This week WhatsOn is back with the top 5 movies and reviews. To make your weekend more delightful and less boring don’t forget to stream those.
Slalom
Slalom is being billed as a Me Too movie set in the world of competitive skiing, but that does the picture a mild injustice. The film is too human for any kind of categorization. It’s a delicate, authentic look at the complicated ways in which abuse works. Much of its power derives from the performance of newcomer Noée Abita as Lyz, a 15-year-old girl studying in the Swiss Alps, where she has joined an elite ski team led by Fred, a tough coach who thinks nothing of observing and manhandling the kids’ bodies, supposedly to make them better skiers. Although we know where things are generally headed, almost nothing in Slalom feels specifically predictable.
Mimi
Mimi, a great Bollywood movie and it delivers an excellent message to all individuals. Kiran, Evelyn, Sai, Supriya Pathak and all other women roles did exceptionally well. They portrayed the daughter, mother, friend, lover, ambitious, sister qualities very well. They did the script very well, the direction was very simple and acting was with ease. The movie is a full on roller-coaster ride of emotion, from humor to rage, to tears of sadness or lovingness, it has it all packed and well delivered. Acting wise Kriti, the protagonist nails it with her performance here and is effortlessly convincing and strongly into the character in a way you forget her real side of personality which is where her appreciation lies. Pankaj Tripathi is star and he enlightens the movie brighter and brings laughter every time he is on screen!
Minari
Lee Isaac Chung’s beautiful Minari, which stars The Walking Dead’s Steven Yeun and veteran Korean actress Youn Yuh-jung, has been generating major buzz since it premiered at Sundance a year ago. It has also just scored three SAG nominations, making it a likely contender in the Oscar race. Based on Chung’s own childhood, Minari is a quintessentially American tale about a Korean-American family that moves to rural Arkansas to start a farm and chase the American dream.
Acasa, My Home
Initially intended to be the site of a reservoir but never actually filled up, Vacaresti Nature Park has stood in the center of the Romanian capital of Bucharest for decades, neglected by bureaucrats and slowly emerging as a rich marshland with startling biodiversity, the largest urban wilderness in Europe. Shot over three years, Radu Ciorniciuc’s film follows Gica and his family as their existence is interrupted by the growing demands of the modern world. But Acasa is not exactly a movie about paradise lost. The film comes in at under an hour and a half, but we see Vacaresti transformed and the Enache family sent into an existential tailspin.
Titli
In ‘Titli’, Rituparno Ghosh, the West Bengal film director pays attention to every detail and beautifully captures the essence of a simple so-called happy family with a compelling story. In this film, Mithun Chakraborty is a popular film star, whereas Konkona Sen Sharma portrays his die-hard fan. Her admiration for the film icon changes when she meets him in person. This is no doubt an interesting narrative. But what makes this film special is the portrayal of a complex mother-daughter relationship, which is further enhanced when we see that the girl’s mother (Aparna Sen) was actually her idol’s love interest in his early days.
