Indian CInema
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Thampu / The Circus Tent (Dir. Govindan Aravindan, 1978, India/Malayalam)
In the dialogue-less opening to Aravindan’s 1978 film Thampu, an open-air truck filled with seemingly ordinary people weaves it way languidly through the sunlit coastal roads of Thalassery, Kerala. This close-knit travelling circus, made up of a troupe of intrepid misfits and fantasists, have habitually made this journey before, living out a transient existence of Continue reading
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Cheriyachante Kroora Krithyangal / The Evil Deeds of Cherian (Dir. John Abraham, 1979, India [Malayalam]
![Cheriyachante Kroora Krithyangal / The Evil Deeds of Cherian (Dir. John Abraham, 1979, India [Malayalam]](https://moviemahal.net/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/9.png?w=640)
Cheriyachan (Adoor Bhasi), a benign yet God fearing landlord in Kuttand, Kerala is unable to comprehend the systemic political changes taking place around him. The peasant workers and farmers have had enough of a feudal power structure that exploits them while enabling landlords like Cheriyachan to rule with impunity, a historical practice that has gone Continue reading
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Modernism by Other Means: the films of Amit Dutta – Srikanth Srinivasan (Lightcube, 2020)
Srikanth Srinivasan’s (aka JAFB who writes at his legendary site The Seventh Art) first monograph is a great book about Indian cinema. It is a great book about a filmmaker. Srikanth lists himself as a film critic on the jacket of his book, which he rightly is, but this work is very much that of Continue reading
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IRRFAN KHAN (1967 – 2020) ‘I don’t know when I became old…’
Irrfan Khan had been ill for a while now. Many of us thought he had recovered for the better. His death has come as a shock to the film industry and at the age of 53 he has passed on tragically early in a career that was gaining momentum with each year. Back in 2017 Continue reading
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A RIFLE AND A BAG (Dir. NoCut Film Collective, 2020, India/Romania/Italy/Qatar)
What is the price for those who join a political revolution? And what happens once you surrender and attempt to reconcile with a political past? The Naxalite Movement, perhaps one of the most sustained political folk/tribal movements in the global south, is the focus of this brilliantly observed documentary by the NoCut Film Collective of Continue reading
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