A lot has been written about how wonderfully this film works and the prime reasons behind it. John Krasinski's clever plot (co-written by Scott Beck and Bryan Woods) makes great use of sound as a device to stage some real horror. Yet it never loses sight of some poignant emotion tied in with the family central to it. One movie that comes to mind, with regards to such fine balance of clever thrills and emotion, is Hitchcock's "Rear Window". Sure there's jump scares and cheap thrills aplenty, but the movie makes it a point to rise above them. Emily Blunt and John Krasinski are at their usual effective selves but surprise comes in the form of the terrific Millicent Simmonds and Noah Jupe. And did I mention the movie's use of sound and what a riot it would have been designing that for the film, with a fabulous soundtrack by Marco Beltrami?
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Falling in love is a reckoning of sorts: a stroll down a twisty trail. It begins with a silent curiosity for the other person, with everythig they do seemingly, a mystery. The infatuation then slowly kicks in, making the object of love seem larger than life, resplendent, and glorious. This might lead to self loathing, for the inadequacies and insufficiencies that are perceieved in oneself. Occasionally, there is anger and hatred, for a desire that's tangible yet out of reach. And if paths were to align, there is consolation, and of course, passion and love: the hurried cascade of affection for the loved one, the myopic disdain for every other thing or person in the vicinity, the smudgy yet starkly distinct first moments of intimacy and lovemaking, the incessant wave of joy. Commercial Telugu Cinema needed a new language. Not content: several new writers and directors have been trying out new and previously unseen content, with mediocre results. What it needed, was a new narrative voice. One that can push Cinema, if not the boundaries, at least the way it prevails and it's existential details. S.S. Rajamouli contributed heavily to this, yet his Cinema is mostly about the grandeur of an idea and not the richness of the world around it.
With "Rangasthalam", Sukumar brings along a movie that takes the template of popular cinema and does very interesting things with it. There's three beautiful parts to this: the content, the detail, and the visual narrative. Firstly, the content subverts so many tropes of Telugu Cinema that have become, to say the least, routine and uninspiring. It is hard to dwell deep on this without spoiling the film, but it may be adequate to say this: the film completely ignores the predictability of structures in the story, the constituent power dynamics, and good - evil tradeoffs that plague most other films. Sukumar is gutsy to have tried this. |
Read MoreAtlantic CityAtlantic City says so much about two people in a relationship, without saying too much.
BooksmartA comedy that is fun, while being just good cinema in the first place.
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