achieve, add to it learning a bit on how to appreciate a cinema , it’s a growth for us readers too. Keep going on !!

Baddy’s Anniyan review:

https://web.archive.org/web/20050628014314/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/

His thoughts on the grand success of Chandramukhi:

https://web.archive.org/web/20051206091625/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2571475

His interview with Bala post Pithamagan:

https://web.archive.org/web/20060520145653/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2340539

His review of Ajith’s Attagasam

https://web.archive.org/web/20130809162224/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2340548

An article on Rekha:

https://web.archive.org/web/20060520151618/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2306559

Some Arre O Sambar columns:

https://web.archive.org/web/20060503135225/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2759707

https://web.archive.org/web/20060426160550/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2829017

https://web.archive.org/web/20060426201811/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2811887

https://web.archive.org/web/20051214171837/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2698262

https://web.archive.org/web/20051222012546/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2685430

https://web.archive.org/web/20070709010226/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2638686

https://web.archive.org/web/20060301093840/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2596995

His lecture on Mani’s Iruvar..

https://web.archive.org/web/20060503135205/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2778669

His overall view about the movies released in 2005:

https://web.archive.org/web/20060503135535/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2783938

A special article to commemorate 5 years of the launch of the new Indian Express where Baddy discusses his 5 favorite movies from the early 2000s:

https://web.archive.org/web/20051222001328/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2706469

Anniyan pre release with Shankar:

https://web.archive.org/web/20070709005656/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2555439

Something about Star Wars:

https://web.archive.org/web/20060810120357/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2571474

Music review of Mumbai Express:

https://web.archive.org/web/20050508032652/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2522158

His review of Suriya’s Mayavi:

https://web.archive.org/web/20050904212410/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2485742

His music review of Chandramukhi:

https://web.archive.org/web/20050924075319/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=1167382

An article about Casino Royale 2006’s announcement without the reveal of the new Bond (which eventually was Daniel Craig):

https://web.archive.org/web/20050506181134/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2459626

His review of Kal Ho Naa Ho:

https://web.archive.org/web/20060519030412/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=1346784

His view on movies released in 2003:

https://web.archive.org/web/20060519030219/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=1447034

An article about the problems Tamil cinema faced creatively in 2003 and some of them still resonates:

https://web.archive.org/web/20060519030207/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=1830997

His review of the infamous Big B – Katrina Kaif movie Boom:

https://web.archive.org/web/20060518154722/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=1543661

https://web.archive.org/web/20060518154711/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=1523042

Koi Mil Gaya:

https://web.archive.org/web/20060518151846/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=1416351

https://web.archive.org/web/20060421022445/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2865525

His review of Pattiyal and Seeman’s Thambi..

Late to the party, but many congratulations BR!! I’m so glad I bumped into your blog all those years ago, which I believe was back in 2014 for your Lingaa review. Ever since, you have served as an inspiration to me, particularly through your writing. Wishing you many more years of success, good health, and happiness.

Congratulations on a great journey sofar, BR! Toddling one to Trending twenty. The best part of the journey has been the way you’ve kept up with the changing tastes and forms. Keep it going for long!

What are your favorite pre title sequences of all time , BR and others?

Congratulations BR and well played. As someone following your writing from your Indian Express days, I feel proud of how you have expanded your horizon continuously and included newer forms of media & communication. And in the process my own horizons, when it comes to viewing a film, have also expanded. I will say what I had said here in the past- I read everything you write and I get inputs as though I am attending a film appreciation class. I might not agree fully with every piece of your writing but then that is also part of the process (as you have said in the past when it came to giving star ratings, how your review is your response to a film and might not be agreeable to all etc). As I keep up (barely) with your frenetic pace, I am happy to have been one of the flock. Very happy for the 20 years and here’s wishing you many such milestones in the future.

Severus Snape

Congratulations BR and thank you for maintaining this blog despite changing platforms and exploring new ways to reach out to newer audiences. I hope you host another zoom meet; I missed the last one.

I wonder if you are on Reddit; there was this amusing comment about one of your Instagram posts(the Criticus Indicus one):

The caption had me 🙂 by u/Old_Specialist7892 in kollywood

“BR is that nalla mama you have who makes uncle jokes but you smile because he’s a good guy.”

I agree with that uncle thing..

BR often gives me that ” chinna mama ” vibes , a character who understand our feelings and guide us for a great future and at the same time he’s also a guy with whom you can crack jokes and have fun with him , something that Vivek often gives me whenever I watch his comedy scenes…

Congrats BR!! A truly unique writer. I took some time to warm up to the “digital” version of BR, but I am loving the interviews now. Thank you also for providing this space to rant abut all things cinema and life. Long may it continue.

sravishanker1401gmailcom

@SeverusSnape – Maybe we should caption this “Attices beside Citricus Indicus”

We used to get Time magazine in our school and my friend and I despaired of ever having movie reviews of the same calibre written by an Indian critic. That changed when BR entered the scene and how! True we had to wait a decade and ahlf more but the wait was worth it.

Thanks to BR – the first cartoon of mine ever published in a public forum was this blog!

Mani matters

CARTOON: “WHICH IS BETTER ? THE BOOK OR THE MOVIE ?”

Great fix to see KayKay and BR going hammer and tongs at each other

Congratulations BR! Longevity is one thing, but to be at the very top for that long in the midst of a rapidly evolving media space, is just phenomenal! Here’s to twenty more years, and then some…

On this occasion, remembering my grand father who saw the word ‘sex’ on The Hindu thanks to BR, and said ‘indha Baradwaj Rangan oru Badawa Rascal’

@abishekspeare – Was that intentional ? Both have initials B & R

So, you are not a teenager anymore 😀

Congratulations, BR. Thanks for everything.

Congratulations BR on 20 years of- BR mein hai “DUM”

January 31, 2023

Well-deserved, BR. And here’s wishing you several more years of writing, video reviews, podcasts – and whatever else the future brings. Thanks for all the years of reading, arguing, agreeing, disagreeing… it’s been a great ride. 🙂

ANotSoAnnoyedFan

Congratulations BR! Here is to another 20 years!

abishekspeare: In other words, I’m a boomer who doesn’t act like a boomer. Awww. Gee, thanks 😛

In the spirit of KayKay I should have said “Hammer and THongs”

In 2019, Roger ALMOST won a slam twenty years after his debut. So with your twenty year milestone, we can safely say you are the Roger Federer of Indian film critics.

BR , someone here asked the links of your old Easy Journal articles and I’ve posted them here but I can’t able to see them here…

Did the comment got deleted as a spam or what?

hari prasad: It went to spam. It had too many links, I think that’s why… You should be able to see it now.

Congratulation BR! Thanks for those great review literature and trying to teaching me how to “see” a film along the way (still not there!)………….wishing you many many more decades!

February 1, 2023

Thank you for the links, hariprasad. Really appreciate the time and effort

hariprasad: Thanks a ton for compiling the links of these old reviews.

Enna koduka sir pera

Best wishes for many more years of this! And, thanks for giving us something interesting to read, watch and listen to for 20 years – it is truly commendable!

I would love to read about your experiences in transitioning back from the US to India (and into a new career) and facing any reverse culture shock.. That would be an interesting read.

Congrats on 20 years BR. I’ve been following you for more than a decade now. You made me think about a lot of poignant behind the scene aspects of filmmaking, like the role of a screenwriter and a director for example. Staging a scene, writing engaging dialogues, subtext of a scene and many more to list here. You did all that while also making me chuckle frequently.

I am a big fan of your “bad film” reviews. In fact I learn a lot from those reviews than the reviews of good films. Initially, I was very skeptical about your move to YouTube, but you proved me wrong and still prove me wrong with every single round table, analysis and wide angle. Just your interview with Rima Das alone makes the whole thing worth it. I downloaded that particular video and saved it in my computer to re-watch whenever I please.

Here is to many more happy years!

BR’s penetrative insights continue to stand proud and erect amidst a sea of flaccid prose and limp analysis, and possessing such vigor even after 20 years is no mean feat. Here’s to another 20 years of pumping….out amazing writing and absorbing videos. Another 20 years of hard grinding…to weed out the chaff that covers much of filmic discussions these days. Another 20 years of vigorously thrusting….your way to the core of what makes a film, or celebrity tick.

Congratulations BR!! It is no mean feat and I wish you the very best for a brilliant future. And KayKay, every time I see your name in the comments section, I smile in anticipation and then when I read your comments, I smile harder.

I’ve found more of Baddy’s supposedly never seen before articles today

Baddy’s movie review of Veyil , GV Prakash’s debut:

https://web.archive.org/web/20100703091943/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=3200526

Music review of Sillunu oru Kadhal:

https://web.archive.org/web/20060825074710/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=3049695

Movie review of Sillunu oru Kadhal , which I think was the first time ever BR ranted about a Tamil movie:

https://web.archive.org/web/20070713074653/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=3086746

Music review of Mani’s Guru:

https://web.archive.org/web/20061201094226/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=3167273

An article on John Lennon :

https://web.archive.org/web/20051222013327/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=1182092

Review of RGV’s Sarkar:

https://web.archive.org/web/20080208223432/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2611529

Review of Hazaaron Khwaishein Aisi:

https://web.archive.org/web/20050513142801/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2547225

An article on the dude who created the first Indian languages based search engine:

https://web.archive.org/web/20050420081739/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2487502

Review of SLB’s Black , a movie which he really liked which I assume from the review:

https://web.archive.org/web/20050904182310/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2447302

Baddy , is Black still your fav SLB movie?

And Baddy , I’ve posted more links of some of your older reviews today, so before it goes to spam , please bring the comment back…

Hari Prasad, not to undermine the good job you are doing, but a lot of these reviews are present on this site itself Black

Review: Jurm / Black

I saw the Black review being here in this blog some hours ago…

And I’m pretty sure I saw the music review of Guru here too…

Dear BR, Congratulations on the achievement. Wishing you many many more………..Thanks for all the wonderful writing which entertained and enlightened us through the years. (Note: For some reason my comments not pushing through – don’t know why!! :-))

Thanks Anuja! From a writer of books I’ve found extremely entertaining, that’s high praise indeed!

….. matter custard, dripping from a dead dog’s eye… It’s as close as you’ll get to an acid trip without tripping out on acid yourself.

Wow, the John Lennon piece is so good. More music reviews please!

…… the case of Tere bina. This is a breathtakingly beautiful composition that describes life without a loved one, and this thought is elevated by a typically Gulzarian metaphor: beswaadi ratiyaan, flavourless nights. Here’s the hero, envisioning (in Rahman’s soaring vocals) the emptiness that would result in the absence of his woman, and you want the jaggedness of the emotion to linger – but the pat, persistent dum tara refrain (which, as a line of music, is admittedly lovely) keeps dragging the song back into a neutral comfort zone. I felt this even more when Chinmayee began to sing, her voice apparently laden with the collective weight of the world’s romantic longing. She’s so magnificent, you can’t help asking of Rahman: Why settle for merely caressing the heart when there’s potential in the song to pierce the soul

Brilliantly put!

The music reviews of Guru and Silunu Oru Kadhal are breathtakingly beautiful and too precious to lie on the easyjournal site unnoticed. Please publish them again here on the WordPress site, if possible.

arunspradeep

February 2, 2023

What a wonderful achievement. Congrats on being the best writer on cinema in India and all the best for the future. Your words and observations on cinema are intertwined with so many of our generation from the 80s and 90s. Looking at your more recent avatars, such as video and podcasting, it reminds me of Conan O’Brien’s quip when he launched his own podcast: “Every time they try to get rid of me, I come back in a smaller format!”

Belated congratulations and best wishes. The next milestone will be 25 years. Another 5 years of endless entertainment till 25 years silver jubilee celebrations start. Hope we will have good music, good music directors along with good films.

The music review of Guru is here at this blog while the Sillunu oru Kadhal music review isn’t..

Added some cartoons by the always-kind Ramki Bellur, a few memories of the Mani Ratnam book launch, a reminder (thanks to Iswarya) that one of my essays has made it to a book, and a funny meme 🙂

I had just one qualm with the Guru review. That I do think Barso Re is hooky as hell. Yeah it moves at lightning speed but the main melodic motif is catchy alright. It was a big, big hit and I would say it harked back to his late 90s form.

bellurramki

Dear BR, Have made a separate blog – posting all the cartoons, memes and designs made in your honor! Have enjoyed creating these !

Inviting all BR fans and followers to visit this blog adda called ‘Brangan’s Fan’!

https://brangansfan.wordpress.com/

Visiting here and reading the comments has become my way of life.

Thank you all for occupying BR-verse and making BR’s Ulagam so rich.

Regards and wish you the best Ramki Bellur

Many congratulations, BR!!

ramki: Those memes are fab, thanks for sharing!

February 4, 2023

I revisited Sillunu Oru Kadhal album after reading the review and I don’t know who else thinks this but it hasn’t aged too well. For me, the title track and Munbe Vaa were the winners from the album even before the revisit and that didn’t change (though I also like the arrangement Shreya is using now in live renditions of Munbe more than Rahman’s trap heavy mix). The other songs had very interesting ideas drowned a bit by too much going on in the arrangement. I haven’t felt this before with Rahman in general and with any other album of this.

February 11, 2023

Congratulations BR ! Too bad I have not been living in India the last 20 years and hence missed all your newspaper debut and reviews. I am very positive I found you while searching for new interesting content related to Kamal. I think you had written a piece about a fan (you) meeting the star, KH ( in a book release event). You had hair 🙂

Going back to not living in India, I have no patience for the mutual back scratching contest that Indian work ethics entail, or the derivative nature of creative output that is the mainstay of entertainment consumption. Youtube channels follow trends just as movies follow trends and it is just 1 big infinite loop of recycled content with a few refreshing pauses of authentic creative moments. You have been more than a pause – you have created a career parallel to the loop with your own ethics that is true to that of your job – a reviewer and a movie buff- not a star promoter, not an audience panderer like most other reviewers define their roles.

I am not sure I follow all your reviews. But I do seek out to touch base with the human who wrote them. Humans who work in the system and yet try to rise above it are perennially interesting long past the sell by date of their product.

Keep up the good work and looking forward to continuing the debate with you on Love today and thiruchittrambalam 🙂

Madan & Bart: Thank you.

Have added another post today:

Saapad Rangan

April 10, 2023

Here’s more of Baddy’s supposedly never seen before reviews that I unearthed just now

His review of Vasool Raja MBBS:

https://groups.google.com/g/rec.arts.movies.local.indian/c/RcZpNda0VAI/m/FzWebw1LIT8J

Khakee , one of Baddy’s most favorite Indhee padam:

https://groups.google.com/g/rec.arts.movies.local.indian/c/poN_nVliAw0/m/VFv466d7WHEJ

https://groups.google.com/g/rec.arts.movies.local.indian/c/R7BTwCeMiV4/m/2GoU0cmCwvgJ

Jaani Dushman – Ek Anokhi Kahaani :

https://groups.google.com/g/rec.arts.movies.local.indian/c/hCSRhJ_4Nak/m/R9xQxvQCa3sJ

https://groups.google.com/g/rec.arts.movies.local.indian/c/b7cED0uzD0E/m/vpqEyuiORAQJ

A discussion on the 2003 Filmfare Awards:

https://groups.google.com/g/rec.arts.movies.local.indian/c/V_v9nvl1Pk8/m/yorkeAdLmEkJ

Veer-Zaara:

https://groups.google.com/g/rec.arts.movies.local.indian/c/w98gk5mAb5Q/m/B4ftJvX-NUoJ

Govind Nihalani’s Dev:

https://groups.google.com/g/rec.arts.movies.local.indian/c/9rkZQdVkHNM/m/8zDc5TYgPBAJ

Deewaar 2004:

https://groups.google.com/g/rec.arts.movies.local.indian/c/2-7XjQDY42M/m/RWAzK5K-zfoJ

Meenaxi : Tale of 3 Cities:

https://groups.google.com/g/rec.arts.movies.local.indian/c/8oH_AuWk4Vg/m/etxEVRYxupUJ

Baddy’s 2 cents on Kaakha Kaakha that I think helped our Jai find his Veeru in GVM:

https://groups.google.com/g/rec.arts.movies.local.indian/c/KWDhGWW_HHY/m/I29nZE1Rvj8J

His 2 cents on Kadhal Konden:

https://groups.google.com/g/rec.arts.movies.local.indian/c/FHLRynlwKgM/m/f6YsDNga7GQJ

https://groups.google.com/g/rec.arts.movies.local.indian/c/PDsrpbV5iCQ/m/-0593Y2sZMoJ

Baddy , again I posted the links some of your lost reviews , can you please bring them back from the spam folder?

Gems from just one thread posted by Hari: Thank you Hari Bhai. BR: BTW, quick quiz: which were the three films/actresses that caused a sensation around the same time for baring their breasts?

easy one. Year 1985 >

Dimple – Saagar Mandakahi – RTGM Rohani Hattagandi – Party. Am I right 🙂 BR: Actually, I was thinking of – Sarika in Nirvaan, Neena Gupta in Utsav and RH in Party. all around 1985 – there was a cover story in some mag (Showtime?) about how “bold” cinema was becoming. Bhardwaj asks a simple question, and we get a useful list of must see movies.

After Tarzan was released, Kitu Gidwani (I think it was her) gave an interview saying that she was originally offered the role, but she declined because she would never be able to walk in the streets, knowing that many people had seen her breasts. Kimi Katkar retorted “What breasts ?” (Kitu Gidwani was flatchested).

And here’s another one :

Baddy’s review of Run ( sadly , the Abhishek one) :

https://groups.google.com/g/rec.arts.movies.local.indian/c/eh25tv0m4_o/m/V_7gSQHMQYEJ

July 9, 2023

More of Baddy’s lost gems:

His thoughts on the North remaking Southern movies , a much relevant topic and how gold is portrayed in Indian cinema :

https://web.archive.org/web/20060520151049/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=1167342

An article on Anju Bobby George and about the ads that came during the 2003 Cricket World Cup:

https://web.archive.org/web/20060520151354/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=1293379

An article on big stars , small movies :

https://web.archive.org/web/20060520151434/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2133351

Baddy having a conversation with his rational and superstitious selves following the Indian Cricket team’s poor performance in the 2004 Asia Cup and him thinking of a horror script along the lines of RGV’s Bhoot :

https://web.archive.org/web/20060520151409/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=1380396

Review of some horror movie named Vaastu Shastra :

https://web.archive.org/web/20060520151630/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2310262

Review of Jawani Deewani and 15 Park Avenue:

https://web.archive.org/web/20060426202113/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2797432

Interview with Pedro Soler and Zubin Mehta:

https://web.archive.org/web/20060426202009/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2776382

Baddy trying his best to find the evolution of the phrase ” Happy New Year” , his thoughts about video jockeys and watching TV after a long time :

https://web.archive.org/web/20050504203005/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2340585

Baddy sharing his 2004 Tsunami experience and watching a cricket match on the big screen at Besant Nagar Beach in 2003 :

https://web.archive.org/web/20050503184503/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=1293367

Review of a Biblical soft porn flick named Sins:

https://web.archive.org/web/20050326124012/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2471659

Interview with cinematographer Randy Rathnavelu:

https://web.archive.org/web/20050924223737/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2487514

Review of My Brother Nikil :

https://web.archive.org/web/20050818045123/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2522148

Baddy interviews some people who left their profession to pursue their passion :

https://web.archive.org/web/20050507035508/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2522130

Review of Lord Bobby’s Tango Charlie :

https://web.archive.org/web/20050905103547/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2487486

An Arre O Sambar column :

Review of Apaharan:

https://web.archive.org/web/20060503135500/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2761331

Review of Bhagam Bhag :

https://web.archive.org/web/20070709005935/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=3215743

An interview with TM Krishna and Sangeetha Sivakumar :

https://web.archive.org/web/20070703164636/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=3191900

Interview with Om Puri :

https://web.archive.org/web/20061201093501/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=3157835

Valentines Day 2006 Special :

https://web.archive.org/web/20061201094202/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=3148671

Music review of Mozart Meets India :

https://web.archive.org/web/20070213163642/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=3085498

Review of Lage Raho Munnabhai :

https://web.archive.org/web/20060916014335/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=3065800

Reviews of Woh Lamhe and Jai Santoshi Maa:

https://web.archive.org/web/20071109071023/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=3104292

Baddy finding reasons on why MN Shyamalan’s Lady in the Water flopped :

https://web.archive.org/web/20060824164811/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=3049701

Interviews with Aparna Sen and Govind Nihalani :

https://web.archive.org/web/20060827023757/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2958054

Baddy shares his experience on getting an Ayurvedic treatment in Kerala and a Goa trip :

https://web.archive.org/web/20060824164759/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2956477

Reviews of Shwet and Corporate :

https://web.archive.org/web/20060911144808/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=3002396

Reviews of Chup Chupke and Phir Hera Pheri (just scroll down since you have read his review for Krrish) :

https://web.archive.org/web/20060831222055/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2962854

Music reviews of Kabhi Alvida Naa Kehna and Fanaa :

https://web.archive.org/web/20060831073017/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2917969

Baddy shares his favorite dad moments in Bollywood from each decade :

https://web.archive.org/web/20060812043518/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2973035

Something about the Da Vinci Code movie and American TV Dramas :

https://web.archive.org/web/20060812025633/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2960776

Reviews: Tathastu / Tom, Dick and Harry :

https://web.archive.org/web/20060812043438/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2936858

Reviews: 36 China Town / Humko Deewana Kar Gaye

https://web.archive.org/web/20060814062705/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2910709

East-meets-West: Been there, done that? / A short story becomes a musical CD

https://web.archive.org/web/20060620025718/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2847587

Interview with Priyadarshan :

https://web.archive.org/web/20060620025704/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2835995

Celebrity Advertising in India :

https://web.archive.org/web/20060620025538/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2873544

Baddy’s review of F**** C*** :

https://web.archive.org/web/20060620021645/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2852540

Reviews of Aksar and Holiday :

https://web.archive.org/web/20060620021656/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2840339

Reviews: Family – Ties of Blood / Zinda (the Oldboy unofficial remake) :

https://web.archive.org/web/20060620153219/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2805520

Reviews of Shikar and Vaah! Life Ho Toh Aisi :

(As a self confessed gaming fan , I thank you Baddy , for that pun on Mortal Kombat)

https://web.archive.org/web/20060620153208/http://brangan.easyjournal.com/entry.aspx?eid=2787508

Baddy , I’ve posted links of some of your lost articles , interviews and reviews.

Can you please retrieve them back from the spam folder?

Sri Prabhuram

January 30, 2024

Congratulations on 21 years of your profession, BR. Your passion and dedication towards your love of cinema will always be respected by me regardless of our differences in opinion. Keep it up, sir. 🫡

Congratulations, BR.

Counting down

10. Breakdowns

9. BReakneck

8. BReakups

Cheers to 21 and beyond!

Re. The picture below, I hope, is an accurate representation of me while reviewing the debut film of Ananya Panday’s kid, much to the delight of some commenters here.

Ha ha ha ha , LMAO !!

Wah kya reverse trolling hai.

Congratulations BR , keep reviewing , interviewing , rocking, writing and acting!!

hi Baddy, A very hearty congratulations to you for your successful twenty one years.

i was not that much fluent in English till 10th grade, but one day, I was just scrolling the YouTube and find a man who is speaking English fast and using some terms which was new to me .

I forget you few years … But your English was remembering to me and was trying to speak like how you are ….

Years passed…. Finally, Now, I am able to speak a language known as “English” and still learning from you …..

Heartful Thanks 👍🙏

Congratulations, BR! Now that you’re twenty one and all, can we hope to see some drunken reviews?

kaizokukeshav

Was that old pic created with FaceApp ?

Congrats BRo, as someone who have been reading your “blogs” since 2003, I wish you keep rocking for the next series of 21 years

Congrats BR! And to Karthik’s suggestion, I’d drink to that!

Congrats. I believe, I am reading you for almost 13+ years now. Learnt a lot. thankfully avoided a lot. saved tons of time. have almost 100-150 movies to watch. not in hurry.

Congrats BR on 21 years! I’ve literally grown up with your writing and it’s definitely had a huge impact on a lot of us and the way we view cinema. Here’s to 21 more years 🙂

BTW this ‘old’ profile pic reminds me of the “Baddy for Daddy/Zaddy” meme that some of your Gen Z female fans tried to popularise on Twitter a few years ago 😉

Waqt kahan badalta hai, woh sirf guzarta hai ….

How time flies…. it only seems yesterday I started reading you …

Congrats Brangan!

Congratulations BR. Thank you for everything. Your reviews, views and interviews have become a part of my life. Thank you.

Congratulations BR. I have learnt a lot about cinema from your writings and about myself through your blog. Thank You!

21 years. It is like seeing one’s kid reaching 21 years. It must be a sort of roller coaster ride! A thrilling ride carrying with you all your admirers and others too. Carry on boss. A bunch of fresh flowers and congrats to you.

Aravind Nadarajan

Congratulations BR! Been a mostly silent reader of this blog from 2007. Started with the wonderful – “Maniratnam-Madras Male” article and have been hooked on ever since. Hope you continue writing/reviewing and hope more people learn to appreciate the movies as you do. Cheers!

Congratulations BR! And thank you for the blog; the articles, archives and the comments are an indispensable part of my life now

Sai Madhusudanan

Huge fan of you Baddy, before you realise your mistake of including my 15min fame amala youtube comment on your 21 years post and remove it, i will take printout and frame it.

“The picture below, I hope, is an accurate representation of me while reviewing the debut film of Ananya Panday’s kid, much to the delight of some commenters here.”

Desperately trying to thinking of suitable synonym to ‘Nepotism’, having already used it several times in the piece 😀

Congratulations BR sir! I can truly say I have learnt a lot about film and film appreciation by reading your reviews and the insightful comments of regular readers.

I distinctly remember the first review of yours that I read 14 years ago, which was that of Vivaah . Up until then, I was not fan of the Sooraj Barjatya school of film making and am in a minority who found HAHK boring, and Hum Saath Saath Hain even more so. And so, I had no plans of seeing Vivaah when it released. Most of the reviews I had glanced through had been quite critical of the movie, but the one that stuck in my mind was Raja Sen’s which came across as rather mean-spirited. Fast-forward a few months, and on one really boring evening, I somehow stumbled upon Vivaah and started watching it with every intent of shutting it off in 10 mins. To my own surprise, I not only sat through it but ended up actually liking it somewhat. I decided to search if any other reviewer had anything kind to say about the movie, and one such Google search directed me to your review. And what struck me was not just that I found myself nodding in agreement with your observations, not even your brilliant prose, but with how much care and professionalism the review had been written. Other well-known film critics (Khalid Mohammed, Rajiv Masand, etc.) always gave me the impression of being rather vicious and personal in their criticism; seemingly with an axe to grind, or with an intent to prove their intellectual superiority. But with you, your love for the cinematic form just shone through your writings every time, so that even when you had something critical to say about a movie, the criticism was delivered with grace, humility, and with actual reasons explaining your thinking. Another thing I absolutely loved was your not engaging in the highly reductive activity of assigning a star rating.

So, thank you for sharing your work with us readers, and for giving us a space to engage with other cine-lovers. Any wishing you many, many more years of writing! Cheers!

Gayathri IYER

just read through this cutesy article. Many congratulations and to many more decades to come. And the pics you have posted, you must this really organised person to be collecting your own memes 😂

Just thought I would go through BR’s efficiency tips after Gayathri’s comment.

Happy 21+ , BR

Bitty Ruminations 89 – Efficiency tips

Mayur Panchamia

congratulations

Raghu Narayanan

Congratulations BR! 21 Not Out! Have a great year 22…and still a lot more to come for sure.

Congrats and Happy 21st Anniversary, BR! Please continue the great work! And hopefully we’ll get to see your acting debut as well as MANK chetta making his directorial debut based off one of your screenplays!

Congratulations, BR!

Congratulations and Happy 21, brangan. Here’s to more writing on, commenting on and enjoyment of the movies and perhaps a deeper involvement in the making of them too as you foray into acting and screenplay writing. Hopefully this community of cinema lovers will continue to thrive.

karthik_somasundaram

congratulation Baddy. You are a mentor and teacher of cinema and its language. Thank you for that. Keep it coming.

January 31, 2024

Congrats, da!

Congrats, BR.

Congrats, BR! That bit about Ananya Pandey’s kid though! 😆😆

Looking forward to host “50 Years of BR: The Mottai Boss who’s also a Andavar fan!”. Hope God gives me such an opportunity. Wishing you good health and happiness, BR.

Congratulations BR – I’m a long time silent reader of your blog, started reading in 07 i think, when i chanced upon your blog when i lived in auckland and loved reading something in eloquent english.. then.. i moved countries, got married, travelled , had kids, but continued to read your blog , and now look up to your review to decide if i should watch a movie or not! I think you also made a good transition to video reviews but i still prefer to read it than listen…i think its a good time to probably say you have a lot of silent lurkers like me 🙂 who enjoy your blog , so dont stop blogging.

Congratulations BR ! Its a pleasure to read your reviews and I should say I learned quite a lot by reading them . I never used yours, or any other , reviews to make a decision to watch a movie or not , but coming back to your review after watching an interesting movie is almost always happen 🙂 just to see what you have written about it (I may have quickly glanced over it before but after watching the movie its a different experience to read it) . I may disagree with some opinions but its always an immense pleasure to read your thoughts about it . I should say I start looking for nuances etc in a movie after start reading these reviews but I still fail to pick all of them you would have – thats a master skill you have 🙂 . Adding that to the eloquent writing ,hope you have many many more years to celebrate this – hope to continue this journey with you many many more years . Once again, congrats

As some of the comments already mentioned , please dont stop writing – video and all are good , I understand why its necessary now , but reading you is the pleasure I hope dont get compromised

Congratulations on 21 years, BR! Thank you for this blog, which is one of the most wonderful corners of the Internet. Grateful for your move to GP where you again write review pieces and wish you’d do one long form Kamal Hassan interview like Master of Arts again very soon so that all of us readers/watchers can have a field day discussing where your loyalties lie xD.

Also, please do another Medai event soon.

February 1, 2024

Congratulations BR. Hope your body of work continues to grow in the next 21 years!

February 2, 2024

Hi Badesaab,

Congratulations! I believe 21 in reviewer years is definitely a glorious 100 in cricketing terms ….. much needed from Indian batters!

You are THE BEST out there. You are the Sachin Tendulkar of reviewers. Keep it going!

February 3, 2024

MAJOR NEWS: BR’s blog turns 21…

Dear BR, Hearty Congrats on turning 21 ! Two stamps released @ Brangan’s Fan blog on this MAJOR occasion! For all BR fans, have made a separate blog – posting all the cartoons, memes and designs made in honor of BR! Have enjoyed creating these !

Inviting all BR fans and followers to visit this blog adda called ‘Brangan’s Fan’!

Thank you all for occupying BR-verse and making BR’s Ulagam so rich.

Congratulations BR!! I am confident your best years are ahead of you!!

February 4, 2024

also want to say this again: “BR bravely gives us this space to discuss thoughts, opinions on various topics, some of which are unrelated to films even. And the readers/commenters in this space are awesome — they are an audience you want to engage with. Thanksgiving is coming up this Thursday, so I can unabashedly say this: this blog is something I will always be thankful for.”

February 9, 2024

Happy 21st, BR! I know I’ve become a better reader and writer from following your work on this blog. Life has caught up and I haven’t been here of late, but this place remains a happy time capsule for me. Thank you for this space! Here’s to 21 more years (at least)!

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I: A terrific performance let down by an uninspired, exhausting movie

A story this pulpy should have been way more exciting..

Updated - January 15, 2015 09:08 am IST

Published - January 14, 2015 05:53 pm IST

A still from the movie I.

Is there another filmmaker as fascinated by the double role as Shankar? (Even the frivolous Jeans is riveted by the sight of twins.) Where others employ this trope as merely a means to magnify the hero — see two stars for the price of one! — or maybe to flesh out the separated-at-birth scenario so popular in the masala format, Shankar uses the device to split open the protagonist’s psyche.

In films like Mudhalvan and Gentleman — where it’s not two roles so much as two faces of the character (journalist/chief minister, mild-mannered entrepreneur by day/vigilante by night) — the second ‘character’ is made to do things the first one cannot, and in Sivaji , the bald-headed persona was essentially the hero assuming another ‘face’ in order to continue where he left off.

This split was carried out to the extreme in Anniyan and Enthiran , where the other roles weren’t just assumed by the protagonist but birthed by him. In the former, which gave the leading man three roles to play, the driving force was schizophrenia, and in the latter, the Evil Twin was ‘invented’ by the Good Twin as a reflection of himself, in his own form. For all its problems, Enthiran marked a departure point in Shankar’s career because, for the first time, the second role wasn’t that of a vigilante or a do-gooder out to clean up society, but a confused, gone-berserk manifestation of the protagonist’s ID. All of which is another way of saying that I had quite a few expectations of I , which arrives four years after Enthiran , after teasing us with trailers featuring a regular-looking Vikram and a hunchbacked avatar.

But I is just more of the same – it’s the old vigilante scenario, except that the villains don’t represent a microcosm of society. This time, it’s purely personal. The evildoers in I mess up the hero’s life and he embarks on revenge. After a point, the film begins to remind us of Aboorva Sagotharargal , where a noxious substance results in the hero’s ‘deformity’, and when he discovers how he came to be this way, he doles out punishment in a variety of inventive ways. (Even the parrot from that film finds an equivalent: a faithful dog.) For a while, I is innocuous fun. We meet Lingesan (Vikram), a gym rat who’s in love with a model (Diya, played by Amy Jackson) he keeps seeing in magazines and on TV and on billboards. As his best friend Velu, Santhanam contributes a few laughs and keeps things light, and Vikram, too, does no heavy lifting outside the gym. He is relaxed, charming, and he draws us to this nobody who wants to be a somebody. In an amusing scene, he participates in a body-building championship and dances to ‘ Azeem-o-shaan shahenshah ’, his ‘choreography’ made up entirely of poses that show off his muscles. There’s more showing off, courtesy the technical departments, in the ‘ Mersalaayiten ’ music video — the song’s pep is complemented by a series of well-imagined, well-staged visual effects.

But once Lingesan meets Diya and gets a makeover, the film turns tedious. Since Anniyan , Shankar has run out of ideas for storylines for the ‘normal guy’ character — we need to wait for the second half in order to get to the real story, with the ‘other guy’ character, and so we bide time with lavishly shot (but very generic-looking) song sequences (music by A. R. Rahman) and a patience-sapping love angle. Shankar’s never been the most sensitive of filmmakers, and there’s never much use in expecting these ‘mass films’ to depict politically correct attitudes (Diya’s suitors reject her because she may not be a virgin) – still, the track with a transgender makeup artist (Ojas M. Rajani) made me squirm. Things become slightly better once the focus shifts to the hunchback, but even these portions come with a strong sense of déjà vu . There’s no urgency, no tension, not one surprising moment in the narrative — even the mastermind-villain’s identity is evident from the minute we set eyes on him.

There’s a hint of subtext in the beauty-and-the-beast premise. I is set largely in the world of advertising, where looks matter, and the biggest suffering one can endure, according to the film, is the loss of these looks. But it’s understandable that these themes aren’t elaborated — no film made on this kind of budget, with gargantuan images from P. C. Sreeram, can afford to traffic in that kind of nuance. What’s surprising though is that even the entertainment aspects are glossed over. There’s a great masala moment that involves undone shoelaces, but elsewhere — in the fights, in the revenge scenarios — there’s a distinct lack of freshness. A story this pulpy should have been way more exciting.

And moving, too. In over three exhausting hours, we get just one human-sized moment, when Lingesan collapses in the gym due to over-exertion and we sense his desperation to win the championship. Everywhere else, I leaves us with the impression of watching a giant machine grinding away. In films like Mudhalvan , Shankar made us feel for his characters. Here, there’s nothing to make us care — nothing, except Vikram’s performance as the hunchback. Despite the pustules on his face, the swollen lower lip, the horrifying emaciation — the makeup and the physical transformation are both top-notch — he does his darnedest to make us care for the character, using his voice, his eyes. But beyond a point he has nothing to do, nothing to play — he’s all dressed up and he has nowhere to go.

A version of this review can be read at >http://baradwajrangan.wordpress.com

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Pathaan Movie Review (2023)

• 25 Jan 2023

Siddharth Anand's 'Pathaan' is a fine blend of Hollywood-style action and desi-style masala

Pathaan Movie Cast & Crew

It's probably too early to say this, but on the basis of War and now Pathaan , writer Shridhar Raghavan, dialogue-writer Abbas Tyrewala, and director Siddharth Anand have revitalised the Indian action movie. I use the word "Indian" deliberately, because the stunts are from Hollywood, but the heart that makes these "Yash Raj Spy Universe" films tick is as desi as desi can be. In the Dhoom franchise or in the Salman Khan-starring Tiger films, Yash Raj have been trying to marry our masala sensibilities to Bond/ Mission-Impossible action spectacles, with middling results. War is where it all finally came together. Scratch the Hollywood-inspired action set pieces, and you had the emotional connect of a Muslim patriot attempting to atone for the sins of his father and thus fulfil the wishes of his mother.

Pathaan is all about the mother: Mother India. In a Manmohan Desai-esque masterstroke, the story is about a hero named Pathaan (Shah Rukh Khan) and a villain named Jim (John Abraham), and their representational mother is a Hindu named Nandini (Dimple Kapadia). Jim's villainy is created by the fact that his "father" abandoned him, the way the Amitabh Bachchan character's villainy in Shakti was created when his father abandoned him during a hostage negotiation. So there's a lot of Salim-Javed in here, too: like in Deewar , the mother faces one good son, and one son gone bad. I chuckled when a pissed-off Pakistani officer hears about Article 370 being annulled, and calls for war: " elaan-e-jung " is the term he uses. That's the name of an Anil Sharma masala hit from 1989. And that officer does speak like he is in an Anil Sharma movie. Sample line: Shaitan se dosti karne ka waqt aa gaya hai .

Pathaan is introduced in a superbly imagined and choreographed action sequence. Like in War , some of the visual effects are iffy: a vault with heavy-duty gears looks especially embarrassing. But the way these mega-scale stunts are conceived, shot and cleanly edited is brilliant. They are preposterous and campy in a Roger Moore-era James Bond way, and they are filled with seeti -worthy lines. In the Pathaan-intro action stretch, he tells a bad guy: " Ghungroo toot gaye… ab naach !" It's a thrill to hear such unabashedly desi dialogue construction in a film made today. Ashutosh Rana plays a version of M in the Bond movies, like he did in War . Look at what he says when he learns that a former operative is still alive: Kisi ke bhi maut pe bharosa nahin kar sakte! He says it wryly, but the line gets a big laugh. And look at how Pathaan accuses his boss of making Jim a monster: Aap ke ek faisle ne uski aankhon mein uska har gunaah maaf kar diya.

This is both a patriotic movie and  a form of movie patriotism. It keeps the flag of a certain kind of homegrown storytelling flying high. And yet, despite all the cries of Jai Hind, there's no jingoism. Just look at the tune Jim whistles, when he walks towards Pathaan to kill him. It's " Ae mere watan ke logon …" There's no patriotic song that's more popular, but it's given a cool, ironic spin. There's homegrown myth, too. A contagious disease is nicknamed Raktbeej, after the asura whose every drop of spilt blood gave rise to multiple clones of him: he was the original super-spreader. And when we hear Nandini say "Pathaan ka 'vanvaas' ka time khatm hua ," we are essentially seeing the conflation of a Muslim name with a term associated with the holiest epic of the Hindus.

The ideology behind Pathaan is another dash of home-ground masala . As an infant, he was abandoned in a cinema theatre, and he says he was raised by his nation: " Meri desh ne meri parvarish ki ." He may carry the name Pathaan – but we never know what religion he belongs to. (The story behind the name is another effective reminder that humanity triumphs over religion and nationalism, and it contains another mother figure.) At best, you could call Pathaan an "adopted Muslim" – in other words, what matters is not who he worships but the fact that he is Indian. In contrast, Jim has broken away from his Indian identity. He says, " Jahaan main khada hoon, wahi mera desh, wahi meri duniya ." And by the end, Pathaan – the Every-Indian – is given the task of holding together the broken spirits of people who fight for the country. The film compares its hero to the gold used in the Japanese art of kintsugi , to glue back broken china. It's a lovely metaphor.

The globe-trotting Pathaan – whose story is incited by the Kashmir issue – does not come together as elegantly as the globe-trotting War did. There are clunky bits in the character-exposition dumps. When Rubina's – that's the Deepika Padukone character – traumatic past explodes as a nightmare, those images are enough. We put together her backstory in our heads. There's no need for the lines that follow, telling us what we have just seen. The energy dips in the pre-interval Pathaan-Rubina sequences. I guess the idea was to give the audience a breather, but the will-they-won't-they romance angle doesn't heat up as it should, and this is the one part where the lines feel laboured. But hey, a film that shows a Pakistani as masala cinema's "good Muslim" and clad in saffron… not bad, huh! 

Deepika plays Rubina as both a fashionista and a fighter. She's good, but the best female performer here is Dimple Kapadia. She really gets what her character is saying. She snaps when needed. The pauses in her line readings are perfectly timed. And her big scene in a hi-tech lab made me want to get up and applaud. This scene is really an "explanation scene": it's there because the audience needs to know what will happen if Jim pulls off his big idea. But the way it's written is a salute to soldiers, both men and especially women. You get to see how to say "fuck you!" to a terrorist without lifting a single gun. John Abraham is in fine form, too. In the midst of all the mayhem, he gets a beautiful bit of existentialism where he muses about the cost of war, which he calls " kafan ka never-ending supply". After a pause, he adds, " Bas laashon ke naam badalte rehte hain ." Oof! Gooseflesh!

But yes, the film belongs to Shah Rukh Khan. Is it a makeover? He's already done big action stretches in Fan , though not to this level. But more than the carnage, what's fascinating is the cruelty. Shah Rukh is the rare "romantic hero" who – with a shift of his sine-curve eyebrows – can look like he can destroy you in two seconds. We saw this side of him when he threw those killer barbs at the Preity Zinta character in Kabhi Alvida Naa Kehna. We saw this side of him in the way he treated the Anushka Sharma character in Zero . We saw this side of him in the fantastically edited meat-market fight in Raees . And we see this side of him in Pathaan , too – it convinces us that he can be a ruthless, relentless, Terminator-like killer.

As Tamil and Telugu viewers know all too well, hero-worship is part of this type of cinema, and Pathaan isn't afraid of taking you out of this movie and planting you in another one: I smiled at a " Tu hai meri Kiran" reference. And when Salman Khan makes his guest appearance as Tiger, all you need for the whistles to begin is the sight of a fluttering scarf. I can't wait for a future "Yash Raj Spy Universe" film that throws in Hrithik Roshan, too. Can today's younger heroes carry the weight of a masala crowd-pleaser like this one? The discussion actually comes up in the film, in a very funny and very meta manner. And at least for now, the answer is probably "no". Our biggest stars may be aging, but put them in the right movie and they become ageless.

Pratikshya Movie Review

• 14 Jan 2023

Thunivu Movie Review

• 11 Jan 2023
• About The Author
• More From Author

Baradwaj Rangan

National Award-winning film critic Baradwaj Rangan, former deputy editor of The Hindu and senior editor of Film Companion, has carved a niche for himself over the years as a powerful voice in cinema, especially the Tamil film industry, with his reviews of films. While he was pursuing his chemical engineering degree, he was fascinated with the writing and analysis of world cinema by American critics. Baradwaj completed his Master’s degree in Advertising and Public Relations through scholarship. His first review was for the Hindi film Dum, published on January 30, 2003, in the Madras Plus supplement of The Economic Times. He then started critiquing Tamil films in 2014 and did a review on the film Subramaniapuram, while also debuting as a writer in the unreleased rom-com Kadhal 2 Kalyanam. Furthermore, Baradwaj has authored two books - Conversations with Mani Ratnam, 2012, and A Journey Through Indian Cinema, 2014. In 2017, he joined Film Companion South and continued to show his prowess in critiquing for the next five years garnering a wide viewership and a fan following of his own before announcing to be a part of Galatta Media in March 2022.

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I didn't think we'd get a review that actually talks about the movie tbh, most people seem to miss the point and either shit on it or connect to it in a terrible and miss-appropriate way. The movie did not work for me so I didn't really talk about it for a while but when I saw how it's being perceived I was a lil surprised.

It'd be nice to hear your thoughts on this, keep an open mind watch it and share your thoughts.

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Darbar Movie Review: AR Murugadoss And Rajinikanth Unite For A Barely Okay Action-Drama

Director: AR Murugadoss

Cast: Rajinikanth, Nayanthara, Nivetha Thomas, Yogi Babu, Suniel Shetty

How effective is the hero-intro scene? That's at least one way to gauge how much thought has gone into the writing of a "mass" movie, where the first sighting of the leading man – especially Superstar – is everything. It needs so much style that a quick scan of Twitter feeds from the FDFS yields multiple iterations of the word "swag". It needs so much punch that a mild Dolby Atmos tremor should rattle the floors of the theatre. It needs so much surprise that we forget we've seen this situation a few thousand times. It needs so much… mass that science classrooms of the future will stop saying Force equals Mass times Acceleration. Force will be redefined in units of Rajinikanth's acceleration in this scene.

And this is how it unfolds in Darbar , written and directed by AR Murugadoss . We're in Mumbai. We've been told that a "mad cop" – Commissioner Aaditya Arunasalam – in on a killing spree. Goon after nameless goon is felled by a bullet. One nameless goon – a complete idiot, if you ask me – issues an open challenge to the Commissioner: Come get me if you can! (The only excuse for this stupidity can be that he hasn't seen too many Tamil movies.) He goes to a politician's birthday party, expecting protection. The name of the politician – Amar Singh – made me sit up. Is this one of those vague hints this actor likes to drop in his films, like the saffron flag that flutters in the corner of a frame in a later scene? (Political classrooms of the future may find it interesting that the last time this actor was seen in Mumbai, in Kaala , the saffron flag was planted squarely in the opposition side.)

And then, it happens. Close the shutters , says Amar Singh. A shadow runs… um, accelerates through the scene. About two thousand guns are fired. Any elementary Maths classroom will tell you that the bullet count is 12,000. Not one falls on Aaditya Arunasalam, whose name acronyms to AA, like the battery – only, he needs no recharging. He swings around what looks like a Hattori Hanzo sword and everyone around him falls like rag dolls. That's it? Where's the style ? Where's the punch ? Where's the surprise ? Where, apart from the gravity-defying guitar riffs from Anirudh, is the… mass ?

The sequence is filled not so much with filmmaking energy as a sense of duty. It feels like a teacher making a tick mark. Okay, on to the next item in the list! That's what all of Darbar feels like, like it's going through the motions. It's not bad. It's not much good, either. Look closely and you'll see what the film could have been. This could have been the story of a rogue cop, a single father whose daughter (Nivetha Thomas, who admirably fleshes out a sketchy role) wants him to get married before she does. The cop's trigger-happy ways result in tragedy, and he loses his will to go on – until the daughter urges him to rise again and return to his slo-mo glory.

That's a solid story. Even better, though the enemies are drug dealers, the director reins in his PSA-ey tendencies. There isn't a lecture within earshot. And as always with Murugadoss, there are many good ideas that, at least on paper, sound smashing. An arrested man goes missing in an unusual way. A cop employs the services of prisoners. He also uses a powerful man's influence to execute a massive cleanup operation. A daughter gives her father song-and-dance training in order to make his dating life more exciting. Best of all is the stretch where the villain (Suniel Shetty, whose character, like AA, is driven by fatherly passions) orders a hit on all cops, making bounty hunters of his band of thugs.

Why, then, is Darbar so bland? I think Murugadoss wanted to make another pacy thriller like Thuppakki , but the dramatic beats keep weighing him down. The film falls in a no-man's land. The drama isn't powerful enough. The action isn't punchy enough. In such a film, we want a villain-intro scene on a par with the hero's. Instead, we get one where he is appointed head of the international drug dealers' ring. Or something. The scene should have had the pomp and ceremony of a presidential election. It feels like the anointment of a class pupil leader. By the end, the man is a joke. He threatens AA to land up alone, or else. We think he has a plan. He does. His plan is… fisticuffs. The sound of my palm striking my forehead echoed louder than anything from the speakers.

So how is Rajinikanth? Not bad, I'd say – only because the film doesn't give him the scope to be much good. He goes through the motions, too – though, as always, he owns the screen. He keeps you watching. He also plays his age. Well, almost. When he starts following Lilly (Nayanthara) around, she thinks he's a creepy stalker. Give the film some points for that. That's exactly what would happen in real life if a man his age behaved this way with a woman her age. And give some more points for the scene where her cousin visits AA and asks him if it's fair that he wants a woman so young. What if your daughter started seeing someone your age?

Okay. At least, we're spared the duets – though I wished the film had treated the romantic angle more seriously. Nearly 30 years ago, in Annamalai , Rajinikanth made himself look older and romanced a grey-haired Khushbu. Now that he is actually that age, why can't we see him in a song sequence as warm and sweet as 'Rekka Katti Parakkuthadi…'? Nayanthara, as always, looks fantastic. She also looks like she should be in some other movie, where she'd be more gainfully employed.  Then again, Darbar has bigger problems in the writing department – say, the fact that we learn about a character's death long before the actual death occurs. Where's the logic in this? Why strip away this suspense? Or should we not ask such questions? After all, the only logic, these days, is: It's a "mass" film, so nothing else matters .

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