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A still from “Ninaivo Oru Paravai”.

The taming of colour and light

Modern cinematography in studios seems to have created a templated, charmless deploying of the very thing that makes cinema possible—light.
Prathyush Parasuraman
Outside a cinema theatre in Mumbai, on May 9.

‘The Kerala Story’ is greedy in its impulse to demonise Muslims

In it, expressions of love for India and Hinduism are intertwined with hostility towards Islam.
Prathyush Parasuraman
Surupa Sen and Bijayini Satpathy performing Odissi in Chennai. A file photograph.

The elusive idea of grace

Is grace that feeling of being swept into and receding from something, as in an Odissi recital?
Prathyush Parasuraman
A view of Nita Mukesh Ambani Cultural Centre at Jio World Centre, in Mumbai.

Nita Mukesh Ambani Cultural Centre: Culture as spectacle

Culture thrives on patronage, and to participate in patronised culture is to forever remember how fraught the very desire for culture is.
Prathyush Parasuraman
Salman Rushdie at a press conference at Aviles, in northern Spain, in October 2015.

Manufacturing magic: On Salman Rushdie and ‘Victory City’

There is a constant need to explain the rules of fantasy in Salman Rushdie’s new novel.
Prathyush Parasuraman
A scene from Everything Everywhere All At Once. Michelle Yeoh became the first Asian woman ever to win the Best Actress Oscar in the 95 years of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

Oscars 2023: What’s fair got to do with it?

We see the Oscars wins as ours, a validation of our tastes, but that is it. Fair play has no role.
Prathyush Parasuraman
A visitor listens to the artist Samson Young’s interactive installation, “Reasonable Music”, at Aspinwall House, Fort Kochi. 

Kochi-Muziris Biennale: A throbbing rigidity

Does India’s first and only arts biennale take itself a little too seriously?
Prathyush Parasuraman
A still from Fursat.

‘Fursat’: When big directors wield the small phone

One only wishes that Vishal Bhardwaj’s film had come with the whisper of a story that moved us, too.
Prathyush Parasuraman
Charles Simic, as a critic, reproduced entire poems of the poet, giving one the space to marinate in even the smallest image.

Can there be something such as an honest critic?

The critic is a persona largely missing from India’s classical music and dance scene.
Prathyush Parasuraman
A still from “Pathaan”.

Shah Rukh Khan: The new action hero on the block

With Pathaan and Jawan, will he use his stardom to rewrite the genre or will the genre rewrite him?
Prathyush Parasuraman
The actor Sam Worthington in a scene from Avatar: The Way of Water. The release of the movie is a significant event in cinematic history, much like Avatar was, each being the most expensive film of its time. 

Films like ‘Avatar 2’ challenge how acting is thought of as a craft

It is reduced to something mechanical and processed, replicable, and too reliant on technology.
Prathyush Parasuraman
A still from ‘Dubai Bling’.

Why Netflix reality show ‘Dubai Bling’ is a voyeuristic ode to a post-global city

It fetishises a culture of smoke and mirrors.
Prathyush Parasuraman
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