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The Blue Keychain

On a cold winter afternoon in Delhi, I am with two of my closest friends and all three of our mothers. We are in Dilli Haat, a place known for its food, souvenirs and trinkets. Of course, the three five-year-olds insisted on getting something from there. I was in awe of the person writing names on a tiny grain of rice the moment I saw him. After a lot of insistence, my mother relented and agreed. I ran to the man and immediately started looking at all the keychain options he had. With so many designs and colours to pick from, I could not pick the wrong keychain. After ten minutes of fishing around the basket of keychains, I finally saw it, the perfect one. A deep blue guitar. Since I was a child, I have always loved music, I can not sing or play any instruments per se but my love for the art remains. My parents, too, are extremely fond of music and I have been a dancer for as long as I can remember, which definitely added to my love for music. I did try learning how to play the guitar ...
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7:29

there’s a clock in my class. it’s broken, it shows 7:29 every single time i look at it. it’s nice to see it when i’m restless in class, because it doesn’t give me the correct time so i’m forced to leave it be and focus on what’s happening right then. maybe i should put a broken clock in my room too, or perhaps remove the battery in the one i wear all the time. maybe then i’ll enjoy the present without hoping time passes by faster or worse, hope time stops when i’m truly happy. no constant ticking to remind me of the seconds i’ve wasted, no slowly ticking needles increasing an unexplainable anxiety. it’s still. unlike my thoughts. it stopped. unlike the world we live in. but maybe that’s the point. maybe i need to stop not the world, maybe i get to decide how my world moves. if it’s a rollercoaster ride or a simple walk in the park. maybe my heart doesn’t have to race every time i hear the hauntingly slow ticks nor do i have to hold my breathe in hopes that the time will slow down and i...
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A critical analysis of Ved Vardhan Sahni from Tamasha

Character Background Ved Vardhan Sahni is a middle-class man from Shimla, India, who grows up enthralled by stories, myths and legends. As a child, he visits a storyteller who instils a love for imagination and narrative. However, societal expectations steer Ved into a life at odds with his natural inclinations. He becomes an engineer, adhering to the conventional path dictated by his family and society. His professional life as a product manager in Delhi is mundane and suppressive, lacking the creative spark he yearned for as a child. Ved’s background reflects a clash between individuality and conformity—a universal theme that grounds his struggles in a relatable context. This foundation establishes him as a character torn between societal expectations and personal fulfilment. Psychological Landscape Ved is a deeply layered character, defined by his internal conflict between his authentic self and the socially constructed persona he adopts to meet societal expectations. His rich ...
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A short journal entry on Satya, Black Friday and Salaam Bombay

For this piece I will be analysing and discussing three films: Satya, Black Friday and Salaam Bombay. I will be talking about their narratives, cinematography and editing, in particular for this journal entry. Starting with Ram Gopal Varma's Satya - it revolutionised the portrayal of the Mumbai underworld. It moved away from romanticised gangster figures and presented a brutal, almost documentary-like depiction of gang life. Satya, the protagonist, is not a charismatic leader but a desperate individual caught in a cycle of violence. The narrative focuses on the internal dynamics of the gang, the constant threat of betrayal, and the psychological toll of a life lived on the fringes of society. The film doesn't offer easy moral judgments; instead, it presents the characters as products of their environment. The rise and fall narrative is compressed, emphasising the precarious nature of power in the underworld. Anurag Kashyap's Black Friday is based on S. Hussain Zaidi'...
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An analysis of Wake Up Sid and an alternative narrative flow for it

Wake Up Sid is a film written and directed by Ayan Mukerji. Released in 2009, the film was a commercial success. The narrative revolves around Sid, Sidharth Mehra, a privileged and careless college student whose life takes a turn after he befriends Aisha Banerjee, an aspiring writer from Kolkata. The film utilises the interval well and, to an extent, depends on it, too. The first half of the film is almost monotonous and frustrating to watch at certain points due to the immature decisions and ignorant attitude of the protagonist.  Various elements are used to heighten the emotional impact of the interval. The plot builds up to the scene right before the interval, where Sid has a heated confrontation with his father after failing his exams. The scene starts with him discovering that he has failed, followed by him lashing out at his friends who are trying to be supportive. When he comes home, his mother asks him about his day and why he seems upset, and he yells at her and is disresp...
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A short journal entry on the Angry Young Man Archetype

For this piece I will be discussing the angry young man archetype with the example of the iconic film - Deewaar, which is also considered one of the establishers of this archetype in Indian cinema. Directed by Yash Chopra, the film revolves around two brothers, Vijay (Amitabh Bachchan) and Ravi (Shashi Kapoor). The film explores the tension between morality and survival through the brothers, who are on two ends of the law.  Starting with the archetype, the Angry Young Man (AYM) is predominantly a blue-collar worker who realises that the system is not going to make his life better and decides to fight it. More often than not, the character was called Vijay after the success of previous films. The reason for a blue-collar job is also that it is not considered a desirable job and, to an extent, is even a form of disguised unemployment. The AYM is not trained, nor does he have a gym-toned body; he is rugged due to hard manual labour and is always ready to fight if he has to.  The ...
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Love Per Square Foot - The Indian Dream and the Commodification of Love

Love Per Square Foot (2018), directed by Anand Tiwari, is a modern Indian romantic comedy-drama that revolves around two middle-class individuals, Sanjay Chaturvedi and Kareena D'Souza, who decide to marry not for love but to jointly acquire a house in Mumbai, a city notorious for its exorbitant real estate prices. While the film is primarily seen as a feel-good romance, I would like to point out the socio-economic aspects and class struggles for this analysis. I enjoyed watching this film the first time, and upon rewatching, I noticed their class struggles' impact and how it can be viewed as a commentary on the same.  The film is set in Mumbai, a city known for its economic disparities. Further, the plot revolves around owning a house in a city with extremely high real estate rates. The need to acquire a house and take extreme measures to get it depicts the capitalist ideology and how ingrained it is in our society very well. The sense of upward mobility and the societal belie...
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