Berlin Syndrome

BY:  Aalokitaa Basu Imagine backpacking through a foreign land, with only yourself as company, slowly exploring the place and yourself and bumping into a cute local boy who you connect with and who makes you feel special… this sounds like the stuff dreams and bucket lists are made of, right? Well you’d be correct on…

The House of Small Cubes

BY: Smriti Girish A man, his pipe, and his sepia colored memories. If every scene in this film was assigned a line that described it, what would emerge is poetry derivative of a Van Gogh painting. The House of Small Cubes is a 2008 Japanese short subject film directed by Kunio Kato. The film is…

The Legend of the Blue Sea

BY:  Garima Agarwal This was the first Korean Drama series I ever watched on high recommendation of a friend. Being a mixture of romance, comedy, adventure and tragedy- this 20 episode series carefully draws the circle of life around two totally different worlds- the life on land and the life under sea. I took no…

The African Doctor

BY: Sumedha Batra The African Doctor, originally titled Bienvenue À Marly-Gomont, is a 2016 French film based on the true life story of the father of the musician Kamini. The film, beautifully directed by Julien Rambaldi, is set in 1970s. It revolves around Dr. Seyolo Zantoko, the only African male at a medical school. After…

Tokyo Girl

BY: Shraddha Kumar Tokyo Girl (Tôkyô Joshi Zukan) is a limited-run Japanese show that aired  between 2016 and 2017. The premise for this show seems quite familiar- Aya (portrayed wonderfully by Asami Mizukawa),  a small town girl,  wants to move to the big city in pursuit of love and riches. Dissatisfied with her prospects in…

Atypical

By Shagun Agarwal “Adelie, Chinstrap, Emperor, Gentoo, Adelie, Chinstrap, Emperor, Gentoo”. I’m going to start off with the names of these four Antarctic penguins because it’s stressful to write a review on this show, one which does it enough justice. Atypical is a TV show which has miraculously been able to balance out (very subtly)…

The Face Thief

BY: Smriti Girish Paranoia and fear as a tenebrous and bleak landscape of a cluster of ity building switches to a lady, clutching a folder close to her heart, running for her life from a faceless red presence, through the seedy underbelly of the gloomy city. Sinister, thunderous music growing louder still, sweeping us away…

Taare Zameen Par

BY: Garima Agarwal This  2007 Amir Khan Production starring Darsheel Safary is based on the story of a child battling  dyslexia, and it will always be one of the best movies Bollywood has given us. The subtle portrayal of ideas around the stigma attached to mental illnesses or recently, cases of ‘Neurodiversity’ make me watch…

Maniac

By Divina Sethi Netflix’s Maniac is a powerful sci fi psychological thriller (as I would like to call it). Each member of the stellar cast (Jonah Hill, Emma Stone, Justin Theroux, Sally Field) portrays a deeply complex, troubled character. Set in a Blade Runner 2049- Black Mirror like technologically advanced 2018, the series follows the…

Little Miss Sunshine

BY: Aalokitaa Basu Little Miss Sunshine is an odd film. That being said, its oddity is its biggest selling point, it’s the kind of odd that puts a smile on your face. Be warned, there is no happy ending in sight for any character whatsoever, still you somehow end up feeling cushioned and reassured by…