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This week, I wanted to watch a Nepali movie. To be honest, I kind of started missing the good old days when I’d go to the multiplex halls every week, popcorn in hand, parking coupon in the pocket, and try to enjoy whatever was presented on screen by Nepali filmmakers. I tried to relive the experience, although at home, streaming on a 43” inch screen on YouTube. Now the thing about YouTube or an OTT platform is, it gives you immense choice on what to watch as well as the option of skipping through boring parts. You can watch a 1hr 30-minute feature film in 15 minutes and still understand what’s going on.

I did the same this week. Not because I was in a hurry, but because some recent (pre-2020) movies I watched on YouTube did not deserve more than 10 minutes of attention, including a couple by Nepal’s highest-paid ‘film star’. Disappointed, I also began fearing for the future of the Nepali film industry. I cannot speak for all, but I am pretty sure a lot of multiplex audiences like me have been spoiled by OTTs where we can seamlessly watch movies from around the world on their personal screens and for a fraction of the price we spent in theaters. If the Nepali film industry does not step up its game, it’s going to collapse in a few years, I thought, while watching the opening credits of the 2019-film “Gopi.”

Written and directed by film journalist-turned-filmmaker Dipendra Lama, “Gopi” is a perfect example of the route Nepal could take to the OTT platform. It is a film that represents a part of Nepali society and projects it on screen without superficial distortions. Lama, who is known to stylistically stay closer to the real world than most Nepali filmmakers, directs the extremely talented Bipin Karki in the lead role of Sudhir aka Gopi. The actor-director duo tells the story of a common man who has been invisible in Nepali cinema for so many years.

Sudhir (Karki) is a college lecturer and a cattle farmer. So passionate is he about raising cows, he is even ready to give up even his girlfriend Sujata (Surakshya Panta) if forced into a choice. As it is, his relationship with his father (Prakash Ghimire) is stressful. The father wants him to apply for a US Green Card; Sudhir does not want to leave the country. Sudhir is like some of our youths who are determined to do something worthwhile in their homeland, and his father represents the many parents who’d spend millions of rupees to send their children abroad rather than support their trades or professions in the country itself.

As any common man would do, Sudhir struggles. A passionate farmer who loves cows, Sudhir has to fight through many difficulties to survive. His personal relationships are strained because of his choice of work, and this country, he finds, although it is still deemed an agricultural nation, is no country for poor farmers!

Sudhir’s story is so organic that had it not been for the background score and the multi-angle shots, it would seem like a documentary. But that’s also a setback for the film. In the pursuit of genuineness, imagination takes a backseat and thus the tempo suffers. Throughout its 2hr run-time, the film maintains a constant pace and never does anything more than portray Sudhir’s life as it is. The film’s inability to heighten conflicts at times, and a somewhat lazy climax, do not allow the film to maximize its true potential. Nonetheless, I’d watch Gopi half-a-dozen times than see the highest-paid Nepali actor disappoint with every expression. 

Who should watch it?

Gopi is a family film and if you scroll through its comment section on OSR Digital’s official YouTube channel, you’ll notice many youths, especially those who have been forced to migrate abroad for work, identify with it closely. Still, this family entertainer is meant for people from all walks of lives and we highly recommend Gopi to all Nepali audiences as a preview of what Nepali movies on OTT might look like.  

Rating 3
GOPI
Drama
Director: Dipendra Lama
Cast: Bipin Karki, Barsha Raut, Surakshya Pant
Time: 2hrs 2mins 

If there is a movie adaptation of a book on Netflix that I haven’t read, I will put off watching it till I’ve gotten around to reading the book. It’s a crime to watch the movie before you’ve read the book, right? I think it should be. However, I must confess, I watched ‘Bird Box’ before reading Josh Malerman’s debut novel by the same name. I had heard so much about it that I just couldn’t stop myself from hitting play. Also, Sandra Bullock, who portrays the protagonist Malorie, is one of my favorite actors.

Bird Box is a dystopian novel where unseen creatures, whose mere sight drives people crazy enough to kill themselves, are taking over the planet. At the beginning of the story, Malorie is seen leaving the house with two children she calls ‘Boy’ and ‘Girl’ to go on a boat ride up the river in search of the safe place that is presumably somewhere out there. The catch is that they are blindfolded and Malorie and the children have to listen carefully to navigate their way despite not being able to see the danger that lurks around them. The narrative alternates between their journey up the river and Malorie’s flashbacks to events that led them to that point.

This is the first time I watched a movie and then read the related book. It’s also perhaps the only time I have liked the movie adaptation better than the book. Is it because I watched the movie first and Malorie was Sandra Bullock instead of a character in my head? Is it because the tension is palpable in the movie and not so much in the book where things appear rather laid back at times? Or is it because I already knew what was going to happen and waiting for it to unfold page by page was a bit taxing?

The book feels a bit stretched out. Malerman builds up tension, a sense of danger, only to have it fizzle out. And there are quite a few such incidents. Then, you know there are some dangerous creatures out there but you don’t know what they are and you never find out. That curiosity is never quelled. It’s frustrating.

Don’t get me wrong; I enjoyed the book. I had a good time. I was a nervous wreck every time I got a sense that something was about to happen. I was rooting for the other survivors—namely Tom, Olympia, Jules, Cheryl, and Felix—even when I knew they were doomed. It’s just that I think I would have loved the book a whole lot more had I read it before watching the movie. Note to self: Never again.

3 stars
Fiction
Bird Box
Josh Malerman
Published: 2014
Publisher: Harper Collins
Pages: 379, Paperback

There’s a lot of Young Adult fiction out there these days. I’m a bit jealous of those who are able to grow up reading these uplifting, important stories that help you understand yourself and the world around you. I wish the stories that are being written today were there when I was growing up. Armed with the wisdom, might I have made fewer mistakes, been a less difficult daughter, and had as much sense at 25 as I think I have now, a decade later? I’d like to believe so.

 The YA books that I’ve been reading in recent times have made me slightly more compassionate and tolerant of people and ideas that don’t necessarily support my stand on things. They might have hit differently and I might have gotten far more out of them had I read them earlier, as a teen or in my 20s. When I was growing up, I was reading mostly for entertainment and stories largely served that purpose too. Not that there is anything wrong with that. But the books that are being written now, with the added value of insight and the experiences of the characters, are so vast and varied.

‘Simon vs. The Home Sapiens Agenda’ is a much-talked about book. Many adult book clubs have chosen to read and discuss this YA novel and almost every booktuber I follow on YouTube has raved about it. Becky Albertalli’s debut novel tells the story of 16-year-old Simon Spier who is gay but hasn’t come out. The only person who knows the truth is a boy named Blue, another closet gay teen. The two meet through Tumblr and they communicate via emails. Both have no idea who the other person is.

Then one day, a boy named Martin reads Simon’s emails to Blue on the school computer after Simon forgets to sign out of his email account. Martin now knows his secret and he wants Simon to help him date Abby, the new girl in school. If he doesn’t figure out how to do that, then Martin is going to tell the entire school that Simon is gay.

What follows is a part-hilarious, part-moving story about the angst of growing up and learning to accept yourself for who you are. It’s also a tender and poignant tale of friendship and love. I thoroughly enjoyed it. The only reason I gave it three stars is because I’m quite stingy with my four and five stars and reserve those for books that blow my mind and have me blabbering about them all wide-eyed. Simon vs. The Home Sapiens Agenda might not have had that effect but it was still a great read.

3 stars
Fiction
Simon vs. The Homo Sapiens Agenda
Becky Albertalli
Published: 2015
Publisher: Penguin Books
Pages: 303, Paperbac

A group of strangers is traveling in the same vehicle through a dense forest at night. Everything is going fine in the journey when suddenly something appears in the middle of the road and unable to swerve away, the driver crashes the vehicle. The group is thus stranded in the middle of nowhere, unable to get help. On the top of that, the place they’re in seems to be haunted or has that creepy, eerie aura to it. Then they start getting killed one after another.

A rather clichéd plot for a horror movie, repeated multiple times over the years, right? Well, that’s what the freshly released “A Classic Horror Story” on Netflix wants to tell you. The Italian horror film, for which altogether four different writers take credit, at first feels like it’s a serious spoof of some iconic horror movies. But when you learn these allusions to classic horror movies are deliberate, you know “A Classic Horror Story” is not your run-of-the-mill horror flick.

Roberto De Feo and Paolo Strippoli direct this modern production that is intentionally styled after many classic horror movies. Five strangers—Elisa (Matilda Anna Ingrid Lutz), Fabrizio (Francesco Russo), Riccardo (Peppino Mazzotta), Mark (Will Merrick), and Sofia (Yuliia Sobol)—find themselves in a lurch when the RV they are taking crashes in the middle of the road somewhere in southern Italy. Everyone survives, but they find themselves on a clearing in a dense forest which seems to be inhabited by a cult that worships something sinister and performs human sacrifices.

Narrating the movie’s story without giving out spoilers is almost impossible. The film starts as a typical horror show but by the time you reach the second half, it tells you it is definitely not so. It then twists and turns so much that you get bewildered by the quick changes. It is a strange amalgamation of some iconic horror movies, and infused with some modern motifs to create a stylistically driven horror film that is a visual treat.

The film’s technical aspects, although the movie is seemingly under-budget compared to most Hollywood productions, are well-covered and become its highlights. More than the storytelling itself. The overall schematics, including the terrific cinematography, lighting, color grading, and background music, make this an enjoyable watch because of the visual and aural vibes it gives.

But the efforts put in by the actors as well as the production crew are somewhat discredited by the four writers of the film. Maybe a classic case of ‘too many cooks.’ Trying to cut too many corners in the film gives it a ‘wrong turn’, from where it never comes back. The direction also cannot save the film from going haywire.

To make matters worse, there are very few scary moments in the whole film. The makers have taken inspiration from classic horror movies but seem to have forgotten to emulate their shock factors. Even the ‘slasher film’ type of sequences lack the brutality and without much ingenuity, the film starts to bore by the time it reaches the second half. The makers keep the film short at 1hr 35mins and this is probably one of the wisest decisions they’ve made in making this film.

Who should watch it?

For those less acquainted with the niche world of hard-core horror films and those who prefer far less blood and gore than typical slasher flicks, A Classic Horror Story will not disappoint. It has all the elements to make for an interesting horror film, just not enough for someone whose toddler watches scary scenes from “Annabelle” and “The Nun” more than nursery rhymes.

Rating: 2.5 stars
Genre: Horror, thriller
Director: Roberto De Feo, Paolo Strippoli
Actors: Matilda Anna Ingrid Lutz, Francesco Russo, Peppino Mazzotta, Yuliia Sobol
Run time: 1hr 35mins