Some men just want to watch the world learn.

 Some movies have unlikely heroes, but Dasvi (2022) has one of the unlikeliest.  Ganga Ram Chaudhary (Abhishek Bachchan) is the charming, arrogant, and gleefully corrupt Chief Minister of the semi-fictional state of Harit Pradesh.  (The "state" is actually a region in Uttar Pradesh with some cultural and linguistic differences which some have proposed breaking off as a new independent state.  It's clearly fictional, but perhaps a bit more plausible than an American movie dealing with the internal politics of the state of Cascadia.)

 Chaudhary's crimes may have finally caught up with him; he's implicated in a scam involving funding money form the state's schools, though it's never entirely clear whether Chaudhary was involved personally.  In any case, he's sent to jail and, at first, enjoys a comfy life. He has a luxurious private room, the guards and other prisoners are obsequious, and his shy wife Bimla (Nimrat Kaur) is able to serve as CM while he's away.

Things change pretty rapidly.  Stubborn and incorruptible new prison superintendent Jyoti Deswal (Yami Gautam) takes over, and suddenly Chaudhary has to stay in a regular cell and eat and work with the other prisoners, while Bimla has broken out of her shell and learned to love being in power.  She can only be CM while her husband is in jail, so suddenly the party machine is a lot less helpful.

Chaudhary is assigned to work in the wood shop, making chairs.  He does not want to make chairs, so he tries everything to get out of it, but Jyoti won't budge.  And then he gets his big idea - education!  Many of the prisoners are studying in the prison library to earn their high school diplomas, and Chaudhary is legally entitled to the same opportunity.

 It starts as a scam, but while reading about the history of the struggle for Indian independence, Chaudhary gets swept up in the narrative and starts imagining himself as a part of history, Wishbone-style.  Chaudhary learns from history so that he won't be condemned to repeat it, and dedicates himself to earning his degree properly.  In fact, he vows that he will not serve as CM anymore unless he can earn his degree.

There is a problem - Chaudhary is kind of a lunkhead with no noticeable skills beyond politics.  Fortunately some of his fellow prisoners are there to tutor him, and bicycle thief Ghanti (Arun Kushwah) discovers the secret - he teaches math using vote counts and election probability, and Chaudhary gets it!  Soon he's making strides in every subject except Hindi, and the only one he can turn to is Jyoti.  Meanwhile Bimla has realized that if Chaudhary doesn't pass the test and earn his degree, she gets to stay as CM, so she does everything she can to subtly interfere with his efforts. This causes tension in their marriage.

Chaudhary and Jyoti grow closer, and another movie would probably end with them realizing that they love each other, but Dasvi does not.  It's refreshing to see a genuine friendship develop onscreen between a man and a woman, and see that platonic relationship presented as something valuable that's worth fighting for.

 In any case, by the end of the movie Chaudhary's true love is education.  He's still something of a lunkhead, but he's a lunkhead who wants to learn, and wants to make it possible for others to learn as well.  I expected wacky school-related hijinks, but I did not expect a movie making such a strong argument for education for its own sake.  Perhaps Chaudhary is not such an unlikely hero after all.

 

One panther, pink.

 Despite the title, Jewel Thief: The Heist Begins (2025) has basically no relation to 1967's Jewel Thief, a stylish cotton candy noir starring Dev Anand.  That doesn't mean it's particularly original; the new Jewel Thief draws clear inspiration form a number of heist films.  Then again, there are only so many ways you can spin stealing a diamond.

The jewel thief in question is Rehan Roy (Saif Ali Khan), a charming international playboy who may well have a heart of gold, or at least silver,  maybe a highly polished ornamental copper.  Rehan was disowned by his saintly doctor father Jayant (Kulbashan Kharbanda),  but when little brother Avi (Gagan Arora) shows up at his Budapest home to say that their father is in danger unless Rehan agrees to do a job for "art collector" and brutal gangster Rajan Aulakh ( Jaideep Ahlawat), Rehan is not going to say no.  Though since he is a wanted criminal, he travels by means of a cunning scheme, humiliating Vikram Patel (Kunal Kapoor), the obsessive cop who has been chasing him for three years, in the process.

 Rajan has recently had several assets seized, and he owes money to people who are not patient and understanding, so he wants Rehan to steal the Red Sun, a large jewel known as "Africa's Koh-i-Noor" which is due to be displayed at an art museum in Mumbai.  The two men banter for a bit, then Rajan takes a moment to clearly establish that he is a very bad man by shooting his own dog.  Rehan is still willing to do the job (because blackmail) but manages to talk Rajan into a full partnership and fifty-fifty split.  There are conditions, however: Rehan will live at Rajan's complex until the heist is over, and will be under constant surveillance.

Also at the complex - Rajan's wife, a gentle artist named Farah (Nikita Dutta).  Farah doesn't disclose her reasons for marrying  Rajan, but he is clearly abusive and controlling, and Rehan impulsively boasts that he's going to steal the Red Sun and her on the same night.

And then - well, it's a heist film, so it  follows a certain pattern.  They spend a long time planning the heist.  The first attempt fails, so they're forced to carry out an even more audacious heist from a commercial flight.  Rajan seeks out Istanbul-based gangster Moosa (Loitongbam Dorendra Singh) to fence the jewel, and while they do not like one another it does not stop them from scheming to double-cross Rehan.  Rehan quietly and subtly woos Farah when no one is looking, and considers reconciling with his father.  And Vikram follows in the background, relentless but always two steps behind.

 Jewel Thief is fun and it oozes style, but there's not much going on underneath; despite the twists and turns, it's very predictable, and despite the sometimes brutal violence it feels very safe and lightweight.  Still, there are worse ways to spend an evening.

 

Cheers for these moonlighting friends.

Romance isn't really timeless - culture shifts and tastes change, so cinematic romance will also evolve form era to era.  Plan A Plan B (2022) tries so hard to be a modern love story that it ends up feeling like a relic from another place and time - in this case, an American TV sitcom from the 1980s and 90s.

 This kind of "Will they, won't they" romance requires a mismatched pair of opposites - here we have Nirali (Tamannaah Bhatia), an earnest psychologist who is taking over the matchmaking service founded by her mother Kiran (Poonam Dhillon), and Kaustabh "Kosti" Chougule (Ritiesh Deshmukh), a thorny and meticulous family lawyer who specializes in divorces.  Both characters have quirks: Kosti may be tightly wound but he's an excellent dancer, while Nirali doesn't dance and is much more likely to spend her nights eating ice cream while babysitting Kabeer (Prithviraj Sarnaik), the son of her plucky best friend Seema (Kusha Kapila).  And they're both dealing with secret heartbreak.  Nirali lost her long-time boyfriend Varun a while ago, and Kosti is refusing to finalize the divorce from his estranged wife Runjhun (Bidita Bag), instead annoying his friends and pouring out his heart to random women he meets on dating apps.

Kosti and Nirali have neighboring offices in the same building, and they clash immediately - it's not just mildly antagonistic flirting,  they have wildly different views on relationships, life, the world, and appropriate levels of noise in a shared office space.  Still, the people around them can't help but notice that they spend an awful lot of time talking about each other; at one point Seema is amazed that Nirali goes four hours without talking about Varun because she's too busy compaining about ol' Caustic Chougule.  Still, they're so hostile that even friendship is unlikely.

And then Kosti meets Kiran, and while he starts out Eddie Haskelling in order to annoy Nirali, he actually gets along with Kiran.  She invites him to her upcoming 60th birthday party, and he winds up teaching her friends in an impromptu dance class which quickly becomes a regular dance class.  Kiran asks Nirali and Kosti to knock off the fighting until after the birthday party, and they agree.  Of course, since they're not fighting they start actually talking, and sparks begin to fly.  It would be a terrible shame if this budding friendship was derailed by a misunderstanding.

 

The budding friendship is promptly derailed by a misunderstanding.

 

Of course, there's never any question of how things will end.  The movie has the inevitability of Sam and Diane, David and Maddie, Ross and Rachel.   The plot asks "Will they or won't they," but of course they will.  And like the sitcoms that came before it, once they do the whole thing becomes a bit less interesting.  Of course, this is a movie tightly focused on the relationship rather than a series, so the good news is that it wraps up nicely instead of dragging on for four more seasons.

 

Screenshots I'm hosting for another internet project.