In Achal Mishra’s new fifty minute long feature Dhuin, which is now premiering at the 22nd Mumbai Festival, ambitions, emotions and the related frustrations of life come staring at us in nervously unsettling ways in its stillness, fogged gloom and the burdens of reality. Through striking visual imagery, and a gorgeous background score dominated by minimalistic guitar riffs, Mishra adopts a pristine, simple and subtle approach of narrating a story of dreams and ambitions, thereby delivering the deep impact of his quietly disturbing film in a poignant resonance of life.

Kabir Khan was very clear what he wanted to achieve with 83. The proceedings are kept simplistic by design, back stories of individual players or melodrama outside cricket is kept minimalistic by design, the screenplay unabashedly plays to the gallery by design, all the emotional buttons are manipulated by design, and we can see and feel all of it. But no one cares, because all of that works by design too! It is the perfect feel good, nostalgia ride one would want to take this holiday season and come out all smiling and teary eyed from it.

Shoojit Sircar is a man of quiet depth and restrained emotions. Even when he makes his lighter films, there is a unique elegance and classy charm attached to them, them studded with precious gem like moments, deeply layered subtlety, and an inexplicable repeat watch quality where you keep discovering a new something with every repeat watch. When the news first started flowing around that my most favourite hindi filmmaker of today’s times was going to make a biopic on Sardar Udham Singh and had the incredible Irrfan on his mind to play the titular role, it was naturally very exciting. While there were apprehensions about Shoojit also jumping into the biopic bandwagon, and also indulging in a genre that was outside his comfort zone, I also had the confidence that Shoojit, with his research , detailing, aesthetics and restraint, will lend the right amount of depth and gravitas to the forgotten story of this valiant revolutionary who took all his time but never lost focus on seeking justice on possibly the single most heinous crime and the darkest event of blood bath that marred India’s struggle for independence.