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Dulquer Salmaan’s 5 Films To See, And The One We’ll Never Get To See
Dulquer Salmaan has chosen a career path very different from his father the iconic Mammoothy
I asked Dulquer Salmaan if that was deliberate. “It had to be different from his. I couldn’t possibly do what he had already done. He has a larger-than-life image. It made no sense to walk in his footsteps.
There is a nothing like a ‘born actor’. It’s all about honing the skills. Duplication never works for anybody. Why would it have worked for me?I chose my own path because that was the only way to go . At the same time I’ve to admit there was an advantage in being my fathers’s son. The debut film came much easier to me than it would have if I was an outsider.”
So would like to do a film with his father? “The thought has crossed the minds of many filmmakers. We’ve had quite a few offers to work together. But no.I don’t think that’s a good idea. The comparisons would be unacceptable to me. So unless it is something that offers a truly special challenge for us to come together it is unlikely that we will work together.”
While it is unlikely that we will see Dulquer Salmaan with his illustrious father together, here are Dulquer Salmaan’s 5 films worth checking out.
Solo: 4 stories about bereavement and loss, Solo with its supremely impassioned plea to fob off isolation is a shout-out for comfort and warmth in a world gone completely cold. In the frigid frozen environment of isolated hearts and broken promises, a light is lit. Solo is ample proof of Bejoy Nambiar’s mastery over the desi noire genre which so far Anurag Kashyap thought he owned.
It is also a lucid testimony to Dulquer Salmaan’s virtuosity. He has rapidly emerged as one of India’s most exciting contemporary actors. Nambiar’s characters find love and then lose it in the most bizarre ways. In the first and my favourite story Shekhar with the speech impairment loves and marries the seductive dancer Radhika(the very fetching Sai Dhansika) who can see better than those with vision.
Their ravishing romance, more Mani Ratnam than Karan Johar, reaches an awful dilemma then slides into a tragedy with such resonance that I was rendered teary eyed and speechless in no time at all. Nambiar gives us no room to grieve for lost love.
The next story which is cleverly and stylishly noire–ish(Kashyap and Ramu on one of their more inspired outings) has chameleon-like Dulquer transforming into a vendetta-seeking widower. I found this story way too devious and self-congratulatory to be spontaneous. The storytelling here lacks the grace of the first story. Bejoy is way too eager to push all the right de Palma-Hitchcock buttons. The morality tale is just about gripping though never gloriously memorable. The third story , a dark violent saga of persecution and retribution again soars to tremendous heights of lucidity.
Here Dulquer Salmaan ,playing the gun-toting killer from a broken violent home, uses his silences to express screaming disdain for social codes. Among the four stories this one has the optimum velocity and an ability to be an independent full-length feature film on its own.
The gangsters (these include the very wonderful Dinesh Prabhakar , seen in the week’s other release Chef) are constantly fighting over MGR-Sivaji Ganesan songs . The brutal hits are staged in grotesquely ironical circumstances , for instance a Tamil melodrama plays on television while the man of the house is being roughed up outside. Or a businessman who is vital to the plot is attacked while he performs Ganpati puja in Mumbai.
This story is partly set in Mumbai and conveys a lot of the city’s gangster-patois with a relish that Nambiar had displayed in his stunning debut film Shaitaan. There are images and shots in this story that I’d rate as among the best in the gangster genre in Indian cinema.
Like the first two stories this one too has an unexpected twist in the tale that leaves one of the protagonists bereaved and alone….solo! Dulquer plays the child-man in the fourth and least satisfying story about a volatile armyman and his forbidden love for his neighbour’s daughter(Neha Sharma). The incestuous undertones in this story left me somewhat underwhelmed though not in any permenantly damaging way.
Mahaniti: Dulquer Salmaan’s Gemini Ganesan is a masterly portrayal of the male ego swathed in superficial compassion . Again, like Keerthy, Dulquer steers the performance away from being imitative. Bravely the film doesn’t gloss over the unpleasant aspects of Savitri’s life. The marriage to the much-married Tamil matinee idol Gemini Ganesan (played with an endearing vigour by Dulquer Salman) and the subsequent clash of egos, her lapse into alcoholism and her eventual plunge into penury are all dealt with a certain beguiling blend of melodrama and poignancy.
The mix can be infuriatingly overblown for the uninitiated but highly satisfying for those who are familiar with the drama of deceit depression and descent that governs many success stories of the entertainment world.
Kadhal Kanmani: I was reminded of Vivek Oberoi and Rani Mukherjee and the life that they tried to make together in Saathiya after marrying under trying circumstances. In Mani’s new delightful disarming drama of love without commitment Aditya(Dulquer Salmaan) and Tara(Nithya Menon) don’t just shy away from marriage and the accompanying obligations, the splendidly scripted drama makes a valid case for the Mumbai couple to stay unmarried and enjoy a kind of freedom that is an obligation of a kind different from what we think of as marital duties.
Ratnam’s lovers ooze a poised charm without getting overly cute . Salmaan and Menon are so compatible together you wonder what’s keeping them from taking the plunge.They look so made for each other, it isn’t funny. As in his past romantic yarn Mani Ratnam remains the master of vignettes. He weaves precious little scenes of distending drama that exude a portable passion.
The romance is vast in scope but not immeasurably ‘epic’ .The young actors know their job and does it with a flair that tenders a deep empathy for their characters. We can’t help falling in love with the love that Aditya and Tara feel for one another. Railway tracks and compartments crowded with impatient commuters serve as a meeting ground for Mani Ratnam’s young lovers in Ok Kadhal Kanmani.
Karwaan: Irfaan and Dulquer together is reason enough to sink your teeth into this tale of a weird yatra.In a sequence that would have been profoundly amusing if it were not so tragic a beautiful lady (Amala Akinneni, if you must know) looks at two coffins and tells Dulquer, “The right one is your father.” Sighs Dulquer, “So far the right one was the wrong one for me.”Excavating humour from the innards of mortality is never easy.
Writer-Director Akarsh Khurana attempts the near-impossible and comes up with a film that never offends, even when it poses some serious problems of pacing.You know that the film is looking for ways to keep the journey going when there are unnecessary detours on the way. And why not?! Dulquer’s Avinash is a repressed unhappy 10-5 geek who hates his bullying boss (Akarsh Khurana) and wants nothing more, nothing less, than to break out of his executive dungeon and …well, just shoot pictures with an actual camera, not its digital doppelgangers.
Karwaan has much that is wrong with it. But it also has plenty that pleases, a warmth and an empathy for the misfits that makes it a very endearing road trip, albeit with irrelevant deviations.
Zoya Factor: Dulquer Salmaan as the captain of the cricket team which “adopts” ‘Zoya’ Sonam Kapoor as their lucky mascot, is the only saving grace in this vapid adaptation of an interesting novel. Dulquer’s reined-in performance works to pan out Sonam’s excessively exuberant portrayal of a girl who is so hellbent on creating a stir she ends up courting chaos. So far Dulquer Salmaan has not been lucky in his choice of roles in Hindi. That needs to be rectified sooner rather than later.
Dulquer Salmaan is an Indian Film actor who predominantly works in Malayalam cinema. He is the son of actor Mammootty. Dulquer made his debut with the Malayalam film Second Show (2012) for which he received the Filmfare Award for Best Male Debut.
He also received award for his Tamil debut Vaayai Moodi Pesavum (2014). He won the Kerala State Film Award for Best Actor for his performance in Charlie (2015).
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Why On Earth Is Sushmita Sen Smoking A Cigar In Aarya’s First Look?

Season 3 of Aarya is being shot as you read this, and naturally Sushmita Sen is super-kicked about it, so kicked that she has put out a video where she is seen in the best Lady Boss version of herself.
Alarmingly, she is seen puffing away at a cigar, to complete her Badass Lady Boss image.
There was a time when women smoking cigarettes in Hindi cinema signaled vampishness. If a female actor was shown smoking it meant she had evil designs over the hero, and life in general.
Sushmita being Sushmita, a cigarette won’t do. A cigar it is, to go with her formidable image. The last Bollywood actor I saw smoking a cigar on screen was Premnath in the 1970s. Back then so many people didn’t die of cancer by smoking.
These are different far more dangerous and deadly times.
Sushmita is an iconic actor.She needs to be more careful about the image she projects . Smoking a cigar doesn’t enhance a woman’s(or a man’s) muscle power. Nor does it make her look cool.
About shooting for the third season of Aarya Sushmita says, “Aarya is synonymous with my name. I have lived as Aarya for two whole seasons and the love received by the audiences has only encouraged me to do more. Walking on the sets of Aarya Season 3 makes me feel at home and gives me a sense of empowerment. I’m grateful to the entire team at Disney+ Hotstar, Ram Madhvani Films and Endemol Shine India for the vision of creating Aarya and taking it to newer heights with every season.”
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Shah Rukh, Deepika, John Will Meet The Media On Monday At 4 pm(But There’s A Catch)

Pathaan has effectually discredited the efficacy of media interactions to promote a film. The film’s lead actors Shah Rukh Khan, Deepika Padukone and John Abraham did not conduct any press or portal interviews to promote the film.
And yet Pathaan is a blockbuster.
This weekend the Pathaan producer Aditya Chopra of Yash Raj Films took a call on behalf of the Pathaan team to do one media meet at the Taj Land’s End in Mumbai on Monday January 30 at 4 pm.
The three principal actors and director Siddharth Malhotra will address the media.
But here’s the catch: the media will not be allowed to ask any questions. There will be no Q& A s or one-on-one interactions.This basically means that the Pathaan team will have an opportunity to say what it wants to the media. But the media will have no say.
Make what you will of this one-way traffic.
A source close to Yash Raj informs me that this is the pattern regarding the media that Yash Raj will follow for future releases: no press meets no promotional engagements.
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Fake Projects of Pathaan Director Being Planted In Media

Siddharth Anand Denies Considering Any Project With Deepak Mukut
A word of caution to those marketing and publicity wizkids who think it’s okay to plant fake stories on (fake) projects with the Pathaan director.
It is not.
Such baseless announcements are meant only to raise the equity of the producers with whom Siddharth Anand’s name is linked. One such producer whose name has cropped up after the spectacular success of Pathaan is Deepak Mukut.
There were reports everywhere that Siddharth Anand’s next would be with Mukut.
Turned out to be a false rumour.
A source in the know informs, “Siddharth now has to complete Fighter starring Hrithik Roshan and Deepika Padukone for Yash Raj.Then he is committed to direct the sequel to War 2 for Yash Raj films. They will then start work on the next film in the Pathaan franchise. There is no scope or room for any outside projects for Siddharth Anand. So every announcement that you read of a new film to be directed by Siddharth Anand for an outside producer is likely to be a hundred percent fake.”
When I asked Siddharth Anand about the supposed project with producer Deepak Mukut he promptly replied, “NOT AT ALL.”
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Pink Director’s Next Featuring Yami As A Crime Reporter To Stream From February 16

Anniruddha Roy Chowdhury whose Pink featuring Amitabh Bachchan and Taapsee Pannu was one of the most important films of 2016, is all set to release his next Hindi film.
Entitled Lost, Anniruddha’s film , based on true events, will see Yami Gautam Dhar(that’s what the actress calls herself after her marriage) as a crime journalist. LOST is an emotional social thriller that represents a higher quest, a search for lost values of empathy and integrity.
Inspired by true events, Lost is a story of a bright young woman crime reporter in her relentless search for the truth behind the sudden disappearance of a young theatre activist.

Lost
Says Aniruddha “The shoot of LOST has been an incredible journey. I have been eager for the release of our hard-worked venture. The film is a realistic highlight of media in a social context and I am sure that it will give the audience a compelling watch. I am curious about its release and see the responses it shall get. I hope they will welcome it with open hearts.”
Yami Gautam Dhar who plays the lead of the crime reporter says, “I can’t be happier and more proud of the film’s selection for the opening night at CSAFF. I feel like its one that the people will connect to and will be the one that you cannot miss, especially in the current age and time. I have loved playing this role because it was such a special experience, it allowed me to explore so many layers of emotions as an actor and the entire team has worked really hard on it. I genuinely cannot wait for the film’s release, especially to see the reactions of the audience to it.”
The crime investigation drama boasts a stellar cast. Along with Yami, the film will feature Pankaj Kapur, Rahul Khanna, and an ensemble of younger talent, including Neil Bhoopalam, Pia Bajpai, and Tushar Pandey, in pivotal roles.
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