La Piscine (The Swimming Pool) [1969]

 Nearly a decade after Alain Delon’s character – triggered by fragile insecurity, repressed envy and spurned ego – took Maurice Ronet’s character to his watery grave in the dazzling thriller Plein Soleil, he did it again for similar underlying reasons in La Piscine. Sultry, sensuous and gloriously sun-drenched on one hand, while menacing, ominous and disquieting on the other – accentuated by rippling undercurrents of sexual tension and fervid jealousy – Jacques Deray’s luscious, languid, hypnotic, slow-burn smash hit served as the perfect companion piece to the earlier film. It also witnessed the ravishing pairing of former lovers Delon and Romy Schneider; she was roped in upon Delon’s insistence after Jeanne Moreau had turned down the role. Failed writer, recovering alcoholic and ad-man Jean-Paul (Delon), and his entrancing girlfriend Marianne (Schneider) with whom he’s in a passionate fling, are enjoying a lazy, carefree and steamy summer vacation at a luxurious Saint-Tropez villa in Côte d'Azur – basking in the sun, swimming in the open-air pool under the resplendent sky, and with the Mediterranean Sea discernible in the background – when their idyllic isolation is shattered by the sudden arrival of Marianne’s former boyfriend Harry (Ronet), a successful and insouciant music producer who’s still enamoured by her, along with his coy teenage daughter Pénélope (Jane Birkin). Marianne’s free chemistry with Harry, who’s an old buddy of Jean-Paul’s, provokes intense anxiety and turmoil under the latter’s disconcertingly placid demeanour, which in turn propels him towards seducing the wide-eyed teenager. This superbly performed ménage à quatre inevitably leads the increasingly tense narrative – photographed in lush visuals, with the camera often gazing at the roguishly attractive bourgeois characters, and accompanied by Michel Legrand’s jazz score – to a sinister finale.

Director: Jacques Deray

Genre: Thriller/Crime Thriller/Marital Thriller/Neo-Noir

Language: French

Country: France

Eaux Profondes (Deep Water) [1981]

 Three decades before Jean-Louis Trintignant and Isabelle Huppert, two giants of French cinema, played father and daughter in Haneke’s devastating masterwork Amour, they had their first onscreen collaboration – and the only one for many years – as a couple conjoined in a toxic marriage in Michel Deville’s saucy, pulpy and criminally under-watched Eaux Profondes. This striking rendition of Patricia Highsmith’s magnificent novel Deep Water mirrored the author’s deliciously warped portrayal of a noxious relationship and closet sociopathy, and consequently emerged as a terrific adaptation of Highsmith, nearly at par with Hitchcock’s Strangers on a Train, Clément’s Plein Soleil and Wenders’ The American Friend. Middle-aged Vic (Trintignant) is a soft-spoken, well-to-do man of private passions – be it his vocation as a perfumier or his oddball hobby of petting snails in his garage – and lives a sedate life at a provincial French town. His friends, however, are concerned for him due to his placid demeanour despite his striking young wife Mélanie (Huppert) – with whom he has a doting daughter – openly taking young men as lovers. What they don’t know is that, he probably loves being cuckolded by his promiscuous wife who, in turn, teases him with her scorching sensuality and adulteries; what she, however, doesn’t know is that, there’s a violent streak under his sociable persona that’s about to snap. The vivid visuals, jazzy score, lurid carnality and seething violence boldly evoked a touch of giallo and B-movies. Trintignant was stunning in an atypical role, while Huppert was tantalizing as a coquettish seductress in the same year as her similarly sultry turn in Tavernier’s blazing tour de force Coup de Torchon, which too – incidentally – was a powerhouse adaptation of American crime literature.

Director: Michel Deville

Genre: Thriller/Crime Thriller/Psychological Thriller/Neo-Noir/Marital Thriller

Language: French

Country: France

Senso [1954]

 Luchino Visconti’s celebrated fourth feature Senso served as a pivotal milestone for the “Red Count”, as it marked his decisive turn from a pioneering neorealist filmmaker to a practitioner of grand and ambitious historical melodramas. This visually sumptuous, emotionally feverish, vividly operatic and lavishly mounted epic – that exultantly combined Visconti’s love of cinema, theatre, opera and the fine arts – formed a precursor to and therefore one half of a diptych with his gargantuan masterpiece The Leopard, in that both were extraordinarily lush, formally meticulous, and were set against the turbulent backdrop of the radical social and political transformations that swept through the country during the Risorgimento. At its heart is a torrid, outrageously reckless and thoroughly self-destructive love affair that Livia (Alida Valli), a beautiful countess unhappily married to an older aristocrat with a chameleonic ability to shift his allegiances in sync with changing landscapes, gets embroiled in with a much younger, roguish and self-serving Austrian Lieutenant (Farley Granger), which leads her to betray her patriotic principles – viz. the causes of Italian Nationalists who’re battling for independence from the Austrian Occupation – and takes her to complete moral and existential doom. The resplendently designed and crafted film magnificently evoked the arresting architectural and locational splendour of Venice, Rome, Veneto and Verona – rapturously amplified by luscious art décor, ornate costumes and actual artworks; ravishingly shot in muted, fading colours by three different cinematographers (G.R. Aldo died midway, upon which Robert Krasker came in, but conflicts with Visconti’s vision led to Giuseppe Rotunno being asked to step in); and accompanied by a classical score – comprised of a spectacularly orchestrated and filmed battle scenes at par with what Visconti staged in The Leopard.

Director: Luchino Visconti

Genre: Drama/Historical Drama/Romantic Drama/Epic

Language: Italian

Country: Italy

Killers of the Flower Moon [2023]

 Martin Scorsese’s bravura adaptation of the acclaimed nonfiction book of the same name by David Grann – for the 44^th feature-length film of his storied career – is a bleak, brooding, engrossing and sprawling meditation on evil, greed and the capitalist excesses. It simultaneously delved into the rotten core of settler-colonialism, and specifically, the genocidal “birth” of a nation-state at the bloody-soaked expense of indigenous populations. This ambitious work – that freely worked in equal measures as revisionist Western, slow-burn crime, black comedy, existential horror and historical epic – delivered a macabre retelling of the serial killings – bordering on extermination – of the Osage people, who’d discovered oil in Oklahoma and became incredibly wealthy upon their forced relocation there, by white supremacists who wanted to seize control of the massive oil money. That Native Americans were patronized as sub-humans, made it easier to carry out the massacre with impunity, braggadocio and untroubled conscience. In a remarkable reworking of the book, which had primarily chronicled the proto-FBI’s investigations into the crimes, Scorsese focused instead on the perpetrators – specifically, the calcified and slimy William Hale (Robert De Niro), an affluent cattle rancher whose seemingly genial attitude towards the Osage community masks his monstrous heart, and his dim-witted and easily manipulated nephew Ernest Bucharest (Leonardo DiCaprio) who enters into a “poisonous” marriage to Mollie Kyle (Lily Gladstone) as part of his uncle’s elaborate nefarious and murderous scheme. Both Scorsese regulars were outstanding in their embodiment of the grotesque underbelly of American history. In a formally blazing and politically audacious finale, the tragic saga is transformed into a lurid radio opera, thus providing a cutting commentary on how popular media cynically repurposes historical injustices into kitschy consumerist fodder.

Director: Martin Scorsese

Genre: Revisionist Western/Crime Drama/Docufiction/Historical Epic

Language: English

Country: US

The Palestinians [1975]

 Dutch documentary filmmaker and photographer Johan van der Keuken, as an essay in Jump Cut appropriately observed about him, “works on the margins of the film industry and lets those on the margins of society whose voices are not usually heard speak through his films.” That statement is equally applicable to his stirring docu The Palestinians, which was, in parallel, deeply moving and filled with urgency. In this daring example of radical cinema – one that was so politically progressive that many of his fellow left-wing friends were perturbed by it – he boldly took the side of the forcibly displaced and infinitely persecuted Palestinian refugees living in Lebanon, amidst squalor, desperation, despair, anger and incessant violence. They’re stuck between a rock and a hard place – or, more specifically, the apartheid settler-colonialism of the Israeli occupation and the callous indifference of the Lebanese power structure – thus making them a tragically stateless people. Keuken punctuated the docu-essay with reflections on the industrialized massacre of the Jewish people by European fascism, which ironically segued into occupation, brutality, injustice and dislocation of the Palestinian people. With the context set and his political position clearly established, the guerilla work – shot on location in 1975, with grainy visuals manifesting the best of underground reportage and a startling sense of here-and-now – he trained his lens on individual and collective stories. We see women lamenting the destruction of their homes and the death of their kids; protesters defiantly displaying solidarity on the streets; old men pensively reminiscing their lost homes and lands; rebel fighters training by the day and breaking bread in the evening; and a schoolteacher cogently ensuring the kids know their history of oppression by heart.

Director: Johan van der Keuken

Genre: Documentary/Essay Film/Short Film

Language: Dutch/Arabic

Country: Netherlands/Palestine

Jenin, Jenin [2002]

Jenin, Jenin, as cinema of resistance, was at once powerful, defiant and lucid in how Palestinian actor and filmmaker Mohammed Bakri used a series of interviews – shorn of peripheral contexts and expositions; disquieting in its recording of blazing emotions; and providing rare agency to the voiceless – to craft a polyphonic memorialization of the oppressed, the dispossessed and the persecuted. The radical treatise, despite its brevity, exhibited a harrowing reminder of repressive settler colonialism being faced by the Palestinian people ever since the occupation, through the devastating crackdown and violence that the impoverished residents of Jenin’s refugee camp – located in West Bank – faced at the hands of Israel’s military during “Operation Defensive Shield” in 2002. It, therefore, emphatically evoked the broader picture through its intense specificity, and, in turn, fiercely chronicled the inseparability of the personal and the political for Palestinians, irrespective of whether they’re rebels, partisans, activists or regular civilians. Bakri’s camera unwaveringly captured the rage, despair and sorrow of the survivors – a broken aged man; a livid grandmother; a bitter middle-aged man; a feisty doctor; a helpless father; a heartbroken mother; a disoriented disabled guy; and an unforgettably furious adolescent girl representing the next generation of resistance – through their testimony of what unfolded. Their stirring refusal to capitulate, even at the face of apartheid and tyranny, powerfully stood out. This therefore served as one of many brutal examples of collective punishment that Palestine have faced in the past, thus making it especially pertinent to the gargantuan monstrosity that’s taking place today. Unsurprisingly, the documentary was censored and banned in Israel, while Bakri faced harassments and became a pariah for his courage and dissidence in challenging the mainstream narrative.

Director: Mohammed Bakri

Genre: Documentary/Essay Film

Language: Arabic

Country: Palestine

Symbiopsychotaxiplasm: Take One [1968]

 Pioneering documentarian William Greaves’ formally daring exercise – albeit one that remained undistributed for 23 years, until its stunning “discovery” during a Greaves retrospective at the Brooklyn Museum, thanks to its bold curator – blazingly blurred the boundaries between verité and artifice. For this film-within-film-within-film made in NYC’s Central Park, he ostensibly decided to shoot the auditioning process of a short film on marital breakdown, for which he deployed four camera setups – one for the primary shoot focussed on a middle-aged couple; a second one to record the shooting process; a third to provide a peripheral context by capturing passers-by in the park; and finally, the director wielding a mobile camera himself. Meanwhile, the crew are seen growing dissatisfied and potentially mutinous against Greaves – or rather the incompetent, sexist and nonchalant version of himself that he enacts – for his lack of vision and method, and he edits their free-flowing discourses into it, even if it isn’t clear if this was off-screen friction or purposely staged. Alongside its subversion of the lines between nonfiction, direct action and contrivances – reminiscent of the dazzling Moroccan docu-fiction About Some Meaningless Events – and striking use of split screens, this freeform work – jauntily accompanied by Miles Davis’ music – was political too; it was, after all, the time of the New Left, anti-government protests, and Civil Rights and counterculture movements. That an African-American filmmaker was making something as wildly experimental as this, with a predominantly white crew, advocating the idea of dissenting against an authority figure, and openly covering the topics of abortion and closet homosexuality – and thus providing trailblazing manifestations of Black cinema, queer cinema and New Hollywood – made it eminently political, even if not overly so.

Director: William Greaves

Genre: Documentary/Experimental Film/Avant-Garde

Language: English

Country: US

30 Favourite Films from 2022

1. Tar | Todd Field | US
2. My Imaginary Country | Patricio Guzman | Chile
3. One Fine Morning | Mia Hansen-Love | France
4. All That Breathes | Shaunak Sen | India
5. All the Beauty and the Bloodshed | Laura Poitras | US
6. Joyland | Salim Sadiq | Pakistan
7. No Bears | Jafar Panahi | Iran
8. R.M.N. | Cristian Mungiu | Romania
9. Pada | Kamal K.M. | India
10. Leila's Brothers | Saeed Roustayi | Iran
11. Crimes of the Future | David Cronenberg | Canada
12. Nelly & Nadine | Magnus Gertten | Sweden
13. While We Watched | Vinay Shukla | India
14. Trenque Lauquen | Laura Citarella | Argentina
15. The Novelist's Film | Hong Sang-soo | South Korea
16. Triangle of Sadness | Ruben Östlund | Sweden
17. Rimini | Ulrich Seidl | Austria
18. Red Africa | Alexander Markov | Russia
19. You Have to Come and See it | Jonás Trueba | Spain
20. The Fire Within | Werner Herzog | UK
21. Decision to Leave | Park Chan-Wook | South Korea
22. Alcarràs | Carla Simon | Spain
23. Petite Fleur | Santiago Mitre | Argentina
24. Until Tomorrow | Ali Asgari | Iran
25. Showing Up | Kelly Reichardt | US
26. Dry Ground Burning | Joana Pimenta & Adirley Queirós | Brazil
27. Camouflage | Jonathan Perel | Argentina
28. Esterno Notte | Marco Bellocchio | Italy
29. Nope | Jordan Peele | US
30. Metronom | Alexandru Belc | Romania

Monica, O My Darling [2022]

 Monica, O My Darling is a heady, devilish and deliriously entertaining joyride, and riotously lurid and pulpy at that. This crackling celebration of lowbrow crime genre was liberally peppered with references – Vasan Bala, who’s as much a cinephile as he’s a filmmaker, doffed his hats to pulpy hardboiled literature, neo-noir capers, cheesy B-movies, crime comics and old-school Bollywood – thus exuberantly underscoring its self-reflexive nature, even though that never came in the way of the enjoyment. Interestingly, amidst the stylistic flourishes, hyperbolic expressions of sensuality and violence, a labyrinthine plot packed with red herrings and outrageous twists, and darkly ironic interjections, Bala also craftily sprayed some pungent social observations into the mix – from ethics of AI and self-serving corporate governance to sharp class commentaries, nepotism and male gaze. Deliciously adapted from Keigo Higashino’s Burūtasu no Shinzō, the narrative hinges around a slew of gleefully saucy characters – the titular Monica (Huma Qureshi), an incredibly voluptuous and promiscuous femme fatale who has no qualms about her desires, wants and needs; Jayant (Rajkumar Rao), who’s made it big as much for his engineering chops as his relationship with his boss’ daughter, but which now hangs in balance thanks to Monica; the boss’ brash son Nishikant (Sikandar Kher) who hatches a preposterous plan to murder Monica, as she’s accused him – among others – of impregnating her; and ACP Naidu (Radhika Apte), a chatty and wisecracking cop. This rollicking tale of lust, greed, blackmail, double (and triple) crosses, and multiple grisly murders, was superbly complemented by a terrific retro soundtrack inspired by 1970s Hindi music – the film’s title is itself a gushing nod to an iconic R.D. Burman composition – created by Achint Thakkar and Varun Grover.

Director: Vasan Bala

Genre: Crime Thriller/Black Comedy/Neo-Noir/Mystery

Language: Hindi

Country: India

You Have to Come and See It [ 2022]

 Spanish director Jonás Trueba’s deceptively conceived, structured and titled film You Have to Come and See It – a playful post-pandemic work – was laced with Rohmer’s enchanting influences with its lyrical, disarmingly intellectual depiction of two gentle-natured bourgeois couples. It also had a dash of Godard’s impish subversion with its meta, self-referential coda, and a touch of Woody’s deadpan neurosis too with its urban malaise and rambling conversations. I wonder how many filmmakers can speak of such eclectic references! It began with a rapturous opening montage – Chano Domínguez’s “live” performance of his intoxicating new composition Limbo at a jazz bar in Madrid, counterpointed by alternately lingering on the faces of the four protagonists through soft close-ups that provided observant introductions to them – that, with its leisurely evocation of a relaxing mood through the beguiling choice of devoting nearly 8 minutes in a slender runtime of an hour, was gloriously immersive. The strikingly lovely, bespectacled and erudite Elena (Itsaso Arana) and doodling, fidgety Daniel (Vitor Sanz) – who live in the city – and the pretty, friendly Susana (Irene Escolar) who’s expecting and the casual, carefree Guillermo (Francesco Carril) – who’ve recently moved to the countryside – are old friends meeting after a long gap, presumably on account of Covid and the latter couple’s decision to relocate. The former couple make a reluctant trip by train to the exurbs six months later – accompanied by Bill Callahan’s melodic “Let’s Move to the Country” – and the group have a lazy time catching up on their intimate personal developments, having an al fresco lunch, indulging in political/philosophical banter courtesy Elena’s passionate discourse on Peter Sloterdijk’s You Must Change Your Life, playing ping pong, and exploring the surrounding environs.

Director: Jonas Trueba

Genre: Drama/Experimental Film

Language: Spanish

Country: Spain

The Banshees of Inisherin [2022]

 In Irish playwright turned filmmaker Martin McDonagh’s captivating debut film In Bruges, Colin Farrell and Brendan Gleeson had portrayed an oddly fascinating bromance. Made 14 years later, The Banshees of Inisherin reunited the two actors, along with the sense of being oppressively stuck in a ravishing locale, into a darker, nastier and gorier variant of the Laurel and Hardy films – with Farrel embodying a baffled shaggy dog persona, while Gleeson bringing in stolid stoicism – albeit no less absurdist or farcical, and occasionally as funny too. However, its demonstration of an intimate friendship transforming into an ugly, bitter and mutually destructive separation – catalysed by brittle male egos and wounded male prides which reach gothic proportions – ambitiously aimed for profundity, ingenuity and grand Shakespearean tragedy (with sharp satiric undertones and a macabre sense of humour), even if it couldn’t always sidestep artifice and contrivances. The grim fairy tale – articulating the collapse of reasons and morals amidst spiralling madness and violence, wherein a fable playing out in an eerily tranquil and astonishingly beautiful island served as an analogy to the dance of destruction and deaths that was playing out in the Irish mainland – kicked-off on a deadpan note when the dim simpleton and dumbfounded Pádraic (Farrell) is made to realize that Colm (Gleeson) – afflicted with existential anguish – has decided to cut off their seemingly inseparable bond, in order to spend his days composing, playing and teaching music, as opposed to indulging in meaningless banter. This banal premise rapidly escalates into the realms of lurid ludicrosity. The film’s outstanding central cast also comprised of Kerry Condon as Pádraic’s intelligent sister Siobhán, and Barry Keoghan, a troubled guy regularly beaten by his policeman dad.

Director: Martin McDonagh

Genre: Black Comedy/Social Satire

Language: English

Country: UK

The Fabelmans [2022]

 The gold standard for autobiographical cinematic representations of directors’ coming-of-age as cinephiles and their journeys into filmmaking – across films à clef and docu essays/diaries – would include Truffaut’s The 400 Blows, Mészáros’ Diary Trilogy (Diary for My Children, Diary for My Lovers, Diary for My Father and Mother), Mekas’ Lost, Lost, Lost, Varda’s The Beaches of Agnès, etc. Spielberg’s The Fabelmans, as a love letter to the movies, ode to discovering one’s life-long passion, in seeing the world through the camera’s lens, and the myth making capacities of this medium – alongside its quirky humour, self-effacing tone, tender personal anecdotes, and cinema’s ability to display alternative realities – aimed for the afore-mentioned echelon. The brilliant meta reference evoked through a home video that the protagonist makes – fun and bonhomie in the released version vis-à-vis discomfiting forebodings in the director’s cut – was its most representative moment. It was also, however, marked by sentimental approach, largely sanitized exploration of topical particularities – with rare incursions into political contexts – and whimsy intended at easy likeability; and these undid its lofty ambitions. It began with Sammy – Spielberg’s deadpan alter-ego – literally crashing into the world of movies upon seeing Cecil B. DeMille’s The Greatest Show on Earth with his dad Burt (Paul Dano), a low-key guy and brilliant computer engineer, and mom Mitzi (Michelle Williams), a deeply temperamental woman and trained pianist. The gradual marital unravelling of his parents – accentuated by physical dislocations and Mitzi’s falling for Burt’s friend (Seth Rogen) – provided an engaging parallel track to Sammy’s obsessive immersion into filmmaking. The film’s standout turn belonged to Williams, and comprised of two striking cameos – by Judd Hirsch as Sammy’s eccentric granduncle and David Lynch as John Ford.

Director: Steven Spielberg

Genre: Drama/Family Drama/Biopic/Film a Clef/Coming-of-Age

Language: English

Country: US

Rabiye Kurnaz Vs. George W. Bush [2022]

 Turning grim, serious and incredibly tragic historical incidents/episodes into funny and idiosyncratic comedies is either a very brave creative choice or a very stupid one, as they can either turn into blazing, if provocative, works (Wertmuller’s Seven Beauties, Holland’s Europa Europa, Menzel’s I Served the King of England, etc.) or films that divide its viewers right down the middle (Benigni’s Life Is Beautiful, Tarantino’s Inglourious Basterds, etc.) or despicable pieces of trash best suited for the garbage bins (Waititi’s Jojo Rabit, etc.). While this docufiction by German filmmaker Andreas Dresen didn’t belong to the inherently complex sub-genre of Holocaust films, its focus on extra-judicial measures, nefarious subversion of due processes, and colossal travesty of justice that the US freely carried out under the guise of “war on terrorism” – which included racial profiling, kidnapping, illegal detentions for indefinite periods, limitless tortures, etc. – did make for a bleak, solemn and intensely sensitive subject. Hence the director’s formal choice – alternating between deadpan and bouncy – could’ve easily led to flippancy and trivialization of the matter. Fortunately, he was careful and empathetic enough to avoid that, and in turn succeeded at making a film worth watching, despite some of its broad brushstrokes and crowd-pleasing flaws. The film catalogued the relentless efforts of Rabiye Kurnaz – a super gregarious and effervescent Turkish-German housewife living in Bremen, memorably played by Meltem Kaptan – in order to get her eldest son Murat released from the notorious Guantanamo Bay hellhole. Over nearly 5 years, and with massive help from soft-spoken but dogged human rights lawyer Bernhard Docke (Alexander Scheer), she must defiantly battle through the opaque, murky and Kafkaesque world of post-9/11 geopolitics if she hopes to achieve the impossible.

Director: Andreas Dresen

Genre: Black Comedy/Political Satire/Docufiction

Language: German/Turkish/English

Country: Germany

Both Sides of the Blade [2022]

 Clair Denis’ Both Sides of the Blade portrays the sequence of events upon the sudden return of an old flame, which leads to a turbulent love triangle, marital discord and eventually emotional collapse for all. The veteran filmmaker structured this along the intersections of grand melodrama and slow-burn erotic thriller, and liberally peppered the narrative with a heady cocktail of messy, chaotic, unbridled, tempestuous and violent emotions ranging from romantic turmoil, sensual enticement and fervid lust to heartbreak, fury and self-destructive outbursts. What made it especially intriguing, aside from its reckless passions and charged atmosphere, was that Denis based it on middle-aged people with their freckled backs, loosening skins and deep wrinkles; the seething, bursting and ravishing allure, desires, pleasures and urges that the ever-magnificent Juliette Binoche, nearing her 60s, so nakedly and boldly displayed – both literally and figuratively – was especially breathtaking. And she, as radio journalist Sara – who hosts a political talk show covering the daily lives of people from former French colonies – whose seemingly happy marriage to Jean (Vincent London) starts unravelling upon the return of her former boyfriend François (Grégoire Colin), added magnetic dimensions to this otherwise conventional story. London was compelling too as a former rugby player with felony record bouncing between his successful wife, increasingly lost mixed-race teenage son (Issa Perica), and the business venture that he gets drawn into with François despite some past baggage. The lack of a murkier and more discomfiting denouement that the edgy but tad muddled script was seemingly leading us towards along the lines of a Chabrol or a Highsmith – albeit, accompanied by hypnotic jazz-based score and moody compositions – made this otherwise engaging film stop short of greatness.

Director: Claire Denis

Genre: Drama/Romantic Drama/Marital Drama

Language: French

Country: France

Red Africa [2022]

 Red Africa – a kaleidoscopic compilation of astounding footage – operated in the porous intersection of political reportage, myth making and dry satire. Alexander Markov achieved this magnetic balance by meticulously stitching together singular historical artefacts in the form of a subtly shape-shifting tapestry that begun, and ran for most parts, as a disarmingly straight-faced peek into a relatively lesser-known side of Cold War history, and only much later revealed its darkly ironic stance. In a bold formal choice, it’s fully bereft of narrations and expositions. Instead, this dazzling documentary collage – based on footage shot by Soviet filmmakers in various African countries and back home from 1957 to 1991 – organically and diagetically contextualized the images, and in turn their meanings, interpretations and significances. In the 1960s, a wave of independence swept through a slew of African countries after years of colonial subjugation; in parallel, they also found a seemingly unlikely comrade from a far-flung place. The Soviet Union, in its strategic choice of courting the global south, made emphatic overtures towards these newly liberated countries that were in immediate need of patronage. The film, through its engrossing archival footage, documented the economic, industrial, educational, cultural and political exchanges that the Soviet Union had with these countries. Having experienced contempt and exploitation from the western world so far, this unanticipated display of alliance won them over, and consequently paved way for their inclusion into the socialist sphere of influence; that is, until the stunning dissolution of the USSR – and the Soviet Bloc in general – around 1989 and 1990. This reversal was captured in the film’s tone too, as the lyricism and lilting score got replaced with an edgy palette and grungy music.

Director: Alexander Markov

Genre: Documentary/Essay Film/Political History

Language: Russian

Country: Russia

All The Beauty And The Bloodshed [2022]

 The celebrated photographer Nan Goldin’s fascinating life has been one of profound personal tragedies, furious defiance, feminist agency, civil disobedience, queer experiences, eclectic underground and counterculture associations, and active participation in anti-establishmentarian communities. These, in turn, influenced her art – which was, at once, gritty, non-conformist, political, sexual, powerful, and above all, intensely personal – and shaped her activism. Laura Poitras’ magnetic documentary All the Beauty and the Bloodshed – filled with urgency, ferocity, angst, immediacy and formal fluidity – captured Goldin’s polychromatic shades through a blend of thrilling reportage, freewheeling memoir, vivid art exhibits, engrossing zeitgeist and melancholic reflections. That Poitras herself has fearlessly critiqued the state machinery and defied the system with her documentaries – which too have existed at the crossroads of art and activism – paved way for a symbiotic collaboration between the two women. It’s a matter of marvel that the different elements of the mosaic combined with such lucidity despite so much ground that it covered – the repressive familial and suburban milieu in which Goldin grew up; the haunting memories of her sister’s suicide; her dizzying friendships with rebellious individuals, radical artists and social misfits living on the margins; her experimentations with drugs, sexuality and subaltern circuits; her journey as a trailblazing artist who merged avant-garde form and subversive undercurrents with rare intimacy; her addiction to Oxycontin that nearly killed her; and her blazing activism to bring the hideous Sackler family to account for their culpability in the opioid epidemic. The protests that she led at the Met, Guggenheim and Louvre – for taking donations from the Slackers and naming galleries after them – provided for rousing moments, as did her dazzling photographic installations accompanied by terrific music hand-picked by Goldin.

Director: Laura Poitras

Genre: Documentary/Essay Film/Biopic

Language: English

Country: US

Until Tomorrow [2022]

 Societal conservatism and patriarchy combated with female solidarity and defiance in Ali Asgari’s Until Tomorrow. Its focus on burning social issues and moral dilemmas manifested through a tense, gripping, moody and suspenseful thriller, thus presenting yet another compelling example of a fearless Iranian film where genre is employed as springboard, McGuffin and catalyst – and therefore interlaced with complex sociopolitical themes and commentaries – instead of an end in itself. The director’s niece Sadaf Asgari brought in a stirring mix of resistance, ingenuity and vulnerability – thus displaying agency amidst repression, and serving as the film’s feminist face – in the role of Fereshteh, a working single mother who’s had a child out of wedlock. While she’s been somehow managing things – her two-month-old baby, job at a printing press, and studying English with the hopes of emigration – living alone in a small flat in a large middle-class building block in Tehran, her delicately strung existence experiences an unanticipated jolt when her parents decide to visit the city for a day. She hasn’t disclosed her motherhood to them – knowing full well the repercussions of that – and hence must somehow find a way to hide her baby and its stuffs until their departure. With a fiercely loyal friend by her side – Atefeh (Ghazal Shojaei), with her red short crop and impudent smarts, made for a striking contrast to Fereshteh’s evocative beauty – she embarks on an increasingly feverish and absurdist urban odyssey for a temporary resolution to her crisis. What the two powerful girls end up doing, however, is circumvent, subvert and even challenge the stifling value systems they’re engulfed in. That it preceded the massive Mahsa Amini protests, imbued additional dimensions to it on hindsight.

Director: Ali Asgari

Genre: Drama/Psychological Thriller

Language: Persian

Country: Iran

Camouflage [2022]

 Jonathan Perel, in his riveting investigative journalism and docu-essay Corporate Accountability, had catalogued how organizations had collaborated with the Argentine military junta during the “Dirty War”, by enabling abductions, disappearances, detentions and tortures. In Camouflage, the haunting remnants from that dark chapter in his country’s past continued to inform its political context, but the canvas very specifically focussed on Campo de Mayo, a massive army base on the outskirts of Buenos Aires which’d served as a notorious concentration camp during the military dictatorship. The life of Félix Bruzzone, a writer in his 40s, has been shaped irrevocably by the dictatorship and the camp like numerous others. His parents were both disappeared when he was a baby; much later, upon moving to a house close to the base, he discovered that his mother was detained, tortured and killed at this chamber of horrors which still exists like a sinister monster. This low-key work alternately served as a personal space for Bruzzone – he loves running as a therapeutic exercise, which is captured through long tracking shots – and a communication channel with people for whom the camp holds starkly diverse meanings. His grandmother with whom he lived after his mom was disappeared; old friends reminiscing the changing landscapes; a woman who survived detention and has been striving to preserve their collective memories; another woman who secretly collects soil from here and sells that to tourists; artists who draw inspiration from this place; a real estate agent who’s excited about property prices around the site; a palaeontologist who wishes it could be converted into a dinosaur park. He also participates in a “killer race” that the army’s propaganda machinery organizes through the complex.

Director: Jonathan Perel

Genre: Documentary/Essay Film/Political History

Language: Spanish

Country: Argentina

Malayankunju [2022]

 Sajimon Prabhakar merged the sub-genre of disaster/survival movies – one that’s not very common in Indian cinema – with strong social commentary – on a topic that’s largely avoided in Indian cinema – in Malayankunju. An ambitious combination such as this meant that the film came with its set of remarkable highs as it worked excellently on certain fronts, alongside a few problematic and disappointing lows. It’s squarely centred on Anikkutan (Fahadh Faasil), a seemingly ordinary man who works as an electronics technician out of his home in the mountains, where he resides with his widowed mother. One, however, doesn’t need to scratch deep to see that he's filled with flaws, neuroses and demons. He’s difficult, troubled and rude; he carries unresolved baggage from the past which has led to an estranged relationship with his sister; and he’s filled with caste-based prejudices. Things, therefore, start slipping out of control when his neighbours – a couple belonging to the so-called lower caste – have a baby, whose cries disturb his sleep. Meanwhile there’re public service announcements of an impending natural disaster, which does strike in the form of devastating flood and landslides. Faasil gave a stunning turn as the edgy, taciturn and unlikeable character; the day-to-day activities and interactions preceding the disaster imbued the script with visceral undercurrents; and the disaster itself was crafted with immersive brilliance. That said, by linking Anikkutan’s casteist nature with his past – and thereby assigning a rationale to that – the director did a grave disserve to this noxious issue; further, while what transpires upon his being trapped by land collapse struck a strong emotional chord, the director conveniently provided a means for the cleansing of his toxicity through a heroic deed.

Director: Sajimon Prabhakar

Genre: Drama/Thriller/Psychological Drama/Social Drama/Disaster Movie

Language: Malayalam

Country: India

Jaya Jaya Jaya Jaya Hey [2022]

 Vipin Das’ darkly humorous film – its playful title, by ironically referencing to a line from the national anthem, highlighted how women are often limited as individuals by placing them on pedestals in terms of their social roles – covered a despicable and pervading societal evil through hilarious fantasy fulfilment, deadpan satire and gleeful hyperboles. On most occasions this was a firecracker work laced with rousing feminist stance and lashing depictions of normalized patriarchy, toxic behaviour and hypocrisy. However, its tricky narrative choices risked trivializing such a serious topic by diminishing a grim reality – marital abuse, denial of agency and voice to women, lack of economic independence that leaves housewives trapped and helpless – into amusing escapism. Consequently, it felt lacking in the kind of nuance, depth and scorching brilliance that The Great Indian Kitchen had manifested; and, by counting the number of slaps instead of articulating that even one slap is one too many – which Thappad categorically did – it also missed a beat. Nevertheless, it had sufficient chutzpah, wackiness and satiric ingenuity to make this a crackling watch despite its simplistic constituents and convenient sidestepping of certain inconvenient topics like abortion through deux ex machina. The eponymous Jaya (Darshana Rajendran) has always been at the mercy of the men surrounding her – her irascible father intent on making all decisions for her; her unctuous uncle (Sudheer Paravoor) who doles out intrusive advices under the guise of caring for her wellbeing; her college teacher (Aju Varghese) whose progressive homilies are a sham; and finally her patriarchal, misogynistic, heavily abusive and manipulative husband (Basil Joseph). The well-enacted film comprised of a number of standout set-pieces, including arguably the funniest karate kick in recent memory.

Director: Vipin Das

Genre: Black Comedy/Social Satire/Family Drama

Language: Malayalam

Country: India