Mechilpuram

 16 March 2020. A date that will stay with me forever. A cold eerie dawn with an undertones of uncertainty. The day we made our way out of hostel, with the backdrop of the Covid Virus threat. Lockdown came a week later. It was like in the movies. Being smuggled out in the shadows of the dark. The narrative made it look like so (in a funny afterthought), but we had our flights in the morning Me and my friends were helped by the local driver, and got cooped up in a typical Omni van, on the way to Indore Airport. We were flying towards different directions. A fear within that I may never meet them again. Through the vast highway connecting Indore-Bhopal, our Rahul bhaiya sped on, the journey interspersed with some swathes of the Yellow/Orange streetlights that we are familiar with. Casting their long and eerie shadow on the deserted roads and lending an appearance that would add to my feelings of uncertainty. I could'nt fathom that we were travelling on a road that connected multiple ...

Musings Nestled within the forested tops of the Western Ghats, a Rifle Club lays await - to celebrate life and the thrill of a hunt, dispersed with a flair to lay waste. Rifle Club surely marks Aashiq Abu's small win from the setback of Neelavelicham and the man can make a living out of cinematography, if he can't lay hands on a good script during the offseason. However, a visual treat can't make up for a lacking screenplay or fitting dialogues to create an aura around a movie. Co-written by Syam Pushkaran , Sharfu ( of the  Suhas-Sharfu duo), Dileesh Karunakaran and Aashiq (the first two whose body of work speak for themselves), this screenplay may not be up there as a best piece of work, because of a lack of impactful dialogues, unnecessary elevation of Anurag Kasyhap's villain character and a overall sense of pretentiousness hanging about in the air. Despite the second half being a letdown - the fun vibe, a sense of thrill and the drip maintained throughout the f...