Weekend

Friends, year 2018 is ending in few days, so on the last weekend of this year, my today’s  blog will have feature on Bollywood and I am writing about few best films of 2018. The films, which I am listing below in random order, may or may not be commercially very successful films:

1. Andhadhun- directed by Shreeram Raghvan, it is a crime thriller starring Ayushman Khurana, Tabu, Raadhika Apte & Anil Dhavan. A supposedly blind pianist witnesses a murder, and what happens next is to be seen and till end viewers are kept in suspense what will happen next. Splendid acting by Tabu and Ayushman. A success at box office.
2. Badhai Ho – directed by Amit Sharma. A middle aged wife gets pregnant, along with her husband they announce the news to their 2 sons & husband’s mother. The elder son who is working and is going steady with his girl friend and younger one is still studying in school. How the family, especially sons cope up with this news, and come to terms with reality is the crux of the film. Wonderful performance by Neena Gupta & Gajraj Rao as parents and Ayushman Khurana as elder son and Sanya Malhotra as his girl friend. Considered to be the highest earning film of the year, compared to its cost of production.
3. Padman- directed by R Balki. Film is based on story by Twinkle Khanna , which was transpired by the life Arunachalam Muruganantham. A man obsession with making of low cost sanitary pad after he watches his wife going through the hell, by using dirty clothes during her periods. He is helped by a lady, who is instrumental in launching the pads, Akshay Kumar in title role, Radhika apte as his wife and Sonam Kapoor as lady who helped him, are the key characters of the movie, and they have performed well. One of the successful films of the year.
4. Raazi- directed by Meghna Gulzar. During Indo Pak war of 1971, based on the request of Research and analysis Wing (RAW), a Kashmiri Girl is married to Pakistani Military Officer, to relay information to India. The story is about this girl land how she survives and come back to India. Alia Bhatt was superb as the spy girl and was ably supported by Vicky Kaushal as her Pakistani husband.
5. Stree- directed by Amar Kaushik. The story of the film is based on the Indian Folk legend Nale Ba, which is about the female spirit who attacks men at night, if they are alone, only leaves their clothes behind. The spirit is referred as Stree. Hero of the film fall in love with heroine, a mystery girl, who is only seen during festival seasons, which forces people to believe she is Stree. How this is resolved is the film. Fine acting by Raj Kumar Rao & Shradha Kapoor in lead role and ably supported by Pankaj Tripathi.
6. Padmavat-directed by Sanjay Leela Bhansali- enough controversy was created for this film by Rajput community before its release, which gave it free publicity. It is story about Rani Padmavati (Deepika Padukone) who is wife of Maharaja Ratan Singh (Shahid Kapoor). Alladdin Khilji (Ranveer Singh) hears about the beauty of Padmavati and attacks the kingdom to capture her. He defeats Ratan Singh any how, but can not capture Padmavati, as she and other ladies of palace perform jauhar and die. Wonderful acting by lead players. Film did the business of more than 300 Cr in domestic market , and it was considered to be super
7. Sanju-directed by Raj Kumar Hirani. A biopic films based on the life of film star Sanjay Dutt. Ranbir Kapoor was brilliant in the title role of Sanju, and was ably supported by ensemble cast, special mention for Vicky Kaushal who played the role of Sanju’s friend. This film was biggest box office hit of the year doing business of 345 Cr.
8. Sonu Ke Titu Ki Sweety- directed by Luv Ranjan. Sonu Sharma (Karthik Aryan) and Titu Sharma (Sunny Singh) are best friend. Titu’s marriage is fixed with Sweety (Nusrat Bhraucha). She tries to control Titu and tries to create rift between friends. In the end Titu tells her if he has to choose between her and Sonu, he will choose his friend. A youngster movie and it was surprise hit of the year, doing more than 110Cr in business.
9. Hichki- directed by Siddharth P Malhotra. Naina Mathur is highly educated lady MSc, BEd, but she suffers from Tourette Syndrome, this causes her to make uncontrollable sounds like hiccups (hichki). She is appointed by a school and given a class called section 9F, this section has students from municipal school, who were transferred to this school, when the present school came to existence at the place where Municipal school was situated. How Naina transforms those students to perform well is the balance of the film. Wonderful acting by Rani Mukerji in lead role.
10. Raid- directed by Raj Kumar Gupta. Film is inspired by 80s incident where a IT officer raided a MP.  In this film, Deputy Commissioner of Income Tax Abhay Patnaik (Ajay Devgn) , on receiving a tip raids  MP Rameshwar Singh’s ( Saurabh Shukla) haveli, where he stays with all his family members. With all the resistance Abhay remains firm, Rameshwar tries his level best with his political connection including Prime Minister. In the end how Abhay is successful is balance part of the film. Wonderful acting by Ajay Devgn and Saurabh Shukla and ably supported by the ensemble cast.

Other honourable mentions are Parmanu, Gold, Mulk, October, Satyamay Jayate, Pari, 102 not out and Sui Dhaga. It so happened that during this year none of the films of 3 Khans find place in the top films of 2018, although each of them had a one release each during this year. Race 3 (Salman Khan), Thugs of Hindustan (Aamir Khan) and Zero ( Shar Rukh Khan) were termed as flops, box office collection wise and content wise also.

Friends, I hope you enjoyed this recap of films released during 2018. Waiting for your comments/views/feed backs.

Anil Malik

Mumbai, India

28^th Dec 2018.