In this review, Anupama Chopra breaks down Anurag Kashyap's long-awaited Kennedy, now streaming on Zee5 after premiering at the Cannes Film Festival in 2023. Anupama examines how the film functions as a stylized descent into the personal hell of an insomniac ex-cop turned contract killer, played by Rahul Bhat, who delivers a physically imposing yet emotionally deadened performance. She highlights the stunning cinematography by Sylvester Fonseca, the haunting score recorded by the Prague Philharmonic Orchestra, and Sunny Leone's surprisingly effective turn as a deeply damaged woman masking her pain with alcohol and brittle laughter.

While Anupama praises Kennedy's atmospheric first hour and its singular moments of horror — including a sequence she ranks among the best in Anurag's entire filmography — she notes that the film ultimately stumbles as its plotting grows increasingly tangled without offering fresh insight into its world of corruption. She draws comparisons to Anurag's recent two-part Nishaanchi, calling Kennedy more propulsive and distinctive, while acknowledging that even in its weaker stretches, the film delivers the kind of skin-pricking flourishes that have defined Anurag's career for over three decades.

In this review for The Hollywood Reporter India, Anupama Chopra examines O Romeo, directed by Vishal Bhardwaj, a nearly three-hour gangster romance loosely inspired by the real-life relationship between Mumbai contract killer Hussain Ustra and Sapna Didi, as chronicled in S. Hussain Zaidi and Jane Borges’ book Mafia Queens of Mumbai. Anupama finds a moving, tender tale of one-sided love buried inside the film’s many excesses — Shahid Kapoor’s Hussain pining for Triptii Dimri’s Afsha, a grieving widow who accepts him as tutor and guide but never as lover. She praises Triptii as pitch perfect, finding a unique mix of vulnerability and steeliness, and highlights the strong supporting cast including Nana Patekar as an IB officer, Farida Jalal as the maternal Dadi, and a fleeting, nostalgia-inducing appearance by Aruna Irani. Anupama notes how Vishal — who previously delivered the great Mumbai gangster film Maqbool and the memorable Kaminey — is the right fit for this material, weaving an elaborate web of violence, romance and poetry.

However, Anupama argues that O Romeo derails halfway through and never finds its way back. A key fault line is the villain Jalal, played by Avinash Tiwary, who despite being a fine actor is badly directed here, resorting to a growling voice and unhinged killing that tips into the unintentionally comic — particularly once he starts fighting a bull bare-chested in a Spanish arena. What could have been a soaring mood piece becomes an eye-glazing dance of bloodletting, with Shahid’s committed performance ultimately defeated by the film’s unnecessary extravagances in both story and style. Anupama’s bottom line: O Romeo is proof that more isn’t always more.

In this review for The Hollywood Reporter India, Anupama Chopra takes on Tu Yaa Main, the creature feature directed by Bejoy Nambiar, an official remake of the 2018 Thai film The Pool. Anupama examines how the film spends too much of its first hour building emotional arcs and backstories for its two leads — Adarsh Gourav as Maruti, a rapper and content creator from Nala Sopara, and Shanaya Kapoor as Avni, a rich influencer known as Miss Vanity — when all we really want is the croc. She notes that Maruti feels like a tired copy of Murad from Gully Boy while Avni is the lonely rich girl archetype, and while Adarsh fleshes out his character with cheerful energy and memorable lines, Shanaya is saddled with the more vanilla role, though this is still a step up from her debut Aankhon Ki Gustaakhiyan.

Anupama argues that the film comes alive once the crocodile enters the picture, with Bejoy squeezing genuine suspense out of the scenario of two people stuck in a pool with a killer. The croc — a mix of real footage, animatronic and CGI — is convincing enough, and the film bakes in enough self-aware humour, including nods to Amitabh Bachchan's Gangaa Jamunaa Saraswati and the Rekha classic Khoon Bhari Maang. While Tu Yaa Main tries to explore ideas of class, ambition and life as social media performance, Anupama finds it too lightweight to deliver real insight or genuine terror. Her bottom line: keep expectations and IQ low, and there are enough kicks in the croc.

In this review for The Hollywood Reporter India, Anupama Chopra breaks down Kohrra Season 2, the Netflix crime drama from writer-showrunner Sudip Sharma, co-created with Gunjit Chopra and Diggy Sisodia. Anupama explores how the sophomore season goes smaller and more focused rather than bigger, delivering a far more piercing and personal story than the first. With Suvinder Vicky's Inspector Balbir Singh no longer part of the proceedings, the season introduces Mona Singh as Inspector Dhanwant Kaur — a grieving mother and relentless cop — alongside Barun Sobti's returning Inspector Garundi, whose crooked smile and razor-sharp wit provide much-needed comic relief. Anupama examines how the show uses a police procedural merely as a framework to delve into the dark heart of regular people, with the raw human drama hitting far harder than the crime itself.

Anupama highlights standout performances from Mona, whose portrayal of internalised grief is quietly devastating, Anurag Arora who finally gets a role worthy of his calibre, Pradhuman Singh as Dhanwant's alcoholic husband, and newcomer Prayrak Mehta whose subplot as a young migrant searching for his father is felt in the bones. She also unpacks the season's fascinating gender dynamics — how the women hold the power and drive the narrative while the men, for all their performative grandstanding, are shown as meek and on the backfoot. Anupama's bottom line: Kohrra Season 2 is an exquisitely crafted crime drama that ensures the personal hits harder than the procedural.

Anupama Chopra reviews Vadh 2 for The Hollywood Reporter India. The film is a spiritual sequel — same lead actors Neena Gupta and Sanjay Mishra, same character names, but an entirely new story. This time, Shambhunath is a prison guard and Manju is a prisoner serving a 28-year sentence. Their unlikely, tender relationship forms the emotional core of a film that once again explores murder with a moral angle. Writer-director Jaspal Singh Sandhu expands the scale from the lean original, setting the action largely inside a prison with many more players.

While Vadh 2 doesn’t quite match the first film’s depth and propulsion — the villain is less effective and the pacing gets sluggish in places — Jaspal creates enough twists to keep you engaged. The real intrigue isn’t the murder itself but who did it and whether they can get away with it. Neena and Sanjay bring warmth and gravity to every scene, and there’s something genuinely thrilling about a franchise built around two sixty-plus actors.

Suchin Mehrotra reviews Daldal, the 7-episode crime thriller from creator Suresh Triveni streaming on Amazon Prime Video and adapted from Vish Dhamija's bestselling novel Bhendi Bazaar. Suchin admires the show's daring to defy algorithm-driven storytelling and refuse to handhold audiences, but finds the execution falls short of its ambitious aspirations. He praises Bhumi Pednekar for bringing stillness and conviction to her role as angry, tortured cop Rita Farrera, calling it a character that deserves a better show, while noting Aditya Rawal continues to prove he's one of the most exciting young actors around as drug addict Sajid.

Despite committed performances from leads including Samara Tijori as serial killer Anant, Suchin finds the show feels like moody, violent, scattered, sad vibes without the required tension of a cat-and-mouse thriller. He criticizes the structure for taking two full episodes to establish who's who, then lacking enough pilot mileage to sustain seven episodes. Director Amrit Raj Gupta and the writers attempt to explore deeper themes of trauma and abuse but seem to forget the surface itself, with the final showdown descending into a messy blur. Suchin concludes it's ironic that a series daring to rise above formula makes you yearn for a little formula to make it go down easier—a well-intentioned, indulgent misfire.

Anupama Chopra reviews Primate, the new horror film from British director Johannes Roberts that delivers a deliciously simple premise: a loving family's pet chimpanzee contracts rabies and turns into a ferocious killer, trapping alluring teenagers in a beautiful cliffside house in Hawaii. Anupama praises the masterstroke of setting much of the action around the swimming pool, since the chimp Ben can't swim and the rabies makes him hydrophobic, turning the water into the only safe haven. She highlights the wondrous work of movement specialist Miguel Torres Umba, whose mix of makeup, special effects, and practical effects makes Ben feel horrifically real rather than an alienating CGI creature.

At a crisp 89 minutes, Anupama notes that Johannes keeps audiences properly terrorized with brutal blood-letting—faces ripped off, chests and heads smashed in—building tension with ruthless efficiency. The cast includes Oscar winner Troy Kotsur as the deaf father Adam, adding another layer to the horror. Anupama confesses she only got through some scenes by closing her eyes, and advises viewers not to look for nuance or subtext. Primate hurtles along like a boulder delivering elemental pleasures, and sometimes that's all you need at the movies.

Anupama Chopra reviews Border 2, the sequel to J.P. Dutta's blockbuster war film released nearly 30 years ago, now directed by Anurag Singh and set during the 1971 Indo-Pak war. Anupama praises the first half for juggling multiple characters, action, and emotion with dexterity, highlighting Anurag's forte for distilling tears from a few lines of dialogue. The film features four leading men—Sunny Deol as Lieutenant Colonel Fateh Singh Kaler, Varun Dhawan as Major Hoshiar Singh Dahiya, Diljit Dosanjh as ace pilot Nirmal Jit Singh Sekhon, and Ahan Shetty as Navy man Rawat—with Sunny delivering the best hero entry through an elaborate fight with nifty footwork on landmines. Anupama notes that Mona Singh is lovely as Fateh's beleaguered wife, and Diljit's irrepressible charm brings levity that lights up the screen.

However, Anupama finds the film wobbles in its three-hour-twenty-minute runtime, with sea battles featuring rudimentary VFX, land battles becoming eye-glazing, and enemy soldiers portrayed as buffoons that never make the stakes feel high enough. She observes the film leans heavily into nostalgia for the original, including casting Ahan who can't match the stony strength of his father Suniel Shetty as Bhairon. Patriotism becomes a substitute for plot, and while Sunny nearing 70 can still do the heavy lifting with panache, the war scenes grow repetitive even as the emotional ones hit the high notes.

Vishal Menon reviews Baby Girl, the new thriller from director Arun Varma that features Nivin Pauly in what feels like an afterthought role added purely for marketing purposes. Vishal notes the film contains a compelling moral dilemma—who deserves to be a mother, the woman capable of giving birth or the woman who can give unconditional love—explored through characters Ritu played by Lijomol and 19-year-old Meenakshi. However, writers Bobby Sanjay turn this potential into a convoluted mess, treating the baby like a missing courier and parading doubtful characters with skewed logic while relying on implausible coincidences to move the plot forward.

Vishal finds the filmmaking dated and basic, like something from the late 90s, with characters meant to look like gypsies appearing borrowed from a school cultural fest. He singles out Sam CS’s music as jarring and stilted, sounding like it was scored by prompting Gemini with “thriller movie music.” The police officers feel irrelevant, dramatic moments turn unserious with weak performances, and Nivin’s character Sanal keeps popping back into action whenever he’s been missing too long. Vishal concludes that Baby Girl is no match to the classic Traffic that the same team made over a decade ago, and ironically in a film about the divine blessing of childbirth, the baby herself feels like little more than a cute plot point.

Vishal Menon reviews Chatha Pacha, the new action comedy from director Advaith Nayar that’s being marketed as India’s first WWE-style wrestling movie. Vishal praises the film’s nostalgic power, beginning with a flashback of three little boys wrestling on their parents’ double cot—a visual that transports 90s and 2000s kids back to when they refused to believe wrestling was fake. He highlights how the film explores sibling rivalry through matches where real-life fights mirror wrestling bouts that were meant to be staged, drawing parallels to the OG Malayalam wrestling comedy Mutharamkunnu PO directed by Sibi Malayil.

The scenes within the ring are so well choreographed that Vishal feels like he’s watching ringside, inches away from beads of sweat flying toward him. He notes that leads Arjun Ashokan and Roshan Mathew channel the biggest sibling war of childhood—Kane and Undertaker—while Vishak Nair delivers the film’s most interesting character as the complex antagonist Cherian. Vishal acknowledges the writing falters with rushed details and unanswered questions, but when a two-and-a-half-hour film feels two-and-a-half minutes long, the crew has done something right. Chatha Pacha may not be a Stone Cold stunner, but works as a lovingly made tribute to boys who dared to try it at home.

Suchin Mehrotra reviews Space Gen: Chandrayaan, the new 5-episode series from TVF streaming on JioHotstar that dramatizes ISRO's historic Chandrayaan 3 mission. Suchin finds the show treats its audience like toddlers, with heavy-handed exposition, wafer-thin characters, and a relentless need to amp up drama where none is needed. He highlights how talented actors like Gopal Dutt, Prakash Belawadi, and Danish Sait are reduced to irritating caricatures, while lead Nakuul Mehta delivers what Suchin calls "the single most irritating protagonist in recent memory."

Despite the inherently compelling story of India becoming the first nation to land on the lunar south pole, Suchin argues the series squanders its potential with loud emotion, tacky packaging, and branded content sensibilities. He notes the special thanks to ISRO's PR team in the credits "says it all," and concludes he'd happily take a million Mission Mangals over this disappointing effort from the usually competent TVF.

Anupama Chopra reviews Happy Patel: Khatarnak Jasoos, the directorial debut of co-directors Vir Das and Kavi Shastri. Vir plays a bumbling 34-year-old wannabe secret agent who has failed the MI7 test seven times. Raised in the UK by his gay dads—both legendary agents—Happy travels to Goa to rescue a kidnapped British citizen, despite his real talents being cooking and ballet. Anupama finds the film a gleeful, good-natured comedy that takes potshots at everything from Bollywood tropes to fairness creams to colonialism, but without malice or the edginess of Vir's earlier collaboration with producer Aamir Khan, Delhi Belly.

The cast plays along beautifully—Mithila Palkar as an aggressive local dancer, Sharib Hashmi as a local fixer, and Mona Singh having a ball as uber don Mama. Imran Khan's cameo, his first screen appearance in nearly a decade, is guaranteed to make audiences smile. While there are stretches where the humour dips, Anupama calls this a welcome change from both gritty spy thrillers and glamorous globe-trotting ones—Happy is the distant desi cousin of Johnny English and Austin Powers, propelled by earnestness and Vir's profound sweetness.

Kairam Vaashi reviews Mana Shankara Vara Prasad Garu, director Anil Ravipudi’s latest Sankranthi release starring Megastar Chiranjeevi. While Anil has earned his reputation as the “Sankranthi director” with hits like Sankranthiki Vastunam, F2, and F3, Kairam finds this outing considerably more basic—functional filmmaking with convenient writing and comedy that lands only about half the time. Nayanthara has little to do, Venkatesh’s cameo feels force-fitted, and most supporting characters could be removed without notice.

What saves the film is Chiranjeevi himself. Present in nearly 90% of scenes, the 70-year-old legend slips effortlessly into his Chantabbai zone—doing self-deprecating humour, weeping at TV serials, mimicking Rajinikanth, and reminding audiences he was always a terrific actor before becoming a star. Kairam’s verdict: a very basic film made watchable by one of Indian cinema’s most comfortable screen presences.

Kairam Vaashi reviews The Raja Saab, directed by Maruthi and starring Prabhas. The film follows Raju, whose sole mission is to reunite his Alzheimer's-afflicted grandmother Gangamma, played beautifully by Zarina Wahab, with her long-lost husband Kanakaraju, played by Sanjay Dutt. Kairam admits he was nervous about this project from day one, questioning whether Maruthi could deliver a Prabhas film given the director hadn't previously worked with a Telugu Tier-1 star or handled films of this scale. Unfortunately, those fears have largely been realised.

Kairam finds the second half genuinely fun once the characters enter a haunted palace, with engaging mind-game sequences between Sanjay and Boman Irani, and between Sanjay and Prabhas forming the strongest dramatic portions. However, the first half struggles with a lack of focus as it plods through Nidhhi Agerwal's track, Malavika Mohanan's track, and Samuthirakani appearing in and out of the narrative without real dramatic or comedic energy. While Kairam gives kudos to Prabhas for choosing a film outside his familiar action-gangster zone, he notes the star doesn't appear comfortable in songs and lacks his full vigour. Thaman's music, particularly "Rebel Saab" and "Sahana," sounds good on the big screen, but the picturisation could have been far better. Kairam concludes that in The Raja Saab, the second half is the Raja, the first half is the sob, making it a middling outing for Prabhas.

Anupama Chopra reviews Laalo – Krishna Sada Sahaayate, the Hindi dub of Gujarati cinema's biggest blockbuster. Released in October with minimal fanfare, the original became a word-of-mouth sensation and the first Gujarati film to cross 100 crores at the box office. With a modest budget of one crore 10 lakh, Anupama argues it's arguably 2025's most successful film in terms of ROI. Debutant director Ankit Sakhiya has crafted an emotionally resonant morality tale about Laalo, a rickshaw driver in Junagadh whose life has been eroded by alcohol addiction.

Anupama highlights Karan Joshi's layered performance as the broken protagonist, rendering his hollow masculinity, cruelty, and inherent goodness with equal conviction. Shruhad Goswami plays Lord Krishna with a lovely lingering smile and benevolent mischief, while Reeva Rachh delivers a solid turn as Tulsi. Though the film occasionally slips into preachiness, Ankit largely resists heavy-handedness, presenting Lord Krishna as a friend and guide. Anupama concludes that while the film draws from Frank Capra's It's a Wonderful Life and Vikramaditya Motwane's Trapped, it ultimately delivers a universal message about living with grace and generosity.

Suchin Mehrotra reviews Freedom At Midnight Season 2, the concluding chapter of the Nikkhil Advani-directed series based on Dominique Lapierre and Larry Collins's book of the same name. Streaming on SonyLIV, this seven-episode season follows the weeks and months leading up to India's independence, the horrors of Partition, and the challenging period that followed. Suchin finds the second season far stronger and more affecting than its admirable yet emotionally distant predecessor, tackling explosive events from the largest mass migration in human history to the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi.

Suchin highlights the conviction and sophistication in the storytelling, praising the writing team of Abhinandan Gupta, Gundeep Kaur, Adwitiya Kareng Das, Divy Nidhi Sharma, Revanta Sarabhai, and Ethan Taylor, along with DOP Malay Prakash's painstaking frames and Ashutosh Pathak's sensitive score. The performances shine, particularly Rajendra Chawla as a scene-stealing Sardar Patel, Luke McGibney as a surprisingly dimensional Lord Mountbatten, and powerful cameos from Abhishek Banerjee and Anurag Thakur. While Sidhant Gupta's Nehru hits hardest in vulnerable moments and Arif Zakaria's Jinnah risks feeling like a villain, editor Shweta Venkat ensures episodes feel alive through striking montages marrying real-life footage with fiction. Suchin concludes that if this show indicates the calibre of storytelling ahead, there may still be hope for the year.