We recommend: The best new movies and TV series

Editor’s note: An anthology, a feature film about a horrific case, and a new Kunal Kemmu comedy. It is a busy week at the movies. Lust Stories 3 streams on Netflix; Zakir Khan brings his familiar dose of sentimentality with Papa Yaar; Slow Horses is back with a new season. These and much more. 

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Lust Stories 3 (Hindi)

Anthologies, a rage during the pandemic, are no longer quite as hot, but this particular series persists. The third edition, like the past iterations, brings in four filmmakers. Each has a short film with lust occupying centrestage. This time, it is Vishal Bhardwaj, Vikramaditya Motwane, Kiran Rao, and Shakun Batra spearheading the exploration. The films are a varied but consistently impressive look at the closeted emotion. There are friends (Konkona Sen Sharma and Radhika Apte) in largely sexless marriages, a pizza delivery boy and a girl from Kerala (Gurfateh Pirzada and Sana Thampi) exploring each other in a cramped Mumbai flat, a couple (Radhika Madan and Ali Fazal) going through a troubled marriage only to realise that sex is the only language they are fluent in, and in Hyderabad another married couple (Aditi Rao Hydari and Siddharth) are deeply in love but sex is a roadblock. 

The performances are compelling and the films leave a mark. But the one that towers over the rest is Batra’s short, starring Madan and Fazal, that delicately frames resentment in relationships as urban chaos. Few filmmakers do it like him. 

Where to watch: Netflix

Vibe (Hindi)

Kunal Kemmu’s sophomore directorial feature brings everything he has come to be known for—slacker men, drug-addled misadventures, perfectly-timed one-liners—and amps it up. Set in Mumbai, the film revolves around Hardik (Kemmu) and his best friend, Bugs (Sparsh Shrivastava) as they inadvertently get embroiled in a national security crisis and are forced to, well, save the country. What happens till the revelation and soon after might be the most fun time at the movies this year. 

“For the first 90 of its 146 minutes, Vibe is comedy gold. Kemmu trusts himself to bring it, and he does. The initiation of Hardik and Bugs into a genre they want no part of finds the sweet spot between spoofy and slapstick. As a viewer, you’re either laughing or laughing in anticipation of laughing,” raves The Hollywood Reporter. 

Where to watch: Theatres

Daayra (Hindi)

Meghna Gulzar’s latest is a police procedural based on a real-life incident. The filmmaker uses the Hyderabad gang rape and murder incident in 2019, where a woman was gang-raped and the accused were arrested and killed in police custody. Using that as a starting point, the filmmaker presents two viewpoints in the form of two police officers. The fundamental difference between them is their contrarian view on justice. Starring Kareena Kapoor Khan and Prithviraj Sukumaran, the film was widely anticipated since its announcement. 

“Daayra tries to stand apart from other films that valourise police personnel who break the law while claiming to defend it. The 143-minute film takes a high-minded approach, deploying realism, leisurely pacing and understated performances to tackle a foul crime,” a review in Scroll states. 

Where to watch: Theatres

Papa Yaar (Hindi)

Comedian Zakir Khan has perfected the art of mining filial relationships for his stand-ups (think: Tathastu). Although most comedians do that, Khan has cracked the mould by introducing a male fragility to this, making it at once deeply confessional and, well, a tad self-serving. His latest is an extension of the same where he stands before an audience and talks about his father. The merits of his arguments aside, Khan remains compellingly persuasive as a storyteller and that, more than anything else, works in his favour. 

Where to watch: Netflix

The Doll - Netflix (Polish)

This new Polish period drama miniseries is an adaptation of a 19th century novel by Bolesław Prus, The Doll (or Lalka). Polish high society of the 1870s serves as gorgeous backdrop to this story of class and yearning: Izabela Łęcka (Sandra Drzymalska) is an aristocrat who’d much rather be a writer; Stanisław Wokulski (Tomasz Schuchardt) is a merchant who’s come into big money via some semi-nefarious means. He’s obsessed with breaking into the noble class, and he’s obsessed with Izabela. Critics have praised the performances and the response to the show overall has been largely positive; writes Decider: “The Doll holds some promise that it’ll have a lot more for viewers than the standard boddice-ripping period dramas have had of late. But it certainly takes the show’s writers a long time to get to something interesting.” 

Where to watch: Netflix

Best of the Best (English)

Maitreyi Ramakrishnan, who had a breakout performance on Netflix’s Never Ever Have I, stars as Maya in this new comedy directed by Lena Khan (with comedians Hasan Minhaj and Prashanth Venkataramanujam the scriptwriters), alongside Priyanka Kedia (Anjali). The two besties join the college Bollywood dance club which they want to completely redefine. And then they face off against other rival Bollywood dance clubs from other American colleges. It’s all very fun (and formulaic), reminiscent of pleasant college comedies with female friendship at their heart, with the added bonus of some Bollywood choreo thrown in. While there are familiar tropes and plot points here, Best of the Best, according to The New York Times, “finds moments of quiet sensitivity that give the film its own voice. Kedia and Ramakrishnan effortlessly bring years of a relationship to life, with Ramakrishnan especially magnetic in scenes where Maya’s confident facade cracks.”

Where to watch: Netflix

You+Me - Against the World (French)  

Emma Green’s ‘Toi + Moi” (You + Me) bestselling romance novel trilogy makes its way to the screen with this new show about two young classmates who, despite being polar opposites, somehow find their way to each other. Alma Lancaster is a good girl with a knack for filmmaking, facing family pressure to study law. Vadim Arcadi, on the other hand, is her mysterious classmate who carries around a cloud of rumours—dark ones, too. A class project brings the two together, setting us up for the perfect young adult romance trope. A great option for fans of YA romance, enemies-to-lovers stories, and a classic good-girl-bad-boy trope.

Where to watch: Prime Video

Fresh off the big screen

Mile End Kicks (English)

Barbie Ferrera stars as Grace, a music critic, who leaves her toxic, abusive workplace and moves to Montreal in an attempt to uproot her life and finally write something she cares about—to be specific, a book about Alanis Morisette’s era-defining album, Jagged Little Pill. She moves into Mile End, a neighbourhood in Montreal, and is confronted with adventures and dilemmas galore as she tries to live out her 20-somethings with passion. This movie is writer-director Caroline Levack’s second feature, and it hits the right notes at the right time, laying bare what it feels like to be a woman in the creative industry, and how sometimes the smartest people can make the dumbest decisions.

Katie Rife writes in IndieWire:

Ferreira is a believable and sympathetic protagonist, bringing a vulnerability to Grace that makes the viewer root for her even as she blows up her life for reasons even she doesn’t seem to understand. She wants to be a critic, but she also desperately wants to be liked. The tension between those modes is gendered, as Grace recognizes when she finally writes something that she believes in late in the film.

Where to watch: Prime Video

Modha Rathiri (Tamil)

Arranged marriages can make for a good comedic premise. Raja Karuppasamy’s directorial debut dives into this headlong. His film revolves around two strangers (Rishikanth and Anishma Anilkumar) who are supposed to get married, and much of the fun arises from the chaos that ensues. Unfolding in the course of one night, the film is a charming addition to a landscape that is increasingly being clogged with similar themes of masculinity. 

“Raja leaves you with a couple of thoughts — empathy alone matters in life, there is nothing a good conversation will not solve, and love does happen. Go watch!,” insists a review in The News Minute.

Where to watch: Netflix 

Thudakkam (Malayalam)

This martial arts action thriller is about a woman whose life is upended when her stalker makes an entrance. Directed by Jude Anthany Joseph, the film stars Mohanlal's daughter, Vismaya Mohanlal (even the superstar makes a cameo), and does well in re-telling a familiar revenge tale with familiar tropes. The inherent messaging in this female empowerment tale is basic: women must learn to protect themselves. And while that feels superficial, the easy action sequences do most of the heavy-lifting. 

Where to watch: JioHotstar

One more chapter

Slow Horses Season 6 (English)

One of the best things about Slow Horses is that it’s freakishly consistent. At a time when fans are made to wait years for a new season of a show they love, Slow Horses diligently churns out a new season (or series) every six months or so. You can always count on the show. . But with such output, you’re also risking an overfamiliarity and dwindling rewards for the casual viewer. Such is the case this time for this Brit spy thriller about a group of loser spies who, somehow, keep finding themselves in the midst of the most explosive global political disasters. Gary Oldman, as the sloppy and often obnoxious Jackson Lamb, is still brilliant (just about), but overall the show seems to be running out of steam a bit. It’s still “slick and confident enough”, according to The Guardian, but it doesn’t quite have the sparkle of its early seasons. 

The main issue, though, is the plot, which boils down to a long chase. The killers keep coming and the slow horses, mainly River, chaotically run away – which often requires the murderers to suddenly become incompetent in order for the story not to end prematurely.

Where to watch: AppleTV