OTTplay Reviews: Scoop, Spider-Verse, School Of Lies

Scoop Broadcasts The Cost Of Being A Female Journalist

This is #CriticalMargin, where Ishita Sengupta gets contemplative over new Hindi films and shows. Today: Scoop.

Dir: Hansal Mehta

Cast: Karishma Tanna

Stream on: Netflix

WHEN a senior male crime reporter is shot dead, a female reporter gets arrested. She is accused by the cops of supplying vital information about her professional rival, the slain journalist, to a wanted criminal. As police investigations continue, a can of worms open up. She was favoured by her ‘sources’, comprising people from both sides of the law. Media reports chronicle more revelations: she had a way with things; her dauntless ambition translated into a prematurely successful career. Her colleagues share that her male boss unfairly indulged her, which reflected in the many front-page bylines she had. On the heels of this, when the same man writes an op-ed expressing solidarity with his protégée, rumours of their intimacy gain steam. What other reason could there be? How else did a woman run in a world largely trodden by men?

MORE REVIEWS

Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse Goes Where No Marvel Feature Has Before

Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse goes where very few animated adventures have gone before. It’s a sublime and surprisingly mature sequel in the way it confronts more pressing questions about the fatigue of modern superhero content. (That is really what the multiverse represents, doesn’t it? A crowded landscape where all of them seem to be linked to each other by commercial identity alone. Now imagine them wondering how to be more than just the brainchild of comic-book writers across eras). In a way, this is the first film that addresses the creative bankruptcy of the Marvel-remake revolution — or the global trend of rebooting the same superheroes across comic-book volumes, decades and franchises.

— RAHUL DESAI

Read more
Playing in: Theatres

School Of Lies: The Story Of A Lost Child Becomes A Tale Of Lost Childhoods

Filmmaker Avinash Arun Dhaware has a penchant for seeing kids for how they are: whimsical, wise, silly. He also has a gift of seeing them for what they are: susceptible beings wanting to belong. His intimate debut feature Killa (2014) is a tender portrait of a young boy who comes to live in a small Konkan village from Pune. His father has just died and his mother has been transferred. As the film unfolds, he takes to the place after being taken to by his new-found friends in school. For his recent long-form outing School Of Lies, Dhaware goes back to the start. He evokes a familiar need for belonging but does so to inspect its lack. This time around, his story starts with the news of a lost child and he uses it as a premise to explore a larger theme: the loss of childhood.

— I.S.

Stream on: Disney+ Hotstar

Zara Hatke...: Luv Ranjan Called, He Wants His Script Back

For the second time this year, the female protagonist in a Hindi film, traditionally a thematic punching bag and a narrative minority, is disciplined for desiring a better life. Also for the second time, that desire of hers is presented as the antithesis to an otherwise perfect family set-up headlined by a man. In quick succession, two male filmmakers woke up one morning and decided to pour out all their misogyny into a pot, stirring it with lurid humour, to make “family entertainers” which are by men, for men and of men. Laxman Utekar’s Zara Hatke Zara Bachke picks up right where Ranjan had left it with Tu Jhoothi Main Makkaar, a film that should be watched — only if one really has to — in Reels.

— I.S.

Playing in: Theatres

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