Absolutely Loved Panchayat Season 2 on Amazon Prime Video 😊

Release Date: 20 May 2022

Genre: Comedy Drama

Language: Hindi

Season: 2

No. of Episodes: 8

Running Time: 29-46 minutes

Writer: Chandan Kumar

Director: Deepak Kumar Mishra

Cast: Raghubir Yadav, Neena Gupta, Jitendra Kumar, Chandan Roy, Faisal Malik

If you like rustic India, desi humour and an entangle of simple & funny problems and solutions, then Panchayat Season 2 is your series to watch.

While Panchayat's first season made a straight entry to audience's heart, it's second season has given it a firm hold therein. 

Now, they actually want to visit Panchayat's Phulera village and spend time with all of it's aforementioned 5 main protagonists!

These characters are extremely well penned and enacted. A tight and well researched screenplay and effective direction doubles the entertainment quotient of the viewers.

The series takes you back to your grassroots, soothes your rattled nerves and re-establishes the fact that an excellent series can be made sans any unnecessary skin show and vulgarity.

My personal favourite amongst all the actors is Raghubir Yadav. His easy portrayal of the role of Pradhan ji, a worldly wise, tradition and prosperous man of the old world who - loves and provides generously to his small family, is hands-on involved in all the issues of his village, gels in with his team but still maintains the aura of a senior leader and is shrewd while dealing with the local politicians, is bang on.

Very few actors can successfully introduce layers to such a simple role!

2 Best Family Drama Based Comedy Web Series In Hindi 😊

If you are from the era, when during your childhood and/or growing up years, you were hooked to family drama based comedy TV series like -

- Yeh Jo Hai Zindagi (1984-85)

- Dekh Bhai Dekh (1993-94)

And if currently you miss such content or look forward to a bout of nostalgia and relaxation, then switch on and enjoy the following web series -

- Yeh Meri Family ... Season 1 Episodes 7 (12 Jul 2018)

In the summer of 1998, 12 years old middle child Harshu balances school, family, friendship and other challenges of growing up in Jaipur, Rajasthan.

The series revolves around a family comprising of a father, a mother and three kids.

Watch it on TVFPlay and Netflix.

- Gullak ...  Season 1 Episodes 5 (27 Jun 2019)

- Gullak ... Season 2  Episodes 5 (15 Jan 2021)

Set in quaint by-lanes in the heart of India, Gullak is a collection of disarming and relatable tales of the Mishra family, mostly from inside but also from outside their house.

The family comprises of a mother, a father, a grown up son and his younger brother who is still a student.

Watch Season 1 on TVFPlay and SonyLiv. Watch Season 2 on SonyLiv.

Yeh Meri Family depicts urban life of the late 90s. I could relate a lot with it. Watching this series was quite nostalgic.

Gullak depicts the current period in a not so advanced town. The characters herein rarely talk straight. The satire, taunt, show-off, and frustration ridden dialogues are quite interesting to hear.

Both the series are well penned and extremely well made. Their castings are perfect and all the characters appear natural and in sync with their respective roles.

Personally, I loved both the series.

The Fame Game (25 Feb 2022)

Channel: Netflix

Genre: Suspense Thriller Drama 

Language: Hindi

No. of Episodes: 8

Average Duration: 45 minutes

Director: Bejoy Nambiar, Karishma Kohli, Sri Rao

Cast: Madhuri Dixit, Sanjay Kapoor, Manav Kaul, Suhasini Mulay, Lakshvir Saran, Rajshri Deshpande, Muskkaan Jaferi, Makrand Deshpande, Gagan Arora, Subhangi Latkar

Music: Andrew Orkin, Harini Raghavan

Editing: Monisha R Baldawa

Introduction: 

The Fame Game is the OTT debut of cine world stalwart Madhuri Dixit, the superstar of the late 80's and full 90's & a cine diva forever with Dharmatic Entertainment, the digital content company by Dharma Productions which is owned by Karan Johar.

It was bound to be impactful and it is. But it is more of a nostalgic ride of Madhuri's dazzling cinematic presence and good acting, rather than a content rich and crisp suspense thriller, that it intends to be.

Plot:

Anamika Anand (Madhuri Dixit), a top actress goes missing post an award event which kick-starts an investigation by no-nonsense and methodical police officer Shobha (Rajshri Deshpande).

As her investigation proceeds, one by one she interviews family members and associates of Anamika, who may not  divulge in front of her the absolute truth, but we as an audience eventually get to see the not so hunky dory interactions that transpired in the last six months between Anamika and her - husband Nikhil (Sanjay Kapoor), son Avi (Lakshvir Saran), daughter Amara (Muskkaan Jaferi), mother (Suhasini Mulay), house manager, co-actor cum old flame Manish Khanna (Manav Kaul), make up man, a slimy financier and an obsessed fan Madhav (Gagan Arora).

As the series shuffles between present and immediate 6past months, it becomes clear that behind the 1000 watt smile of the middle aged but ultra-popular cine diva with a luxurious bungalow, full family, a train of staff, good work at hand, lies a spirited but tired woman who - was forced to enter the tinsel town at a young age against her wishes, all thanks to her controlling mother; shares an almost loveless relationship with her husband that borders on domestic abuse; constantly bears the ire of inferiority complexes of her almost adult children; just cannot escape the snide comments of her mother passed under the garb of disciplining her family and herself; yearns direly but finds it difficult to give a proper second chance to lost love i.e. Manish Khanna as she is a married woman with kids; is tired of making extra efforts to cling onto her stardom and compete with much younger actresses and their skin show route to top the charts!

In short she is tired of flying solo to make it all work when everyone around her is either coning her or taking her for granted.

Given Anamika's circumstances, almost everyone appears to be a suspect in her kidnapping and/or murder.

Watch the series to see what actually happened to Anamika and how the mystery was solved.

Analysis:

In the series, Madhuri Dixit has the maximum screen time and close shots and she has aced it all with her inherent beauty, dignity and grace. She has well adopted the new style of acting and is expectantly wonderful in dance numbers.

Her wardrobe is fantastic. She adorns it all with perfection sans any skin show or in-your-face botox.

All the other actors have also performed well, but Manav Kaul has clearly scored above all. His acting has well defined layers. His character appears kind of besotted and in love with Anamika, but his real self never looks intimidated by Madhuri. Whether it's exuberance or nervous anticipation or despair, he has portrayed it all beautifully.

Conclusion:

If you are a Madhuri Dixit fan, do watch the series. If you are not, you can still watch it as in spite of the missing thrill, it's engaging. The diva keeps you hooked to the screen.

3 Reasons To Watch And 3 Reasons To Skip The Movie - Love Hostel on ZEE5 😊

 

3 reasons to watch it:

- It's crisp with good editing. You are thoroughly engaged and contemplate what will happen next.

The duration of the movie is just 1 hour 40 minutes.

- Good acting by all the lead characters i.e. Vikrant Massey, Sanya Malhotra and Bobby Deol, the former two play the lovebirds who elope and marry via intercaste registry and the latter plays the hired killer in search of them to perform honour killing.

However, Bobby Deol is more effective with his get-up and body language. The moment he speaks, his familiar glint in the eyes and mild smile takes over and clashes with his role of a cold blooded assassin.

- For such a movie, shifting the backdrop from Uttar Pradesh to not much cinematically explored Haryana seems a fresh change. The dialect, dressing and dialogues are interesting to observe.

This is is the second film of Shanker Raman, the director. Incidentally, his debut movie Gurgaon was also Haryana based.

3 reasons to skip it:

- Mindless bloodshed of one and all and unnecessary collateral damage.

- Glimpse of many things but pursual of none.

The movie depicts - lawlessness in a Haryana based town along with it's corrupt and locally powerful lady MLA and police officers, primitive culture of condemning and honour killing of couples of different castes or same sex, trapping and arresting of a simpleton with false charges of being a terrorist, forcing a youth to do unlawful activity, a government run and police protected safe home for married couples fearing honour killing and a self proclaimed vigilante doing cold blooded honor killing, both at will and upon hiring.

But the movie doesn't probe deep into any of the aforementioned topics. In the movie, things just happen in succession without explaining any why and how behind them.

- Vanilla ending. All that built up yields to nothing!

4 New Hindi Web Series On 4 Different OTT Platforms 🙂

The year 2022 has kick-started with 4 new Hindi web series - Kaun Banegi Shikharwati, Ranjish Hi Sahi, Human and Yeh Kaali Kaali Ankhein on ZEE5, Voot, Disney+ Hotstar and Netflix respectively.

All of them are overall nice and starkly different in content. So, if you are a Hindi web series enthusiast, then you have much to binge watch and enjoy!

Here is some factual information and my take on these web series -

1. Kaun Banegi Shikharwati (7 Jan 2022)

Channel: ZEE5

Genre: Drama Comedy

No. of Episodes: 10

Average Duration: 30 minutes

Cast: Naseeruddin Shah, Lara Dutta Bhupathi, Soha Ali Khan, Kritika Kamra, Anya Singh, Raghubir Yadav, Cyrus Sahukar 

Plot: "When an elderly maharaja (played gamely by Shah) is targeted for tax evasion, he concocts a harebrained scheme with the assistance of his right hand man (Yadav) to reunite his four estranged daughters."

Review: It's one of those series that is beautiful and pleasant in all the frames. Throughout the series the aforementioned four sisters compete against each other in games supposedly designed around 'navras' (nine basic emotions) which mostly appear uninteresting and poorly scripted.

The movie has two acting stalwarts - Naseeruddin Shah and Raghubir Yadav, out of which the latter has definitely scored above the former!

Amongst the sisters, Soha Ali Khan has performed the best.

2. Ranjish Hi Sahi (13 Jan 2022)

Channel: Voot

Genre: Drama

No. of Episodes: 8

Average Duration: 40 minutes

Cast: Tahir Raj Bhasin, Amala Paul, Amrita Puri, Zarina Wahab

Plot: "A maverick film director gets drawn into an extra-marital affair with a superstar changing his life; his marriage with his first love spirals as he's torn between two worlds. Set in 70s Bollywood.

It is reportedly based on the controversial love affair of Parveen Babi and Mahesh Bhatt (who is the creator here)."

Review: Would you discuss the quality of a crop if the method of cultivation is faulty in the first place?

Similarly, is it right on the aforementioned creator's part to portray a mixed character (read mostly grey) of a yesteryear popular heroine but project himself holier than thou, clearly not exposing even the basic widely known truths about his life, like his second marriage?

And that too when the concerned heroine is no more alive to defend herself or give her side of the story!

All one can say is that, though the series has good casting, art direction and vintage feel, it lacks an authentic story.

3. Human (14 Jan 2022)

Channel: Disney+ Hotstar

Genre: Thriller

No. of Episodes: 10

Average Duration: 45 minutes

Cast: Shefali Shah, Kirti Kulhari, Ram Kapoor, Seema Biswas, Indraneil Sengupta, Vishal Jethwa, Aditya Srivastava

Plot: "Shefali Shah and Kirti Kulhari play doctors in this medical thriller which looks at the messy, scary world of drug trials. After a pharmaceutical company tries to “fast-track the development of a new drug despite lethal side effects”, Dr Saira Sabharwal (Kulhari) finds herself at odds with the woman she has idolised, Dr Gauri Nath (Shah)."

Review: It's a well made series portraying in detail the various elements involved in a drug trial scam, both in terms of institutions and people alongwith their respective role, answerability, greed, state of awareness and helplessness.

Shefali Shah and Kirti Kulhari are the lead protagonists and the mentor-protégé doctor duo of the series. Both have been styled well and have put forward quite good performances.

However, Shefali Shah seems to have overdone it a bit, both in terms of wardrobe and acting, fulfilling more of her desire of becoming a sensuous Bollywood heroine rather than sticking to her character in the series.

Others artists have also performed well.

Further better performance is expected from Ram Kapoor.

4. Yeh Kaali Kaali Ankhein (14 Jan 2022)

Channel: Netflix

Genre: Thriller

No. of Episodes: 8

Average Duration: 40 minutes

Cast: Tahir Raj Bhasin, Shweta Tripathi Sharma, Anchal Singh, Anant Joshi, Saurabh Shukla, Arunoday Singh, Brijendra Kala

Plot: "Relentlessly pursued by a powerful politician’s daughter who will do anything to make him hers, a man slips down a dark, risky path to reclaim his life."

Review: It's a thriller with beautiful frames and few comic moments, best of which are brought by Anant Joshi who plays the protagonist Tahir Raj Bhasin's best friend.

The series is both innocent and gruesome in it's approach and at times the scenes appear unnecessarily lengthy.

My Suggestions From Current OTT Releases 🙂

Good content seems to be showering on all OTT channels.

Upon browsing, you are prone to find something or the other, worthwhile to occupy your creative mind.

Personally in the last few days, I have binge watched and liked the following series and movies on assorted OTT channels - (sharing only one from each channel)

- Netflix: Squid Game (9 episodes)

An extremely engaging and mind churning Korean series about a set of lethal games (which appear physical but are actually mental) played by a big group of people who are desolate with life due to extreme financial fiasco, for an insane amount of prize money, which will only be given to the final winner. Rest all will die beforehand!

- Prime Video: Sardar Udham

It's about an unsung hero who was a close aid and follower of Bhagat Singh. The movie feels slow paced in the beginning, but soon enough you gel with it's tempo.

Watch the movie to see a different visual treatment of Jallianwala Bagh massacre and Vicky Kaushal.

- Disney+ Hotstar: Dil Bekaraar (10 episodes)

Set in the backdrop of late 1980s, it's a cool amalgamation of sweet family drama and exposure of a the then national issue.

If you are born in the 60s or 70s, watch it for the sheer nostalgia of a forgotten and relatively sweet & simple lifestyle.

It's lovely to see Raj Babbar, Poonam Dhillon and Padmini Kolhapure together in one frame after ages. Chandrachur Singh plays a small role but surprises you with a total look makeover.

- Sony Liv: Tabbar (8 episodes)

An extremely well made and engaging series with excellent screenplay and acting. Storyline is a simple case of drugs misplacement. But the treatment of the story is fantastic and full of surprises.

Pawan Malhotra and Supriya Pathak are a treat to watch as an aged middle class God fearing Punjabi couple.

- ZEE5: Bob Biswas

It's a horizontal sequel to Kahaani (2021) wherein the director's cap has passed on from Sujoy Ghosh to his debutant daughter Diya Annapurna Ghosh and Bob Biswas' character playing has passed on from Saswata Chatterjee to Abhishek Bachchan.

Watch the movie tosee an evolved and much better performing Abhishek Bachchan.

- MX Player: Matsya Kaand (11 episodes)

It's a revenge drama wherein a series of con games are pulled off by Ravi Dubey and his small team, using more of disguise and minute planning rather than muscle. He follows the guidance of stoic Piyush Mishra, who has developed an altogether new and impressive style of dialogue delivery.

Ravi Kishan and Rajesh Sharma bring their own zing.

Antim: The Final Truth (26 Nov 2021)

Genre: Crime Action

Language: Hindi

Duration: 140 minutes

Director: Mahesh Manjrekar

Cast: Salman Khan, Aayush Sharma, Sachin Khedekar, Mahesh Manjrekar, Mahima Makwana, Sayaji Shinde, Upendra Limaye, Jisshu Sengupta, Nikitin Dheer, Rohit Haldikar

Music: Ravi Basrur, Hitesh Modak

Editing: Bunty Nagi, Sarvesh Parab

3 Interesting Observations:

Let's start with my 3 observations after watching the movie -

... Sachin Khedekar is totally invested in the movie. He holds on to his character from start till end with elan and conviction.

... Aayush Sharm is invested in his career. In spite of being a villager, he sports chiseled looks and golden-ish beard and moustache.

He makes full show of - muscular body; all possible emotions like crying, laughing, smirking, threatening and mocking; fight sequences, dance movements and romance.

... Salman Khan is also invested in Aayush's career. He has less screen time than his protégé and no heroine!

Even in the scenes, where the cop in him is reprimanding the criminal in Aayush, he doesn't emanate the vibes of ill-will or hate. It appears as if a guardian is disciplining a young adult.

Plot:

Centred around the plight of poor farmers forced to sell their lands to rich and exploitative zamindars and industrialists, the movie opens with Rahul aka Rahulya's (Aayush Sharma) family being forced to relocate from their village to Poona, once his father Dattaram Patil (Sachin Khedekar), suffers blows and humiliation at the hands of his boss, to whom he had already sold his land and works there as the gatekeeper!

Once in Pune, Rahulya's anger and restlessness puts him on a non returning spree of crime and soon enough he becomes a dreaded and eccentric gangster of Pune and indulges into the heinous acts of land grabbing from poor farmers. Alongside, he also does few Robinhood acts and romances Manda (Mahima Makwana), a girl who runs a tea stall.

Rajveer Singh (Salman Khan) is a know-all, daring and righteous Sikh cop, who decides to clear the crime in the city by turning the gangsters against each other. But when it's Rahulya's turn to get eliminated, he comes and saves him!

Finally everyone gets eliminated. Watch the movie to see how and by whom!

Analysis:

Antim is an Hindi adaptation of the Marathi film Mulshi Pattern, but the latter's treatment is starkly different from the former.

The latter focuses on the plight of farmers and their families upon being forced to leave their land and dignity back in their village to earn a livelihood in the city by doing menial jobs and undignified treatment.

While the former focuses on action scenes, superhero image of Salman Khan and new hero image of Aayush Sharma.

The movie's star cast is good but storyline contradicts itself a couple of times. The chemistry between the lead pair is nil. The direction and music are average. 

Conclusion:

On the whole, it's an average movie filled with bullets, slow motion and cheesy dialogues.