Fortunately, the enterprising chaps at some of our nation’s biggest cinema chains have tapped into the rich oil vein that is Indian cinema, so I’ve injected some Bollywood brilliance to diversify your viewing. Get some cultcha up ya.
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ROOM
A couple of years back, you may have seen Frank, a bizarre and anarchic comedy about… well, let’s be honest, basically about Arcade Fire. It was one of the best comedies of the year, and now director Larry Abrahamson is back to bring the belly laughs yet again!
Uh… oh… no, wait, this is… oh jeez. I’m sorry, that was… wow, that was inappropriate.
An Oscar nominee and the film most likely to remove any trust you have left for the male half of the species, Room is the only world five-year-old Jack (Jason Tremblay) has ever known: the single-room shed in which he and his mother (Brie Larson) are hostages. Taking its cues from the Joseph Fritzl case, it injects some much-needed hope into the story when Jack escapes and has his first experience of the world outside.
tl;dr Recommended viewing position:
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DIRTY GRANDPA
This one will leave you horrified for very different reasons. Last week, I put The 5th Wave in my bottom five list for the year. This “ribald comedy” featuring Robert De Niro (you know, from Taxi Driver?) will most certainly be joining it. This is comedy as low as it gets, and the critics have universally panned it.
“The greatest gift a grandson can give his grandfather is a hot college girl who wants to have unprotected sex with him before he dies.” That’s an actual quote from this actual movie, which attracted an Oscar-winning actor despite clearly being written by a 12-year-old Bam Margera. Why would he – not to mention Zac Efron and Parks And Recreation alumnus Aubrey Plaza – agree to flush his reputation like this?
It’s currently enjoying a well-deserved 8% rating on Rotten Tomatoes and the trailer alone is proof of why. If you’ve watched any medical show, you may know it’s quite common for a person’s bowels to evacuate after their death. The corpse in question here is De Niro’s career.
tl;dr I’m sorry I even posted the trailer. Please look below.
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ROCK THE KASBAH
No one famous has died this week, and yet already we’ve lost two great actors. Comic legend Bill Murray joins De Niro on the burn pile for yet another Certified Rotten attempt at making people laugh.
The ‘creatives’ behind it – again, demonstrably talented filmmakers – have chosen the path well travelled, eschewing the blatant sexism and homophobia of Dirty Grandpa in favour of good ol’ fashioned family racism, as a fairly rotten white guy comes in and fixes Afghanistan by encouraging a little girl to sing.
The Clash don’t deserve this. Murray’s fans don’t deserve this. Afghanistan doesn’t deserve this. Surely the Americans have done enough to it already.
tl;dr Sorry.
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ARANMANAI 2
Couldn’t find a trailer with English subtitles, so I hope your Tamil is on point. It’s a slow release week, people. I can’t be expected to know all the languages in which my reader base does or doesn’t have competency.
For those of you who’ve lapsed in your Indian (i.e. me), ‘aranmanai’ means ‘palace’: in this case a grand ancestral home plagued by malevolent spirits. The only guarantees are possession, jump scares and slapstick giggles. But then, Indian films pride themselves on unpredictability – I walked into Main Hoon Na expecting High School Musical and found myself watching slow-motion gunfights.
You can check it out this week at Event Cinemas.
tl;dr It’s Bollywood – anything could happen.
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SAALA KHADOOS
Yay, more Bollywood! With a trailer that makes it look like a sun-drenched Hindi version of Creed, Saala Khadoos has been making a big impression among Bollywood’s brightest. The trailer depicts disgraced boxing coach and motorbike-riding badass Prabhu (R. Madhavan) taking on aspiring boxer and pissed-off fisherwoman Madhi (Ritika Singh) as a trainee.
Interestingly, it seems that Madhavan (also the film’s co-producer) has a rather feminist bent to which films he chooses to be involved with, so if you’re lamenting the lack of female representation in sports films (except as trophies), let her fists soothe your fury.
Saala Khadoos is playing at your local Hoyts.
tl;dr It’s Million Dollar Bolly!
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And now for THE VERDICT – maybe you only get the chance to see one of these flicks on the big screen, and you don’t wanna waste that night out. So, drum roll please…
