Tag Archives: Ananya Panday

Movie Review: Kesari Chapter 2 (2025)

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2.5 Stars (out of 4)

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Kesari Chapter 2: The Untold Story of Jallianwala Bagh is a film with an agenda. There’s nothing wrong with that, per se, but it’s hard to ignore how deliberately it pushes its audience to feel a certain way.

This movie was belatedly titled as a spiritual successor to 2019’s Kesari to capitalize on name recognition. The only things the films have in common are Akshay Kumar in the lead role and a shared cadre of producers: Karan Johar, Hiroo Yash Johar, Apoorva Mehta, and Aruna Bhatia.

Kesari Chapter 2 opens with a moving recreation of the Jallianwala Bagh massacre in 1919. Thousands of Indians at a rally in Amritsar are cornered and fired upon by British troops, under the direction of General Reginald Dyer (Simon Paisley Day). More than 1,500 people of all ages are killed, either from bullet wounds, crush injuries, or drowning in a well where they leapt to escape the shooting.

We see the mass murder from the perspective of a teenage boy, Pargat Singh (Krish Rao), who loses his mother and younger sister that day. Given the technological limitations of the time, the ruling British government is able to suppress the truth and frame the massacre as a response to an armed uprising.

As the government assembles a commission to investigate the incident, Pargat stands outside the gates, holding up paintings depicting what really happened. He’s ignored by all of the commissioners save one: Justice Chettoor Sankaran Nair (Kumar). Nair’s legal work on behalf of the British has earned him a knighthood and invitations to swanky parties, but his participation on the committee reminds him that the Brits see him as a useful tool, not an equal.

When Pargat dies, the young man’s cause is taken up by rookie lawyer Dilreet Gill (Ananya Panday). Her criticism of Nair for going along with commission’s sham findings — as well as his own remorse over the boy’s death — lead him to join her in filling suit against General Dyer on the charges of genocide.

The events thus far, some of the characters, and the court arguments that follow are amalgamations of various historical incidents and figures. Kesari Chapter 2 isn’t presenting a history lesson but stoking the fires of moral outrage. That’s any movie’s right to do, but it feels fair in this case. There’s general agreement today as to what happened at Jallianwala Bagh, and the British government and monarchy have never formally apologized for the massacre.

Kesari Chapter 2 is actually pretty good at what it’s trying to accomplish. The Brits are racist schemers, and their victims are sympathetic and plentiful. It’s fun to watch Nair get the better of his adversaries in court, including the crown’s mercenary attorney Neville McKinley (R. Madhavan). Indian legal dramas can be confusing for those not versed in the court system, but great English subtitles by Jahan Singh Bakshi and Anantika Mehra make it easy to follow.

Still, the movie occasionally breaks the narrative spell, reminding the audience that it’s trying to make us feel specific emotions. Nair’s expletive-filled outburst in court is directed as much at the audience as at the judge to whom he’s speaking. It would have been nice had writer-director Karan Singh Tyagi let viewers come by their feelings organically.

But that would have required more comprehensive world-building, which Kesari Chapter 2 lacks. Nair is the center of the universe, and all the other characters feel thinly drawn. Panday’s Dillreet gets a few good moments, but Regina Cassandra as Nair’s wife Parvathy hardly needs to be in the movie. Thankfully, Kumar does a solid job carrying the film solo.

The spell is also broken by some odd music choices by composer Shashwat Sachdev. One recurring theme is obviously based on Carl Orff’s “O Fortuna”. Random electric guitar riffs feel strange in 1919 India. And when Nair makes a penis joke at Dyer’s expense, I swear it’s punctuated by something meant to mimic rapper Lil Jon’s signature “Yeah!”.

If nothing else, Kesari Chapter 2 is a movie without pretense. It’s not great, but it is effective.

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Movie Review: CTRL (2024)

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3.5 Stars (out of 4)

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Filmmaker Vikramaditya Motwane’s Netflix Original film CTRL chillingly reminds the audience to do something we regularly neglect: read the fine print.

The film opens with the rapid social media ascent of influencers Nella (Ananya Panday) and Joe (Vihaan Samat), a romantically-involved couple who document their dates and travels on their channel. We see their relationship evolve through their social media posts, which increasingly feature sponsored products. Their lives are entangled as much financially as they are emotionally.

Nella surprises Joe on-camera while he’s out at a meal with friends, only to find him kissing a girl she doesn’t know. Nella’s dramatic meltdown in the restaurant becomes meme-fodder, and we see other creators using her blowup to make their own material.

As she deals with the implosion of her relationship and career, Nella spots a comment advertising an AI service that can remove someone from your digital life. She signs up for the service and creates a virtual assistant “Allen” — who looks like a mop-topped cartoon version of Ranveer Singh and is voiced by Aparshakti Khurana — instructing him to erase Joe from all of the photos and videos on her computer.

Allen asks Nella questions about the photos as he removes Joe pixel by pixel, acting as the confidant she lost in her breakup. When she’s ready to go to sleep, Allen says he can keep deleting Joe overnight if she gives him full access to all of her computer’s systems. She doesn’t think twice before agreeing.

If this were a sci-fi movie, this is where Allen would turn out to be a super-smart AI that takes over Nella’s life. But because CTRL is set in reality — where AI is nowhere near capable of doing that — what happens next is less dramatic, but more frightening because of its mundanity. Nella’s permission allows a developer to remotely access her desktop and all of her apps and files. The human on the other end can snoop around as much as they want — writing, copying, and deleting to their heart’s content while Nella snoozes.

We’re all guilty of agreeing to corporations’ conditions without really knowing what we’re consenting to, whether that’s how the company uses our data or signing away our rights to sue. CTRL is so effective because of how believable it is in its depiction of a worst-case corporate overreach scenario borne out of consumer inattention.

Ananya Panday has been a compelling performer since she debuted, and she demonstrates what a top-tier leading lady she is in CTRL. She acts nearly all of her scenes alone, addressing the camera directly while filming her own video content or interacting with Allen on her laptop. Even without other actors to play off of, she hits every emotional note perfectly, making the audience care deeply for Nella even as she creates new problems for herself.

In the hands of a less-skilled filmmaker, telling a story entirely via social media posts and footage shot through laptop cameras and video calls could come across as gimmicky. But Motwane is so talented that the visual flow of the film feels totally natural. The spell breaks a little when we’re shown footage of other influencers’ posts or cable news reports, but since it’s clear that this is what Nella is watching, it makes narrative sense.

Here’s hoping that some politician watches CTRL and makes it their mission to pursue greater regulation of AI. Trusting corporations to do the right thing is foolish.

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Movie Review: Kho Gaye Hum Kahan (2023)

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3.5 Stars (out of 4)

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Kho Gaye Hum Kahan thoughtfully explores relationship challenges in the age of social media. Debutant writer-director Arjun Varain Singh integrates smartphones into the lives of his characters organically, emphasizing their importance without letting the tech overshadow the humans at the heart of the story.

Three Mumbai twentysomethings have been best friends forever. Imaad (Siddhant Chaturvedi) can afford to pursue his dream of being a stand-up comedian, thanks to his rich dad (played by Rahul Vohra). Corporate consultant Ahana (Ananya Panday) shares an apartment with Imaad but is dating Rohan (Rohan Gurbaxani). Personal trainer Neil (Adarsh Gourav) lives with his working-class parents and wants to open his own gym.

Their love lives are rocky. Rohan asks Ahana to take a break but immediately posts suspicious cupcake photos to his Instagram and likes posts by a beautiful baking influencer. Neil is hooking up with another influencer named Lala (Anya Singh), who’s also one of his personal training clients — although Neil is convinced their relationship is more exclusive than it is. Imaad uses a fake name to meet women on Tinder, then ghosts them after they have sex.

Imaad’s romantic fortunes change when he meets Simran (Kalki Koechlin), a photographer working on an exhibition about Tinder users. She’s older and more mature than Imaad is, yet they have enough fun together for them to consider committing to one another.

Meanwhile, Neil is increasingly angry at Lala’s refusal to make their relationship public and for her flirting with a potential advertiser. Ahana posts racy photos to her own Instagram account in order to get Rohan’s attention. It works.

The trio also decide to go into business together and make Neil’s dream of owning a gym a reality. Ahana quits her dead-end office job to focus on a business strategy, and Imaad invests the money — although his dad warns him that money isn’t the only thing that can be lost when you start a company with your friends.

While the characters’ relationship problems aren’t new, Director Singh skillfully shows how constant access to social media adds a fresh layer of complexity to them. Smartphones have only been around for an eye-blink of human history, and it’s unreasonable to expect us as a species to immediately adapt individually and culturally to the profound emotional consequences of such technological advancement. Singh’s screenplay — which was co-written with Zoya Akhtar, Reema Kagti, and Yash Sahai — offers a comprehensive snapshot of this moment in history for Generation Z.

The only real complaint about the writing is Imaad’s stand-up comedy material. Stand-up routines within movies are often uncomfortable to watch, and none of the writers are themselves comedians. That said, Imaad’s material sounds amateurish enough to befit his status as a comic who hasn’t hit it big yet. Chaturvedi does reasonably well given the challenge of performing the sometimes awkward material he’s given.

Neil is the most volatile of the main characters, and Gourav plays him within the perfect emotional range. When Neil takes revenge via social media, it reinforces the technological themes in Singh’s story.

Panday is so natural as Ahana that she disappears into the role, delivering a subtle and wholly believable performance. This should erase any doubts for those still skeptical of Panday’s abilities.

Kho Gaye Hum Kahan puts a modern spin on the classic problems of young adulthood. I’m excited to see what Arjun Varian Singh does next.

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Movie Review: Gehraiyaan (2022)

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2.5 Stars (out of 4)

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Gehraiyaan is writer-director Shakun Batra’s third film, after his brilliant sophomore effort, Kapoor & Sons. Unfortunately, Gehraiyaan repeats some of the same missteps from Batra’s enjoyable but frustrating debut — Ek Main Aur Ekk Tu — including problems with pacing and a muddled thematic conclusion.

Deepika Padukone stars as Alisha, a woman plagued by fears of succumbing to the same fate as her mother, who died by suicide when Alisha was a little girl. Now an adult, Alisha is dating her childhood best friend Karan (Dhairya Karwa), working overtime as a yoga instructor to support his floundering dreams of being a novelist. She feels stuck — a sentiment her mother expressed before her death.

Then Alisha’s cousin Tia (Ananya Panday) re-enters the picture. Tia is rich, the sole beneficiary of her dad’s real estate empire, which he once shared with Alisha’s father. The parents split on bad terms shortly before Alisha’s mother’s death, separating the cousins and sending their financial fortunes in opposite directions. Now Tia is living the high life with her handsome fiance Zain (Siddhant Chaturvedi), her father’s former protege who aspires to be a big-time developer himself.

On the night they first meet, Zain flirts with Alisha. That should be a red flag to Alisha, but she’s desperate for a change. When opportunity presents itself, she and Zain begin an affair. This exacerbates tensions in her relationship with Karan, leading them to break up. Zain promises to end things with Tia in six months, after he returns an investment she made in his company. Then, he promises, he and Alisha can be together.

Alisha and Zain make a sexy pair, and the thrill of their relationship is apparent. There’s always the danger of what would happen if Tia found out — especially since Tia repeatedly hints in conversations with her mother that there’s something important that Alisha doesn’t know.

About halfway through Gehraiyaan, the relationship drama takes a backseat, as the movie pivots to focus for way too long on financial shenanigans at Zain’s company. The details aren’t particularly interesting in and of themselves, and are even less so because they don’t prompt Zain to undergo any character growth. It’s established early on that Zain’s only priority is himself, and the time spent on his subplot feels like it comes at Alisha’s expense. She’s the only character in the film on a personal growth journey.

Part of Alisha’s journey is deciding what kind of relationship to have with her estranged father Vinod (Naseeruddin Shah), whom she blames for her mother’s death. Given their immense talents, it’s little surprise that the scenes between Padukone and Shah are highlights. Panday is also really good in her supporting role, playing Tia as both canny and vulnerable. The film could have used more scenes between her and Padukone as well.

Even when Alisha’s character growth is foregrounded in the plot, the ways the film’s themes are applied to her story feel off. One theme is about moving beyond the past and choosing the direction of one’s life, but it’s hard for Alisha to choose wisely, since every person she knows is hiding something from her. And the theme of moving forward is at odds with a contradictory theme that you can’t really escape the past anyway.

At best, Batra is trying to too hard to avoid a predictable ending. At worst, his theming is just a mess. Either way, the story ends on what feels like a pointless twist. Ek Main Aur Ekk Tu suffered from a similarly disappointing fate. Kapoor & Sons didn’t have that problem, so here’s hoping Batra nails it next time.

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Movie Review: Student of the Year 2 (2019)

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2.5 Stars (out of 4)

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With an opening scene that features hundreds of students celebrating the start of an intercollegiate competition by chanting, “Student! Student!”, it’s clear that Student of the Year 2 (“SOTY2” henceforth) is not meant to be intellectually challenging. Nevertheless, the romantic comedy-drama sequel is plenty of fun, with some surprisingly rich character development.

Though not a direct sequel to 2012’s Student of the Year, SOTY2 is made in the same narrative mold as the first: a low-income university student competes against his well-heeled contemporaries for respect and the love of a pretty girl. While the original SOTY launched the careers of three newcomers who would become big stars — Alia Bhatt, Varun Dhawan, and Sidharth Malhotra — SOTY2 is star Tiger Shroff’s sixth leading role.

This time Shroff plays Rohan, a working class student at the underfunded Pishorilal Chamandas College where he excels at the sport kabaddi. His wealthy childhood sweetheart Mridula (Tara Sutaria) attends hoity-toity St. Teresa’s College. Without telling Mridula about his plan, Rohan gets an athletic scholarship and transfers to St. Teresa’s to be closer to her.

Rohan is a fish out of water at his new school, where everyone wears designer clothes and drives sports cars. He’s no longer the best athlete, with that distinction belonging to Manav (Aditya Seal), the reigning intercollegiate Student of the Year titleholder. Rohan makes an enemy of Manav’s snobby, vindictive sister Shreya (Ananya Panday, daughter of actor Chunky Pandey). Even Mridula — who goes by “Mia” on campus — acts less than thrilled to see poor Rohan on her fancy turf.

While Rohan could find a place at St. Teresa’s as one of Manav’s toadies, that won’t impress Mridula. What starts out as a good-natured rivalry between the two campus studs changes when Manav realizes Rohan’s ambitions, and Manav reminds Rohan of the hierarchy in the harshest way possible. But Rohan finds an unexpected ally in Shreya, who’s tired of living in her brother’s shadow. Maybe Rohan’s been trying to impress the wrong woman.

Though Shroff is typically drawn to action movies, he’s more charming in a lighter role like this that requires some self-awareness. Shroff nicely depicts Rohan’s struggle to fit in, as well as his realization that he should’ve been kinder to his peers back when he was Big Man on Campus at his old college.

Shreya’s character development is even more impressive than Rohan’s. She evolves from spoiled and aloof to generous and kind, as Rohan learns more about her troubled home life, while still keeping the core of her character intact. Her instinct to respond to slights with cattiness never changes, but she begins to curb her impulsiveness. One would never guess that this is Panday’s first feature role, she’s that good.

This is also Sutaria’s first feature role, having started her career in television. She doesn’t quite match the charisma of Shroff or Panday, but her character isn’t as deep as either of theirs. Mridula is written as shallow and fickle, which doesn’t leave Sutaria much room to maneuver.

Manav is also one-note — a rich bully from start to finish. Seal has to deliver dopey lines with a straight face, such as the multiple times Manav calls Rohan “loser of the year.” On the positive side, Seal and Sutaria are the best dancers of the lead quartet.

The film’s dance numbers are fun and impressive in scale, although they do have some weird elements. Will Smith strolls across the stage during one song for absolutely no reason. A couple of numbers feature a bunch of white women in cheerleader outfits, which stands out because there aren’t any non-Indian male students at St. Teresa. Also, one of my friends was crushed to discover that “Mumbai Dilli Di Kudiyaan” was just released for promotional purposes and wasn’t actually in the movie.

SOTY2 also has a lot of kabaddi scenes, which are sort of exciting, but I didn’t come out of the film understanding anything more about the rules than I did going in. (Although I was delighted to learn that you’re allowed to kick people in kabaddi.) There are also some unrealistic track and field sequences that have slow-motion shots of Manav turning to stare at Rohan in the middle of a race and looking aghast.

Then again, the whole premise of the Student of the Year competition is ridiculous to begin with. It’s only available to male students, there’s no academic component, and it only features two events — one of which is a team sport. Points are accrued by school, not by individual, yet the final award is given to a single participant. It’s pretty dumb if you think about it, so better to just enjoy Student of the Year 2 for its lavish dance numbers and Ananya Panday’s promising debut.

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