7 BOXES (aka 7 CAJAS) (SPANISH/GUARANI) (2012)

Paraguay is a landlocked country in the middle of South America sandwiched between Brazil, Argentina and Bolivia. Due to its central location, it is often referred to as the heart of South America. To the outside world at large, Paraguay is known more for its football than films. Nevertheless, this cracking thriller from Paraguay is set in a bustling market complex in the capital city of Asuncion and unfolds in a span of 48 hours. Our protagonist Victor (Celso Franco) is a 17-year old who makes a living by transporting the loads of his customers on a rickety wheelbarrow across the market which sprawls over eight blocks. While he could hardly make do with paltry earnings, he is fascinated by cell phones (movie is set in 2005 when they were still a novelty) and TV screens attract his attention, even in the middle of a fervent chase. 

One day, the wily butcher Dario, who is expecting a police raid at his premises, offers Victor a deal wherein Victor is required to carry 7 wooden boxes of unknown content around the market for a day and deliver them at a specified location the next day to earn a fat paycheck of $100. Victor gets the deal because Nelson, another wheelbarrow pusher, who is Dario's regular transporter, turns up late as he had to take care of his sick child. Nelson desperately needs the money to pay for the medicine for his kid's treatment. He is frustrated when learns that Dario has given the goods to Victor. Nelson plans to steal the boxes from Victor in order to make the delivery at the specified place to collect the promised $100. Thus, begins a cat and mouse game between Victor and Nelson who enlists the support of several associates in the market to track down Victor and his consignment. There are also a set of cops lurking in the market who are on the lookout for some suspicious activities. Victor is joined by his pushy girl friend Liz who tags along with him in his adventure as he tries to evade his pursuers and safeguard the cargo. In the unfolding tense drama, Victor, Liz, Nelson and his associates become unwitting associates in a high stakes crime involving ruthless gangsters and corrupt cops.


As Victor tries to flee one hurdle after another, Richard Careaga’s with his kinetic camera captures the chase with a frenetic pace that adds to the tension. Director duo Juan Carlos Maneglia and Tana Schémbori use the maze like marketplace buzzing with activity to maximum effect to infuse the movie with crackling energy. This chase movie is an entertaining thriller that would hook the viewers early and keep them engrossed till the very end.

AN EXCELLENT WATCH !!

RATING - 3.5/5 

KABALI (TAMIL/TELUGU/HINDI) (2016)

First up.. The good news.. This is a mighty leap from that lackluster Lingaa.. But, that's not much to write home about.. Is it..?

Be warned..

This is more a film for Rajini, the actor .. who shines through with a neat performance.

And..

Less from the SUPERSTAR, worshiped by the masses.

Director Ranjit's movie is a mixed bag..  A movie which is neither an entertainer in the mass masala mould that the fanboys crave from the Superstar, nor in the signature style of the auteur that is rooted in the milieu and emotionally potent.

It has some good bits of both worlds. Alas, in his meandering between these two worlds, the final result is less than fulfilling.

The revenge drama at the center lacks sufficient bite. While some of the action sequences pack a punch, the rest are so so. This movie has more emotional content than most contemporary movies of the Superstar. Yet, most of it fail to deliver the impact, except for the bits between Rajini and Radhika Apte.

One gets the feeling that this could've been so much more if the best elements from these diverse universes were to be assembled better with more coherence and finesse.

Rajini, with his trademark swag, is in fine form as the aging gangster who still has the fight in him and holds some aces up his sleeves. He convincingly portrays the character's vulnerabilities and yearning for his lost family. After the disastrous Lingaa, he has made a bold choice of choosing to work with a next gen director and a character that suits his age in a story which, while not far off from the run-off-the-mill kind, has enough to showcase his acting skills.

  

Among the other positives are Santosh Narayanan who has delivered a great album that goes well with the movie and Radhika Apte who is once again impressive and holds her own against the Superstar.

Don't get me wrong. This IS a GOOD film. But, given the director's potential, the Superstar's magical presence and the promising glimpses from the trailer, one expected a much more heady cocktail.

Nevertheless, the fact that it comes on the back of a let down called Lingaa and is promoted aggressively through a high pitched carpet bombing marketing campaign, should set the box office on fire as deprived fans lap up enough of their Superstar to satiate themselves till 2.0.

Overall, it feels like a well intentioned recipe that is a tad under-cooked (perhaps, I should call it overcooked, given its length that calls for some trimming) ... a jigsaw puzzle that doesn't quite fit so well.

A DECENT WATCH !!

RATING - 2.5/5

THE BRAND NEW TESTAMENT (aka E TOUT NOUVEAU TESTAMENT) (FRENCH) (2015)

Who wouldn't want to see God..? The Almighty who is the Creator of all of us and everything around, above and below us - including the big and small miseries that engulf us on an everyday basis. While God is generally conceived as an epitome of love, grace and all things wonderful, it is also true that most, if not all of us, on our bad days, would've cursed this very entity for a sadistic streak that piles on the pain on us, the hapless victims.

This delightful movie imagines God (Benoît Poelvoorde) to be a nerdy, booze addled and perennially grumpy middle aged guy, living in Brussels, in an high rise apartment which has no doors to the outside world,  with his submissive wife (Yolande Moreau) and young daughter. He terrorises his meek wife to such an extent that she hardly ever opens her mouth in his presence and shivers whenever his temper escalates which happens quite frequently. He spends most of his time behind closed doors working at his computer through which he controls the fate of everyone on earth. He finds great amusement in concocting ever new modes of misery to torment the mortals on Earth ranging from a falling toast landing on the wrong side to catastrophes which claim numerous lives. 

His daughter, Ea (an endearing Pili Groyne), though, is mischievous and is keen to explore the world outside. She considers her dad as a sadistic boor and hates him for shutting her out of the rest of the world and for his ruthless streak of seeking pleasure by heaping pain on hapless human beings. Egged on by her long lost elder brother JC (Jesus Christ, of course), Ea breaks out of her home. But, before leaving home, she hacks into her dad's computer system and resets the password, thereby locking him out of it. She also reveals the date of death to all the residents of the planet through a celestial SMS which sets off a series of bizarre repercussions across the globe.

After escaping from home, she follows the advice of her elder brother JC and sets out to find six new apostles who would assist her in writing a brand new testament for humanity. She chooses an assorted bunch of persons to be her apostles including a lonely beauty who has lost her arm in a freak accident, a middle aged sex maniac, a corporate worker, a rich and lonely old woman and a young boy diagnosed with terminal illness along with a homeless old beggar who is her designated scribe. The rest of the movie narrates the events of Ea's encounters with this assorted bunch of individuals and creation of a brand new testament even as she is hounded by her dad who wants to regain access to his celestial computer system. 

Director Jaco Van Dormael has created a very imaginative and highly irreverent satire which is playful to the extent of being blasphemous. It is quintessentially a feel good feature which is laced with several laugh-out-loud moments including those involving the fate of the God, in hot pursuit of Ea, getting a taste of his own medicine which are especially hilarious. Besides the loads of fun, there is also a distinct feminist undercurrent that runs through the movie which is perfectly cast and well executed.

A co-production between Belgium, France, and Luxembourg, this movie is a manifest testimonial to the levels of artistic freedom prevalent in these countries which have collaborated to produce a movie with such irreverence to contemporary religious beliefs. A movie of this nature is simply unimaginable in most parts of the world which is sinking under a surge of religious bigotry and intolerance. This movie has won many accolades at multiple film festivals across the globe and was also highly appreciated in the Bengaluru International Film Festival (BIFFES), 2016. 

Check out this lesser known gem and am sure that you would find yourself laughing out loud and grinning till its entire length. A word of caution though to those of you who are highly conservative and may regard any kind of pun/satire on religious beliefs as highly objectionable - If you are one, then you would do well to skip this flick. 

An EXCELLENT WATCH !!

RATING - 3.5/5