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Recent Reviews by Tanul Thakur
Outlook

Tanul Thakur is a National Award-winning film critic and an independent journalist. A film critic for The Wire, he’s written features and opinion pieces for The Caravan, Open, Fountain Ink, GQ, and Yahoo! India.

Films reviewed on this Page

Jigra

Jigra
The Alia Bhatt-starrer Doesn’t Fire but Fizzle Out

Vasan Bala’s directorial is marred by bland writing

The trailer of Jigra promised a coup too delicious to resist: Alia Bhatt as the Angry Young (Wo)man. At one point, Manoj Pahwa tells her, “Arre, [Amitabh] Bachchan nahin banna hai. Bach ke nikalna hai.” A stone-faced Bhatt replies: “Ab toh Bachchan hi banna hai.” This exchange hides loaded meanings: reverence (Bhatt, the best Bollywood actor right now, paying tribute to the best Bollywood actor of the ’70s), inversion (a heroine playing an anti-hero), and nostalgia (a drug always in short supply). There’s a bit of serendipity, too: the movie’s release date, October 11, coincides with Bachchan’s birthday.

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Read all 18 reviews of Jigra here