Review of Double Feluda

Sandip Ray's #DoubleFeluda is different from any other regular Feluda movies and there is a particular reason. It is actually a celebration of completion of long fifty years of Feluda. That is why it is a film where the word Feluda has been used in the title itself and also for the fans it has not one rather two stories in two halves. These two stories are "Samaddarer Chabi" and "Golakdhaam Rahasya".

Apart from these two stories there are some additional features for the fans like the opening credit showing the original textbook snapshots from different popular Feluda stories which will bring back all the memories of reading the books. The end credit is a journey through the memories of Feluda movies where the cast and crew members shares there experience working with Satyajit Ray on Feluda movies.

Coming back to the movie both the stories are from the beginning stage of Feluda stories where there was no presence of Jatayu. Diehard fans will surely miss this inseparable character of Feluda stories.

For those who have not read the stories, “Samaddarer Chabi” is a story of Radharaman

Samaddar, a musical instrument collector who dies out of heart disease and while dying he lefts a clue about where he has kept al his savings, to his nephew Manimohan Samaddar (Bratya Basu). Manimohan hires Feluda to solve the mystery from the parting words of his uncle. “Golakdham Rahasya” is a story about a scientist Nihar Ranjan Dutta (Dhritiman Chatterjee) who was doing a research in US but his path breaking research stopped when he met with an accident and lost his eyes. After this accident he returns to India and starts living with his family. One day someone stoles his unfinished research work papers, that brings Feluda in the picture to solve this crime. The case gets more complicated when one of the two tenants of the house got killed.    

Sandip Ray has a unique style of film making where he keeps his storytelling very simple. He transforms Feluda stories to contemporary times without doing much changes to the original story as a result the look and feel remains the same as of the time period of the original text. Even now Feluda believes more on Sidhu Jyatha rather than Google. These things help to give the old age charm of the original stories.

Sabyasachi Chakraborty has played the character of Feluda on screen for the maximum time and he has succeeded to match our expectations every time. There is no doubt so far he is

the best suited Feluda on screen. When he confirmed to step into the shoes of Feluda once again after giving the opportunity to Abir Chatterjee for one movie, there were many doubts to many people, like Sabyasachi Chakraborty is growing old and he is looking aged. But on a surprising note with perfect make up and a better body language Sabyasachi has managed to overcome those shortcomings.As Topshe, Saheb Bhattacharya has nothing much to do and he is just okay.

Among the supporting cast everyone has done full justification with their characters. Special mention should be given for Saswata Chatterjee,Paran Bandopadhyay and Dhritiman Chatterjee. They have very less screen time but they have managed to leave impression wonderfully.

Finally it can be said, in the movie #DoubleFelua, every possible signature style of Feluda movies are present. Feluda is a nostalgic emotion to most of us and for those will be a better idea than watching the movie, to celebrate glorious fifty years of this emotional journey. Please note do not miss the opening and end credits of the films. These two sections are dedicated to all the Feluda fans there.

Review of Bengali film Antarleen

You must have heard movies based on mix genre like romantic-comedy or horror-sex movies but have you ever thought of an emotional murder mystery, #Antarleen is exactly that mix of basic human emotion related to the pain of being lonely, at the same time it is a whodunit murder mystery.

It starts with a small teaser of a suicide which sets the mood of a thriller but soon after that it shifts a lighter mood. Many tourists from different places of India are going to the hill station Kasouli. There are variety of people with different motives like Kolkata Crime Branch’s senior officer Aniket Sanyal (Kharaj Mukherjee) who is going to Kasouli just for a vacation to overcome the pain of his wife’s demise, then there is Dutta family, a Bengali family from Gurgaon who are on a vacation for a weather change for their ailing mother (Mamata Shankar) who is on medication. There is Bidushi Mukherjee (Sampurna Lahiri) who is on a vacation for a mood change after having some problems in her professional life. Not all are there just for holiday there is Prof Swami (Biswajit Sarkar) who has some personal work there and also there is Anupama Jaiswal ,a trustee of convent school, who is just forced to be there with her Driver Mahendra as their car have some problem during their journey from Amritsar to Shimla. All these people stayed in a same lodge “Blossoms” and spend a good time in their first evening but everything takes a new turn when one of them gets killed in the first night itself. After this point it turns into a murder mystery and Aniket Sanyal who was there just for a vacation has to come back on his duty as an investigation officer of this murder, on request of the local police. Later he is also joined by Bidushi as an assistant who is also a narcotics dept officer. While doing their investigation they come to know about some local residents who are also connected with some of the in mates of the lodge and they also discover that everyone there in the lodge have some secrets with them.

A murder mystery should have two qualities; it should have pace and it should keep the suspense intact till the end. The film fails in the first department, it is not a fast paced film, rather it is lazy with full of emotional scenes which seems to be irrelevant. Though it fails to maintain pace but yes it has maintained the suspense till the end. You can guess it partially few minutes before the climax but still you cannot guess the total truth. The good thing is at end when the mystery unfolds it gives the required shock value and it will also justify the emotional moments which were appearing irrelevant earlier.

Director Arindam Bhattacharya has chosen an unconventional subject for his debut and has handled it quite well. In one movie he has proved he is good in handling both emotional scenes as well as a thriller. Though there is scope of improvement but still we should give him credit for his good attempt.

There is a mix of actors with some seasoned actors and some not so known faces. Some have done good job and some are not so convincing but overall it is a good ensemble cast.

Kharaj Mukherjee normally keeps us entertaining in his comic roles but here he has get a chance to do something different. We hardly have seen him in a lead role that too as a detective and he has done it very well. He has maintained the required smartness and poise for his character. There is one emotional scene where he is remembering his wife and he is too good in that scene. As an addition to that there is one song too in his voice.

Mamata Shankar is very natural as a lonely grandmother. Her emotions looks so real on screen, we wish to see her more on screen. She too has sung a sweet Rabindra sangeet and it is lovely to hear her voice. Biswajit Sarkar is very impressive as the Tamil professor, he has really worked hard on his Tamil accent and it sounds perfect. Sampurna Lahiri has got an important role to play after a long time but sadly she could not utilise it fully. There is no continuity in her performance in some scenes she is good in some she disappoints. Rest of the cast is jut okay.

Among the technical team one man deserves the maximum credit and he is the cinematographer, he has captured the beautiful valleys of Kasouli wonderfully. After watching it you will definitely like to go there for an outing. Also the nigh sequences have been shot with perfect lighting. The sound design is also an integral part of a thriller and it is perfect. Ratul Shankar who is a not a regular to Bengali movies have done good job with the music and background score.

On final thoughts, it can be said that it is not an edge of the seat thriller but it is a good attempt to make a thriller with some human emotions mixed with it.  It is a refreshing film that will give you a satisfactory experience.

Review of Dear Zindagi

It's a very common situation that a new director makes his or her debut with a wonderful film with small budget and almost no stars then they got back up from big houses for their second outing and with the glamour and glitter of big budget and stars they finally lost the main ingredient the story which was their USP. Thankfully director Gauri Shinde has not been victim of this temptation. After winning everyone's heart with small but impressive film #EnglishVinglish she got backed up by Karan Johar as a producer and she also managed to afford big stars like Shahrukh Khan and Alia Bhatt. But fortunately she did not get carried away with all these rather she focused to tell a heart touching story which can connect with the audiences for its simplicity and authentic presentation.

It is a story of a young girl Kaira (Alia Bhatt) who is suffering from many mental disorders

just like any other modern girl of her age. She is insecure about her career as a cinematographer; she is unable to settle in a relationship. In addition to that she is going through the baggage of a disturbed childhood which affects her relationship with her parents. She is totally clueless with what to do with her life when she gets in touch with her DD (Dimaag Ka Doctor) Jehangir Khan aka Jug (Shahrukh Khan) who is a therapist for mental illness. Jug makes Kaira realize that how beautiful life can be and how we make it more complicated and painful. 

The story is very refreshing so is the screenplay though some people may find it a bit long. In the beginning it took little more than required time to introduce the main protagonist and her lifestyle but after almost 50 minutes once the therapy sessions between Dr. Khan and Kaira begins then you won't find any dull moment. And while saying about the story we must be thankful to the makers for bringing up such an important but mostly neglected topic of our society that is to be careful of our mental health. There is nothing to be shy to get open about mental illness and taking help of a specialist for that.

As a director Gauri Shinde is a genius, she has proved her calibre with her debut in

#EnglishVinglish and this time she has proved that it was not a onetime fluke rather it is her genuine talent. The best thing about her story telling is the simplicity which helps it to connect easily with the audiences and make it believable on screen. At this age of film making where every other filmmaker is in a race to enter in some 100cr clubs, Gauri Shinde still believes the story is the real hero of the film, not the larger than life production values. Also choosing Goa as the backdrop is commendable as this is a place which has not been used much in Hindi movies so it has given a fresh feel to it.

All the actors have been cast perfectly and the best has been delivered by none other thanAlia Bhatt. After #Highway it will be her second best role in her career. She is so natural in all her scene that you will feel sympathetic to her when she is sad and feel happy when she is happy. Her body language, style, talking everything is very much apt for her character which is of a modern day ambitious girl. In the emotional scene where she tells about her childhood she is just brilliant.

After #Fan once again Shahrukh Khan is playing a character which is very different from his romantic image of Rajs and Rahuls. Shahrukh Khan is always very impressive when he

gives advice someone in her public appearances and as Dr. Khan you will get that reflection in his acting. It is actually a supporting role and in spite of being a big star still he has chosen to do a supporting role to a much junior actresses, it shows how hungry he is for good roles as an actor. All his dialogues will impress you and even when he has no dialogue when he is just listening to Alia's character he is perfect in those scenes too with his reactions. And finally no matter he is romancing a girl on screen or not he always looks charming and adorable.

Among the supporting cast first we should talk about the guys who have been cast as Alia's boyfriend at different stages. The casting for these boys have been done very cleverly choosing actors who are good and charming but not so regular in movies so it would not have been very difficult to make them agree to do this small  roles and it has also helped to limit the budget. It’s very refreshing to see Kunal Kapoor on screen after a long time. He is good in his role. Ali Zafar has less time to perform than singing and when it comes to singing he is always good. Angad Bedi is good in one scene appearance.

Among the girls both Ira Duvet and Yashaswini R Dayama are fantastic as Kaira's best friends. Especially Ira Dubey is so good we wish to see her more.

Amit Trivedi's music is always different  but sounds good and here too there is no exception. #LoveYouZindagi is a very nice soulful track which will be with you even after the movie. #TuHiHai and #GoToHell are good songs and have been used well in the movie. The background score by Trivedi again is nice and soothing and maintains pace with the story.

Cinematographer Laxman Utekar has captured the natural beauty of Goa wonderfully. It is not the crowded beach side parties rather the calm and peaceful side of Goa. 

Overall it is a well made film which will surely connect with you. Watch it for the superb storytelling and brilliant performances. And also watch it to support the issue which it has addressed that is being healthy mentally which the need of the hour is. 

Winners of 23rd Annual Star Screen Awards 2016

Winners of 23rd Annual Star Screen Awards 2016

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Best Film

Pink

Best Director
Ram Madhvani – Neerja

Best Actor
Amitabh Bachchan – Pink

Best Actress
Alia Bhatt – Udta Punjab⁠

Critics Choice For Best Actor
Sushant Singh Rajput – M.S. Dhoni – The Untold Story

Critics Choice For Best Actress
Swara Bhaskar – Nil Battey Sannata

Best Supporting Actor 
Rishi Kapoor – Kapoor & sons

Best Supporting Actress
Shabana Azmi – Neerja

Best Actor In A Comic Role
Varun Dhawan – Dishoom

Best Child Artist
Riya Shukla – Nil Battey Sannata

Debut Awards

Most promising Debut Director
Tinu Suresh Desai – Rustom⁠

Best Newcomer (Male)

Jim Sarbh – Neerja
Harshvardhan Kapoor – Mirzya

Best Newcomer (Female)
Disha Patani – M.S. Dhoni – The Untold Story

Music Awards

Best Lyricist
Amitabh Bhattacharya – Ae Dil Hai Mushkil

Best Music
Pritam Chakraborty – Ae Dil Hai Mushkil

Best Playback Singer (Male)
Amit Mishra – Bulleya (Ae Dil Hai Mushkil)

Best Playback Singer (Female)
Palak Muchhal – Kaun Tujhe (M.S. Dhoni – The Untold Story)

Technical Awards

Best Choreography
Bosco-Caesar – Kala Chashma (Baar Baar Dekho)

Best Editing
Aditya Bannerji – Pink

Best Cinematography
Anay Goswami – Fitoor

Best Action
Jai Singh Nijjar – Shivaay

Best Story Screenplay
Saiwyn Quadras – Neerja

Best Dialogue
Ritesh Shah – Pink

Review of Thammar Boyfriend

#ThammarBoyfriend the title of the movie itself is very funny but the question is whether the movie too is that funny or not? The answer will be, it has comic moments but it could have been funnier. It is a comic take on a serious social issue that is ignoring elderly people in family and we are thankful to director Anindya Ghosh for bringing up such an important topic.

The movie is about Thamma , grandmother Nandini (Savitri Chatterjee) who is an old aged, wealthy  widow who lives a lonely life in a remote area. She has a big family having son (Biswajit Chakraborty), daughter (Sudipa Basu), son-in-law (Supriyo Dutta), daughter in law (Dolon Roy) and three grand children but no one lives with her. Even when she becomes seriously ill, no one comes to meet her or help her. In such a situation one day her son and daughter get a letter saying their mother is planning to remarry as she has found a new boyfriend (Abir Chatterjee). This shocking news brings the whole family to thamma as they are scared to lose all the property as a new man has entered in thamma’s life. The rest of the movie goes how the family members try to break up the romantic relationship of thamma and her boyfriend Partho.

The screenplay is very much one directional and nothing much happens, so after a point it

starts looking monotonous which is not a good sign. There are funny moments but there could have been more comedy. The dialogues too lack the punch required for comedy.

The screenplay does not take much time to introduce thamma and her boyfriend to the whole family, after that for rest of the film all the family members keep planning to separate them but sadly they do not take much effort to execute their plans, except for Rini (Arunima Ghosh) the elder grand daughter who tries to trap Partho making him fall in love with her.  Though the film’s length is only 2 hours but still towards end it seems it has been dragged for long because of lack of engaging moments. After a point the romantic track between Partho and Rini has been given more importance which has sidelined other family members.

Though it has been promoted as a comedy but rather than comedy, the emotional moments where family members realizes how they have neglected the elderly woman is more appealing. In spite of all these short comings we cannot stop praising the makers for bringing up an important issue to give love and care to the older members of our family.

As a director Anindya Ghosh has chosen a good subject but he has failed to execute it as the screenplay is weak and the characters are very cliche.

Savitri Chatterjee is no doubt a good actress but the she is a miscast here as the required

naughtiness is missing in her acting. Her comic timing is not bang on. Especially the costumes and make up looks too flashy on her and she looks very uncomfortable in those. As her boyfriend Partho, Abir Chatterjee is very natural and looks charming for whom every girl can fall in love. He has done good acting but sadly he had not much to do except for few emotional scenes with Arunima. Arunima Ghosh is in excellent form. In the crowd of actors doing loud attempt to do comedy her acting is very natural and convincing.

Both Supriyo Dutta and Biswajit Chakraborty are good actors but here they have played very cliché characters and they have done full on loud acting, their comedy does not look effortless. Dolon Roy is okay and Sudipa Basu is good in her limited scope. Lama has done good job as the Punjabi driver. He has limited scenes but he will make you laugh with his comic timing.

Over all it is movie which you can enjoy with your whole family.  It is a good attempt to give an important lesson to us that is to love and care elderly people. You can watch it once and take your grandparents too with you.

Update of Bengali Movies in the Third Quarter of 2016

The third quarter of 2016 was quite good in terms of business as well as good movies, specially the month of August which had two big hits.
Let's look back at this quarter and have month wise recap.

July

July is the month of Eid and since last few years Tollywood producers are eyeing at it to release their movies. This year on Eid it was the biggest clash of this year; Eskay Movies vs Shree Venkatesh Films, Jeet vs Dev, Action vs Comedy, #BadshahTheDon vs #KelorKirti.

#BadshahTheDon

It was Jeet starer action drama, a south Indian remake directed by Baba Yadav and Abdul Aziz. It was a joint production of India’s Eskay movies and Bangladesh’s Jazz Multimedia.It had actors from both side of Bengal. The leading lady was Bangladeshi actress Nusrat Faria, also there was Indian actress Shraddha Das. Also it featured Mahesh Manjerekar from Mumbai as the lead villain. The movie was just an average masala entertainer with dramatic punch lines, stylish action sequences and massy music. These types of commercial films are not doing that well now a days and this movie too was not an exception. Still it managed to be a crowd puller in small centres and it get good response in Bangladesh too because of the presence of local actors. The songs like “Piya Tore Bina” and “Dhat Tereki” were very popular among its target audience.

#KelorKirti It was a scene by scene remake of Bollywood adult comedy #NoEntry and that was the

biggest weak point of this film as the original one is already over exposed on TV. This one was a multi starer and the main highlight was Jisshu Sengupta's comeback to mainstream commercial cinema after a long time. Another added attraction was Dev in an extended cameo as a Casanova. Jisshu did a good job with fine comic timing and he was ably supported by Mimi Chakraborty who was playing his on screen wife. There was Nushrat too in a sexy avatar grooving her body to the tunes of “Item Bomb”. But all these could not help this to be a good entertainer. There were several reasons like it was a remake of a hugely popular Hindi movie so there was nothing new for the audiences. Also comedy movies hardly have any market in Bengali commercial cinema, it was too massy for urban audience and for small centres it was less spicy as there were no heavy dialogue or action scenes. Overall this movie became flop in final run.

Apart from this big clash there was one another significant release in this month and it was #Khwato

#Khwato It was an erotic thriller directed by Kamaleshwar Mujherjee and produced by Venkatesh

Films. It was about a passionate poet and his muse played by Prasenjit Chatterjee and Paoli Dam respectively. The movie was one of rare bold films of Bengali cinema not just because of the bold sex scenes rather because of the bold lead characters who are too open to admit their sexual needs. This movie showcased some wonderful performance by Prasenjit Chatterjee, Paoli Dam, Rahul Banerjee. Special credit should be given for Prasenjit for taking this challenging character with grey shades. It was a different concept but was somewhere lost in execution. The movie had potential to leave its mark but sadly finally it remained just a movie about extra marital affair nothing more. As expected at ticket windows its performance was very poor.

August

It's very rare that three big Bengali releases coming in one month that too without any festive season, but that rare scenario had happened in August.
There were three back to back big releases and surprisingly all three were thrillers. Among these three, two were big hits.

#Hemanta This was one long cherished dream of Anjan Dutta to adapt Shakespeare's revenge drama Hamlet. Anjan Dutta had adapted his story in a contemporary setup in today's Kolkata. It

had a wonderful ensemble cast featuring talented actors like Parambrata Chatterjee, Jisshu Sengupta, Shaswata Chatterjee, Gargee Roychoudhury, Payel Sarkar in the lead roles. All of them had done wonderful acting. It had an interesting premise, the characters had been transformed from play to movie keeping their basic emotions intact but somewhere the screenplay failed to transform the play into a movie script. Also towards the end the story was too hurried to finish. All these shortcomings affected the film's performance people rejected it and it failed badly.

#GoyendaShaborEaglerChokh Last year director Arindam Sil had surprised everyone with his slick stylish thriller

#EbarShabor, this time he was back with the second instalment of Shabor Series. Once again it was based on a Shirshendu Mukhopadhyay story, a murder mystery set in today's Kolkata. It was a story revolving around a young guy who is going through a mental trauma after a childhood tragic incident and many female characters around him among them many were sexually attracted to the guy. Shaswata Chatterjee once again did an excellent job as detective Shabor Dashgupta. Among the others it was theatre actor Anirban Bhattacharya in the central character who did a superb job and grabbed everyone's attention. Among the girls Jaya Ahsaan and debutante Riya Bank gave a remarkable performance. The first part of Shabor Series was a big hit and the second one continued that trend. It got a big opening and kept doing excellent business for many weeks. Even after six weeks it's still going strong at theatres. So far it is the second big hit of this year after #Praktan.

#SahebBibiGolaamIt was critic turned director Pratim D Gupta's second directorial venture. Since the first teaser had been released there was enough curiosity for the film. The bold and edgy thriller

had grabbed eyeballs not only in Bengal rather it had got positive feedback from many celebrities from Bollywood too. As a director Pratim D Gupta’s directorial debut was almost unnoticed but this time he was back with full energy and a wonderful cast which consists names like Anjan Dutta, Swastika Mujherjee, Ritwick Chakraborty, Parno Mitra. It was an interesting story about a contact killer , a bore housewife and a taxi driver whose lives gets interconnected with each other in a surprising twist. It was an interesting as well as refreshing story. Another good point about the film was it had raised string voice against social injustice and crime against women and this point helped it more to get connected with the audiences.The music by Anupam Roy was very melodious, the songs like “Mon Bhalo Nei” and “Tomar Ki Naam” were very popular. This movie had to struggle a lot with censor board for its bold contents which had delayed its release date, but the audience were mature enough to accept the bold contents. It got a bumper opening which was not expected at all and continued to run well at theatres for next few weeks.

September

The month of September had not much big releases. The only significant release was Shree Venkatesh Films production #LoveExpress.

#LoveExpress

This was a romantic comedy featuring Dev and Nusrat as the lead pair alongside few regular character actors of commercial Bengali movies. This movie was Dev's first solo release of this year so his fans were very excited. But the excitement does not made a huge impact on its box office performance. It did only average business at the box office. The music of this film was very popular; it marked the comeback for very popular music composer Jeet Ganguly who is not that regular in Bengali movies these days. The songs like "Mon Bolchhe Amar”, "Dhitang Dhitang" and "Majhe Majhe" were very popular among the mass. 

Apart from that there was #KiritiOKalobhramor featuring Indraneil Sengupta as detective Kiriti. It was the on screen debut of famous Seluth character Kiriti. This movie was a average one, both Indraneil and Kaushik Sen in a negative character were effective. But sadly Kiriti did not get positive feedback from viewers unlike the other Seluths like Byomkesh, Feluda or Kakababu.

The third quarter was not that bad but the now we are hopeful with the last quarter of the year. This one has the biggest releases on this Puja and then in Christmas. Hope it will be the best part of the year.

Best Film of Quarter 3 2016

• Eagler Chokh
• Saheb Bibi Golaam

Best Directors of Quarter 3 2016

• Arindam Sil - Eagler Chokh
• Pratim D Gupta - Saheb Bibi Golaam

 Best Actors of Quarter 3 2016

• Prasenjit Chatterjee - Khwato
• Shashwata Chatterjee - Eagler Chokh/Hemanta
• Parambrata Chatterjee - Hemanta
• Rahul Banerjee - Khwato
• Anirban Bhattacharya - Eagler Chokh
• Jishu Sengupta - Hemanta/Kelor Kirti
• Sagnik Chattrerjee- Hemanta
• Shubhra Saurav Das - Hemanta
• Vikram Chatterjee - Saheb Bibi Golaam
• Ritwick Chakraborty - Saheb Bibi Golaam
• Anjan Dutta - Saheb Bibi Golaam

Best Actresses of Quarter 3 2016

• Paoli Dam - Khwato
• Jaya Ahsan - Eagler Chokh
• Mimi Chakraborty - Kelor Kirti
• Gargee Roychowdhury - Hemanta
• Swastika Mukherjee - Saheb Bibi Golaam
• Raima Sen - Khwato
• Payel Sarkar - Eagler Chokh/Hemanta
• Riya Banik - Eagler Chokh
• Parno Mitra - Saheb Bibi Golaam

Update of Bollywood Movies in the 3rd Quarter of 2016

The third quarter of this year was the biggest one so far because it had one Salman Khan Release on Eid. Also it witnessed another 100 cr hit from Akshay Kumar and surprise hit which proved the power of good content.
Let's do a quick recap of Q3 2016.

July
The month of July is the month of Eid and it is dedicated to Bhaijaan Salman Khan.

Continuing this trend, this Eid, he gave his fans #Sultaan, this year's biggest hit so far. This Yashraaj Films production was about the love story of a wrestler. Salman Khan did a superb job as a Haryanvi wrestler and he was ably supported by Anushka Sharma as the leading lady. This movie get an excellent opening day collection of 36 cr and a first week of huge 180 cr. Later it continued to rule the box office for many weeks and that leads it to become the third entry in 300cr club. It is Salman Khan's second big hit so far after #BajrangiBhaijaan.
When a Salman Khan movie releases no other big films comes in that season so there were no other big movies for next two weeks. In last

Friday of July there was another significant release and it was #Dishoom, a light hearted masala entertainer with a solid dose of action, comedy and a hit song. The movie featured John Abraham and Varun Dhawan and together they create solid impact. Then there was the glamour girl Jacqueline Fernandez grooving to the hit song #SauTarahKe. It also marked the comeback of talented actor Akshaye Khanna. Then there some added attraction in form of solid cameo by Akshay Kumar, Nargis Fakri and Parineeti Chopra. This movie was not a great one but it was a good time pass and it earned around 70cr in its lifetime which made it an average earner at box office.


August
In the month of August there was a long weekend for the holiday on 15th August and two big

movies released together on this occasion Akshay Kumar's #Rustom and Hrithik Roshan's #MohenjoDaro. This was one big face off of this year and all were excited to know the final result of this face off. Considering the popularity of Akshay Kumar in recent past it was quite clear #Rustom will lead the race in opening weekend but trade analysts were hopeful from Hrithik Roshan too. But when the movies released #Rustom got the expected response at ticket windows but #MohenjoDaro failed badly. Neither critic not audience came by its side. People rejected this periodic love story featuring Hrithik Roshan and debutante Pooja Hedge. On the other hand Akshay Kumar's

courtroom drama #Rustom did not get a thumbs up from the critics but it was a massive hit. Once again Akshay Kumar proved his star power giving his third 100cr film of the year with a lifetime collection of around 127 cr.
Apart from this big clash on Independence Day weekend, there was a small film made with a very small budget which became a sleeper hit. It was Anand L Rai’s production #HappyBhagJayegi featuring Abhay Deol, Jimmy Shergil, Diana Penty and Ali Fazal in the lead roles. It was a comedy about a runaway bride who landed herself in Pakistan by mistake. This movie get good response much better than expected and it earned around 28 cr in its lifetime which is too big for such small budget film.

September
The month of September started with a weaker note with few back to back flops Sonakshi sinha's action drama #Akira and Karan Johar's production #BaarBaarDekho which was a

love story with a time travel twist and Emraan Hashmi starer #RaazReboot.
The big film of this month came in the third week and it was #Pink. A small movie made with a very small budget and almost no stars apart from Amitabh Bachchan. But this movie proved that content is the real hero of any movie, if the content is powerful and it has been told skill fully then the film will find its audience no matter how small is the opening. This movies business kept growing with each day with positive feedback and strong word of mouth publicity. The movie had a opening day collection of just 4cr which later turned into 21cr after first weekend and around 35cr after first week. This movie just did not make it big at the box office but it made a solid impact in our society too with its strong message about how to respect a woman. The performances by each and everyone were praiseworthy. This movie is still going strong in its third week with a collection of around 60cr so far.

There was another well made film about women empowerment in the rural areas of Rajashthan, it was the movie #Parched. It had some solid performances by three leading ladies but unfortunately the movie did not get much needed publicity and remain almost unnoticed.
On the last day of this quarter, another big movie came in theaters #MSDhoniTheUntoldStory. It is the biopic of one of the most loved captain of Indian cricket team Mahendra Singh Dhoni. It was one of the most eagerly awaited movies of this year and it proved with a bumper opening. It is doing a solid business and hopefully it will be one big hit but we can discuss more about it in next quarter.

Overall the third quarter was very good and now we are eagerly waiting for the big releases of the last quarter of the year. There are biggies like Ajay Devgan's #Shivaay, Karan Johar's romantic film #AeDilHaiMushkil featuring Ranbir Kapoor, Aishwarya Rai Bachchan ,Anushka Sharma. Then there is Shahrukh Khan and Alia Bhatt's #DearZindagi , Aditya Chopra's next #Befikre , featuring Ranveer Singh and finally Amir Khan starer #Dangal. Hope the last quarter will be even better.

Best Film of Q3 2016

• Pink
• MSDhoni The Untold Story
• Parched

Best Director of Q3 2016

• Aniruddha RoyChoudhury - Pink
• Neeraj Pandey - MSDhoni The Untold Story
• Leena Yadav - Parched

Best Actor of Q3 2016

• Salman Khan - Sultan
• Akshay Kumar - Rustom
• Hrithik Roshan - Mohenjo Daro
• Abhay Deol - Happy Bhag Jayegi
• Amitabh Bachhan - Pink
• Nawazuddin Siddiqui - Freaky Ali
• Shushant Singh Rajput - MSDhoni The Untold Story
• Varun Dhawan - Dishoom
• Piyush Mishra - Happy Bhag Jayegi/Pink
• Akshaye Khanna - Dishoom
• Anuraag Kashyap - Akira

Best Actress of Q3 2016

• Anushka Sharma - Sultan
• Tapasee Pannu - Pink
• Sonakshi Sinha - Akira
• Tanishtha Chatterjee - Parched
• Radhika Apte - Parched
• Surveen Chawla - Parched
• Momal Sheikh - Happy Bhag Jayegi
• Kirti Kulhari - Pink

Top Songs of Q3 2016

• Sultan/ Jag Ghoomeya/ Baby Ko Base Pasand Hai - Sultaan
• Tere Sang Yaara - Rustom
• Toota Jo Kabhi Tara - A Flying Jatt
• Kaala Chashma/ Sau Asmaan - Baar Baar Dekho
• Lo Maan Liya - Raaz Reboot
• Besabriyaan - M S Dhoni The Untold Story