Hindi

  • Payal Kapadia – A Night of Knowing Nothing (2021)

    Documentary2021-2030ExperimentalIndiaPayal Kapadia

    Through fictional love letters found in a cupboard at the Film and Television Institute of India, we meet L, a film student writing to her estranged lover while he is away. Gradually we’re immersed in the drastic changes taking place at the school and in the lives of young people across the country as they take to the streets to protest widespread discrimination.

    In her debut film, Payal Kapadia deftly merges reality with fiction, weaving together archival footage with student protest videos to create a vital tapestry of the personal and the political. With its dreamlike editing rhythms and a revelatory use of sound, A Night of Knowing Nothing is both an essential document of contemporary India and a nostalgic look at youth fighting the injustice of their time.Read More »

  • Kabir Khan – Tubelight (2017)

    2011-2020DramaIndiaKabir KhanWar

    In a small picturesque town in North India, Laxman (Salman Khan) lives with his younger brother Bharat (Sohail Khan). The two have no other family and are inseparable. Laxman’s world comes crashing down, when war breaks out and Bharat gets drafted into the Army. A helpless Bharat leaves a devastated Laxman behind. News from the border only worsens, as the tension continues to escalate. Seeing the carnage around him and worried for his brother, Laxman decides he must stop this conflict and get his brother back.Read More »

  • Deepa Mehta – Water (2005)

    2001-2010Deepa MehtaDramaIndia

    Review by Roger Ebert-
    Her father asks Chuyia: “Do you remember getting married?” She does not. He tells her that her husband has died, and she is a widow. She is 8 years old. Under traditional Hindu law, she will be a widow for the rest of her life. There are two alternatives: Marry her husband’s brother, or throw herself on his funeral pyre.Read More »

  • Deepa Mehta – Earth (1998)

    1991-2000Deepa MehtaDramaIndiaPolitics

    Synopsis:
    The movie opens in Lahore of 1947 before India and Pakistan became independent. It is a cosmopolitan city, depicted by the coterie of working class friends who are from different religions. The rest of the movie chronicles the fate of this group and the maddening religious that sweeps even this city as the partition of the two countries is decided and Lahore is given to Pakistan.Read More »

  • Manav Kaul – Tathagat (2020)

    2011-2020DramaIndiaManav Kaul

    Set in the meditative quietude of a Himalayan village, Tathagat is a poetically shot tale of guilt. Following the journey of a monk questioning his renunciation, this philosophical drama takes a thought-provoking look at the relationship between our childhood memories and adulthood perplexities.Read More »

  • Mrinal Sen – Genesis (1986)

    1981-1990ArthouseAsianIndiaMrinal Sen

    A farmer (Naseeruddin Shah) and a weaver (Om Puri) exchange their products for goods provided by a regular passing trader (M.K. Raina). A woman (Shabana Azmi) arrives, forcing the two men’s desires but also urging them to obtain more recompense from the trader. After a visit to a village fair , the two men become more acquisitive and jealousies break out over the now pregnant woman who simply ups and leaves .As the two men fight each other, the trader’s men attack and enslave the workers again.Read More »

  • Prem Kapoor – Badnam Basti AKA Alley Of Ill Repute (1971)

    1971-1980ClassicsDramaIndiaPrem Kapoor

    Based on a novel by Hindi writer Kamleshwar Prasad Saxena, it centers on a love triangle between two men and one woman on the margins of society.

    Badnam Basti is considered one of the first Indian films to explore queer relationships. Based on a novel by Hindi writer Kamleshwar Prasad Saxena, it centers on a love triangle between two men and one woman on the margins of society. The film is noted for its adventurous editing, strong performances, neorealist style, and the music by Vijay Raghav Rao, one of postcolonial India’s most innovative composers. Although Badnam Basti was recut and rereleased in 1978, it has since faded into obscurity; until recently, the film was presumed lost.Read More »

  • Satyajit Ray – Sadgati AKA Deliverance (1981)

    Satyajit Ray1981-1990DramaIndia

    In this interesting look at the differences in the indian caste system, an untouchable Dukhi (played by Om Puri) approaches the village Brahmin to request him to set an auspicious date for his daughter’s upcoming wedding according to the Hindu astrology. The Brahmin promises to perform the task in exchange of Dukhi slaving over household chores in return. (-Artificial Eye)Read More »

  • Vishnu Mathur – Pehla Adhyay AKA The First Chapter (1981)

    1981-1990ArthouseIndiaVishnu Mathur

    The most obscure of the films to come out of the Indian New Wave, Pahla Adhyay is Vishnu Mathur’s only film. In the anti-expressionistic style of auteur Mani Kaul, the film is closer to Ozu than Bresson as one witnesses the same spaces being repeated as the alienation of the lead character, a student is played out in the background of the city of Bombay in the early ’80s. The film explicitly challenges Bollywood’s contemporary representations of the city, especially in the way it uses Dinesh Shakul’s minimalistic acting (modelling), emphasizing the actor as a body occupying a space instead of an expressionistic face.Read More »

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