Harud is a deeply political film that gently, but brilliantly, captures and conveys the experience of living in a land that’s caught in the middle of an interminable ego clash between two nations. In this land, life and limbs move at a cautious pace and the film’s climatic scene explains why.

Mooche hon toh Nathulal jaisi,
aur behna ho toh Ekta Kapoor jaisi.
But bahut kathin hai dagar panghat ki, especially when Tusshar Kapoor is your brother, and doubly so when you have a sinking feeling about a movie where T-Kapoor and his friend Riteish Deshmukh spend most of their middle-aged time ogling girls none of whom, in a really fair world, should even be sharing their galactic space.

Many Bollywood films this year, indeed this decade, have been written by women — and not just of the arty variety, or documentaries, but mainstream, commercial films that have done very well at the box office: Vicky Donor, Shanghai, Kahaani, Agneepath, London Paris New York, Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara, That Girl in Yellow Boots, Dhobi Ghat, Peepli [Live], Guzaarish, Aisha, Shaitan, Tees Maar Khan, Tashan, Dostana, Kambakkht Ishq, Bachna Ae Haseeno, Luck by Chance and the forthcoming Talaash among others.
What does this mean? Is Bollywood making space for a new story and a new storyteller? Are women going to tell the stories that no man has dared to yet, like Sabrina Dhawan did in Monsoon Wedding, and Deepa Mehta in Fire?

Bhai-behnon ka season hai with Rakhi ka tyohaar being around the corner and all. But, you know, I think ki waqt aa gaya hai jab sisters should start tying rakhi to each other. Because real life main toh behen hi behen ke kaam aati hai.

On Wednesday, July 18, the day Rajesh Khanna died, the news meant nothing to me. It was just one more thing to think about — commission a piece, organise photographs, et cetera. I thought of the Havells fans advert (I had just seen an image; I couldn’t bear to watch the whole thing).

Few films have made me feel so nicely elated and then left me completely deflated in a span of just 146 minutes and a few seconds. But I should have known that; the producers and director of this film say so clearly in the title. Alcohol, whether mixed or taken straight, is a downer. And Cocktail, because of its high sugar content, initially gives a heady rush, but leaves a bad hangover.

Rohit Shetty obviously really likes Hrishikesh Mukherjee’s Gol Maal. Not only has he made three trashy films called Golmaal this and Golmaal that, but has now remade the original as well. Well, sort of. Bol Bachchan is not so much a homage to the Amol Palekar-Utpal Dutt classic as it is a delirious get-together of friends going mental over an old movie they adore.

Supermen of Malegaon tells the poignant and goofy story of not just Malegaon but many tier-zero towns in India — of the place and its politics, and of its people and their obsessions — like only a very keenly observant documentary with an eye for the comic can.

First let’s just get Maximum’s main, mean seduction out of the way. Sonu Sood has taken a long time since we met him last as Dabangg’s Chedi Singh, but he has finally arrived. Sood (Sonu just doesn’t do him justice) here is not the dumb muscle man you may recall. He is lean, long and limber, with soulful eyes and a sensuous smile. Though Sood has a nice body and is insanely dishy in some scenes, it’s the whole package that works wonders. He inhabits his cop character beautifully, complete with typic mannerisms, an innate craving for a certain kind of power and a quiet pig-headedness. And he conveys most of this not through dialogue, but with his eyes and a slight smile over jaws that suddenly go taut.

Please, puhlease read the list of names on top again, then close your eyes and think of what a film with this charming circle of creeps of Bollywood — Shakti Kapoor, Aanandbalraj, Raja Chaudhary, Aman Verma — and Veena Malik could be about.