Connect (2022)

Connect (2022)

Directed by: Ashwin Saravanan
Starring: Nayanthara

My relationship with horror films has been a little weird. I never enjoyed almost any horror film I've seen. The only horror I've enjoyed is the sub genres of slasher horror, body horror or survival thrillers which don't have much to do with a "ghost". It's mostly because I always find them terribly predictable. I've not enjoyed jump scares too, because they feel more like a prank a friend is pulling on you than as a scene in a film. But I get excited and intrigued with the idea of a horror film. I was excited about Connect simply because I loved Game Over. And I thoroughly enjoyed Connect even though it was not very different from a lot of horror films I've not enjoyed. It's simply because the jump scares are a notch cleverer than what you'd expect.

I really enjoyed the idea that a mother herself has to perform exorcism with the assistance of an expert over a zoom call. Although the exorcism wasn't explored much, and there wasn't much depth beyond the superficial plot, the film manages to create a solid set of emotional highs and lows. There's a point where she cannot see her father and the exorcist is also injured and she's by herself. That moment was a beautiful low point, and then the film picks itself up naturally with the progression of events that happen. I can remember at least 6-7 points in the film where the tension was building up really well, and the best part is that the film doesn't give you enough time to breathe. The film's a little hard on you, to the point where you kind of surrender and let the experience take over.

Decision to Leave (2022)

Decision to Leave (2022)

Co-written, Directed and Produced by: Park Chan-wook
Best Director at Cannes Film Festival 2022

The film takes off with a simple premise - a murder mystery and as the film progresses there are a lot of layers added to it. And it keeps getting added to a point where it feels a tad bit overwhelming. It being a murder mystery, obviously there are a lot of plot points and details which drive the story. But beyond that, this film has the angle where the detective falls in love with the woman whose husband is dead. There's infidelity, a murder mystery, and tons of interpersonal moral dilemmas. It's also overwhelming because they don't give us enough time to process the bizarre plot points. I felt the same while watching Park Chan-wook's The Handmaiden (2016). All of this with an underlying mystery throughout the film, makes the film's experience a little weird. The most unique thing about the film is the overall tone, and the thing is the tone is a derivative of the story. You can't have this tone with a lot of other stories. So here, style and substance are almost intertwined with each other.

Talking about the style of the film, the way the film is shot, edited and scored adds creates the film's texture. The camera angles are slanted, distorted. The magnification and the lensing is weird. There's a shrieky dramatic mood to the score. And above all this, what surprised me the most in the film is the fluidity. It matches the pace of the current day editing style. It's so snappy, fragmented, moves so quick and jumps from one to another. All these things added, the film has a very strong directorial voice. Almost as if it can be a tonal reference to a lot of new films/shows. 

Avatar: The Way of Water (2022)

Avatar: The Way of Water (2022) 

Directed by: James Cameron

Avatar has the premise of 'man vs nature' and through this, they explore a whole new world. One of the best parts about stories set in different worlds is looking at the small details. Just like in the first part, how we see Jake and Neytiri falling in love, in this film, we see Jake and Neytiri having a family, kids. Here, what was novel was how we see kids growing up in a world like this. It's beautiful. For me, it was just this portion that made the film worth it. It felt like a beautiful, heartwarming PIXAR film. And from there, it goes into the water world, which is also a new world and though this world is not very different, even these portions have that warmth and some interesting elements to it. The film is visually beautiful, and it has the visual palette of a film unlike any other film ever made, which is why it's very easy to forgive any small issues the film has too.

To me, the film was structurally very predictable. Even the first part was lowkey predictable, and this time, the second part felt more predictable. I wish they explored the kids growing up once they entered the water world, because it would've been shorter. Now the portions before they go into the water world, though nice, felt like an extended prologue sequence. In this film, the action felt a lot more slick and stylish than in the first part. I really enjoyed a lot of the portions. Some portions in the ending felt like the film was a mix of Avatar and Titanic. Although I really enjoyed watching the film, I'm not sure about what to expect next. Because the 'man vs nature' conflict is getting repetitive by now, but they also can't deviate from this because that's the core idea of Avatar. I'm curious to see what they'd do.

Good Will Hunting (1997)

Good Will Hunting (1997)

Directed by: Gus Van Sant
Starring and Written by: Matt Damon & Ben Affleck

It's a beautiful film set amidst settings that I really love. College, an outlier misfit student, intelligent professors, a wise therapist, unresolved traumas and a murky relationship. Perfect recipe for a coming-of-age film. Robin Williams is so beautiful, he has tons of depth in just his appearance. He could just say something, and you'd want to buy it. Will is not easy to describe using adjectives, but Will and Sean seem like a perfect duo to have life altering conversations. Will has the answers to everything, he's intelligent. Sean has been through life, he's wise. Will is scared to be hurt again and would do everything to avoid it. Sean has already gone through the biggest possible tragedy of his life and yet doesn't regret one bit of it.

Although the film explores a lot of interesting themes, the film didn't land on me as hard perhaps because I've seen a lot of derivative work of this. Finding what you want to do. Taking a plunge without fear. Unresolved trauma. Wisdom vs intelligence. All these ideas are interesting even now, but I can imagine how blazingly original they'd have been for when the film came out. And though Robin William's character seemed like a spin off of his character in Dead Poets Society, I could never get tired of watching characters like that. I love how the film takes us through this myriad of fights, debates, arguments and ends it on a note where we feel like Will is going to be okay, or in fact more than okay.

Love Today (2022)

Love Today (2022)

Written, Directed and Performed by: Pradeep Ranganathan

Love Today has a terrific idea - terrific because the idea is so simple and has enough depth to explore more than enough. Two lovers are asked to exchange their phones and then decide if they still want to get married. Initially, both of them take it easily, but slowly a lot of lies start coming out. And loss of trust happens. Is there recovery from that? It's a terrific idea for a rom-com, and it's mostly executed well. The best part about the film is that though it's a rom-com, it's treated like a family entertainer with the settings they choose in the film and the way the screenplay unfolds. It's solid on structure and I can see why it's a blockbuster. I enjoyed Yogi Babu's subplot, it added a nice layer to the whole premise. There's one moment in the film that melted my heart, when the protagonist just breaks down in front of his mom. In that moment, one can forget the context and just the image of a young man finally bursting in front of his mother was so moving.

I had some issues with the film. Though the film is packaged as a modern romance, the worldview of the film suddenly becomes so old school sometimes - when he asks her if she's virgin and things like that. The whole conflict of her morphed MMS leaking seemed forced and a tad bit unrealistic conflict in the otherwise grounded, slice of life film. Suddenly with this, the film gets into a life and death territory which is a slight tonal jump. Although the film recovers from that pretty well and soon. I like how the film addresses the line between being silly as a young boy and actually being harmful to strangers on the internet. Overall, I enjoyed the film except for some minor hiccups.

Gold (2022)

Gold (2022)

Written, Directed and Edited by: Alphonse Puthren
Starring: Prithviraj Sukumaran, Nayantara

Gold is a classic example of style over substance. There's barely any story in the film, and the whole film runs on the Alphonse Puthren treatment. There's terrific style throughout - almost every scene is cut to the beats of the background music, almost like music videos, even when nothing is happening in a scene, these minor jump cuts are what make the scenes dynamic and interesting, there's usage of text, split screen, and there's so much style in the edit that it feels like the film was tripping on the edit table. The comedy also works - Alphonse Puthren sometimes has better comedy in the filler/background scenes than in the main scenes, and even in Gold, almost every scene has really good filler comedy. It's probably because there's no pressure and the filler comedy can be really silly too sometimes and it's okay.

The waferthin plot of Gold is not the problem, the issue is that even after watching the whole film, I felt like I didn't know Joshi, the protagonist. On one hand, he's a middle class mama boy. On the other, he becomes this macho man suddenly. The ending is too much of a jump that it almost felt like a parody. I like the self referential nature of the film - it's beautiful that the film reminds you that with edit, style and music a director has such a strong visual signature. I just wish there was some substance in the film to latch on to. With films without a focused plot and great style, it's fun to watch the film for about an hour. After that is when it can get a little draining. Nevertheless, Gold should be studied by editors and filmmakers to see how one can trip on the edit in a film.

HIT: The Second Case

HIT: The Second Case (2022)

Written and Directed by: Sailesh Kolanu
Starring: Adivi Sesh, Meenakshi Choudhary
Minor Spoilers Ahead.

It's a well crafted serial killer film. The film carries terrific tension throughout, it could either be by the details unfolding in the plot, or it could simply be by someone's possible presence around. There's a scene in the second half where KD and his colleague are discussing a scene on the road at night, outside a house. I just couldn't concentrate on what they were discussing because the possible presence of someone around created terrific tension. Though it was predictable that Raghavudu is definitely a red herring, they carried tension there too by eventually presenting evidence against him. And though almost the entire first half is a red herring, it doesn't seem meaningless because of the film's commentary on vigilantism and society's response to it.

There are a lot of beautiful set ups and pay offs, some really nice moments and the final reveal was unpredictable to me. So the film worked on almost every level to me. My only problem was with the violence. I'm not talking about the murders done by the serial killer, but for example the whole sequence between KD and the killer. I think violence can be fun if you see the act. It can get uncomfortable if you see the consequences. We see the shot of a disfigured face of the killer, which I thought they could've done without. But apart from this one thing, I liked pretty much everything in the film. I especially liked how the killer's backstory is not opened after the killer is caught, which I'm usually not a big fan of. I liked how they opened the film with some of that, almost like a cold open in a show. Looking forward to the universe building up.