Category: Reviews

Sector 36

Published on by Harpreet ChhachhiaLeave a comment

Watching Sector 36, one can’t help but be haunted by the grim reality it portrays—a reality that has unfolded in India over the past two decades. The movie leaves you questioning: how could such atrocities have occurred? And why was there no uproar when they did? The answer is stark and troubling—it didn’t happen because the victims were poor.

In India, wealth and power create shields of protection. The tragedies that befall the underprivileged are often met with indifference. This becomes painfully clear when you compare the muted response to the Nithari killings, where over 30 children were brutally murdered, to the outcry over the rape and murder of a doctor from a higher social standing. Both cases involved massive cover-ups, yet only one sparked national outrage. The victims’ socio-economic status determined the level of public sympathy, a truth that resonates throughout Sector 36.

The film shines a spotlight on the systemic injustice that plagues India. The system is a well-oiled machine, designed to serve the powerful. Crores of rupees are spent on lavish weddings and towering statues, while rapists walk free, and whistleblowers languish in prison. We rage against the system, yet we are the system too, perpetuating the very inequalities we decry.

Over the years, India has witnessed several high-profile rape cases that stirred public conscience and led to legal reforms. The Nirbhaya case, for example, resulted in nationwide protests and swift changes to criminal law. But the hard truth is that justice tends to be swift when the accused lack political connections. Where political power is involved, the wheels of justice grind to a halt. Take the Unnao rape case—BJP legislator Kuldeep Sengar evaded arrest for months until media pressure became too loud to ignore. On the flip side, crimes in opposition-ruled states often face heightened scrutiny, with political rivals quick to weaponize these tragedies for their gain.

Sector 36 forces us to confront the fact that crimes in rural areas or involving marginalized communities, particularly Dalits, often go unnoticed. Media coverage is heavily skewed towards metropolitan incidents, leaving the most vulnerable without a voice. The case of the Hathras gang rape—a Dalit woman raped and murdered by upper-caste men in Uttar Pradesh—barely scratched the surface of national consciousness. In these cases, patriarchal values, victim-blaming, and political protection for perpetrators drown out public outrage, creating a system where justice is reserved for the few.

Vikrant Massey delivers a brilliant performance, as expected, but the surprise standout is Deepak Dobriyal’s portrayal of the inspector who uncovers the horror. The film’s pacing is swift, allowing the story to unfold without lingering unnecessarily on the grisly details of the crimes themselves, though their very nature is horrific enough to leave an indelible mark.

Ultimately, Sector 36 is not just a film about a series of murders—it’s an exposé of India’s deep-rooted inequalities, where the poor remain invisible, the powerful remain untouchable, and justice, for most, remains a distant dream.

Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes.

Published on by Harpreet ChhachhiaLeave a comment

I liked the first instalment of the franchise. It really had all the makings of an epic. Followed Caesar’s story avidly as the other two sequels came to theatres. There was a cascade of evolutionary processes, where the apes evolved and where the humans devolved. It was good fare.

Then came along the movie I watched last night. It is set about 300 years post the death of Caesar. His fame has turned him into a Prophet and nearly into god for certain ape communities. There are other communities who have returned to the natural habitat and take their evolution as a natural process. They haven’t even heard about Caesar. They have their own system of beliefs. From these come the main protagonists. Noa, Anaya, and Soona. 

The tribe has their own law and Noa struggles to follow them. From the beginning he is shown to be the one who chooses his own path. They are close to nature and the eagles they bond with become the metaphor for all that is natural. 

Some followers of Caesar have become zealots and believe that it is their right to subjugate humanity. But it is not only human beings that they have a problem with. They have turned into evangelistic bullies, like most people who have misplaced faith in one entity do. Caesar has become the equivalent of the Roman Emperor that ruled with autocratic might. There are many megalomaniacs who want that kind of power, but without the honesty and morality that Caesar possessed. He was willing to work with humans for the betterment of the Apes. 

And this is the second part of the analogy. The first being respectful of the natural world. The second the problems that occur when faith turns into fanaticism. This is wonderfully brought out by the perspective of Noa, the human protagonist.

He is astounded by how apes kill apes – something that Caesar had a law about in the first three movies. Then he gets to know Nova, who can speak. There are those humans who do not as well and Nova does not see herself as part of that tribe. In fact, she comes with her own agendas and racial prejudices, and those juxtapose the ones Proximus Caesar has. They both want one race to subjugate the other. Each feels it is their Right to do so.

The themes are well-woven and intertwined with lovely spectacles and hard-hitting action. Each character stands out as unique and they all linger in the mind long after the movie is done. The tragedy of the movie is that human beings are coming back into power and the beauty of the natural world is once again in peril. If only the rise of the Right and the people who push religion down other’s throats in the guise of morality and proper conduct would understand what is being said. The world would be the home that Noa so desperately seeks to build and preserve, devoid of guns.

May December

Published on by Harpreet ChhachhiaLeave a comment

I got into the film not knowing anything about the story line. I just knew, with actresses like Portman and Moore, I was in for a treat. The acting is superlative – I was not disappointed in the least. The story and the performances got into my head like a drill, though. It was all terribly jarring.

When I watched Animal, the other day, I was not at all unnerved by the performance or the story line… there was nothing to set your eyes aflicker and your mind shake. It was just blood and gore. But this film got to me – it made me look at things deeply and wonder once again of what humanity is capable and incapable of in terms of feeling and consideration.

The film is based loosely on a woman who was convicted with statutory rape. She eventually married the boy who she had been involved with when he turned 21. The premise is well drawn out by Natalie Portman playing the actress who would assay the role of “Gracie” played by Julianne Moore.

Moore plays Gracie with unabashed depth – from a capable housewife to a nervous wreck. She plays the role with a conviction of love. She was in love with her son’s twelve-year-old best friend, and she is still in love with him, as he is now her husband and the father to three of her children.

Furthermore, she takes no responsibility though of her being the adult when they first had sex, insisting that he as a 12-year-old had more control over her than she did on him. However, that is cleverly negated by the way she controls the choice of her daughter, when the latter is choosing a dress for her graduation.

Natalie plays Elizabeth, a method actress who comes to the household to study Gracie and find out more about her life. She seems innocuous enough and yet, from the beginning, we know that she has already judged Gracie and Joe, her husband. She has made one into the perpetrator of a crime and the other a victim.

But there are two instances in which her character dissolves into callousness. One is where she responds to a question about sex in a theatre workshop. She shuts down the person who asks her the question, by describing in detail what she believes happens on set during a love-making scene. By the end of it, she has taken control over the class and has achieved the desired shocked silence. The second one is more insidious. She tells Joe that he can have a life without Gracie. Then she initiates sex, knowing fully well that Joe has not the emotional wherewithal to deal with the guilt and the sensation of being with a woman other than his wife. He is actually ecstatic after the sex and has the only smile in the entire film then. Elizabeth however shuts him down, by saying hookups are what grown-ups do all the time.

Joe’s character is poignantly assayed by Charles Melton. Handsome and naïve, he is the father of three who never knew what it was to be a regular teen. He is afraid of the fact that without his children, he would have nothing in common with Gracie. The most brilliant piece of acting comes when he confronts Gracie after cheating on her. He wants to have a discussion with her about what happened in the past. He wants Gracie to admit to some responsibility to what happened to him when he was 12. She refuses to let that happen. She gaslights him into silence and leaves the discussion with him weeping on the bed. He suffers – because he regrets missing out on a part of his life – and is caught up with a sense of loss – and envy. He yearns to be the monarch he sets free.

The film makes you think… I ended up feeling sorry for everyone in the film and found myself amazed at the complexity of human lives. It makes us introspect. How many of us have abused our power in relationships? What arbitrary lines must people in love follow? Who sets these lines? Who deserves more control in a relationship – a man or a woman? Who decides what is victimhood? Todd Haynes has done a masterful job of tackling a disturbing subject and not creating a binary that is easy to follow. It makes you wonder about victims and villains, and come to the conclusion that life never allows anyone the luxury of simple justification.