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For the Nepali OTT audience, the most talked about topic besides Dashain for the past couple of weeks has probably been Netflix’s South Korean thriller series “Squid Game.” An average Nepali Netflix subscriber has probably talked about the series and its eccentricities on social media, at least once. So, I chose not to review it because i) You’ll probably have talked about it too much for my review to make any impact, and ii) The series is too mind-boggling for me to review in the limited space I get.

So instead of the Korean survival drama, I decided to go even darker and watch/review an American supernatural horror series called “Midnight Mass.” But first, let me reiterate how much I love mini-series because of their brevity and because they end in the same season, without leaving loose ends and making you wait another year for the next season.

Created and directed by Mike Flanagan, the miniseries Midnight Mass centers on Crockett Island—a small, isolated fishing village with a sparse population where everyone knows everyone else. The tight-knit community on the island is devoutly Catholic, except for its new sheriff, Sheriff Hassan (Rahul Kohli), and his son Ali (Rahul Abbur), who are Muslims.

In a town without many violent incidents in the past, Sheriff Hassan does have to deal with a bit of racism and also religious discrimination initially, but not for long. Bigger problems await him and the islanders. After the arrival of Father Paul Hill (Hamish Linklater), as a sudden replacement for the town’s aged Monsignor Pruitt, things start getting eerie. For starters, hundreds of dead cats—murdered—are discovered along the beach, the very next day of Father Hill’s arrival. Some island residents also start seeing a mysterious creature lurking in the shadows at night.

Also read: Ankhon Dekhi movie review: Underrated and under-watched

Quickly, incident after incident leads the townsfolk to believe there is something religious happening. Leeza Scarborough (Annarah Cymone)—who has been paralyzed after a hunting incident and has to use a wheelchair—starts walking at the behest of Father Hill at the church on Sunday Mass. This leaves the town of devout Catholics in a frenzy as they start believing in a religious revival.

Led by the church’s fervent parishioner Bev Keane (Samantha Sloyan), the residents of Crockett Island rejoice in religious fervor, only to find that they’ll soon be visited by a figure from the Bible, someone they never expected. That’s when the whole town is immersed in horrors of biblical measures, followed by deaths and grievances.

The seven episodes of Midnight Mass are named after the respective books from the Bible, starting with Genesis and ending with Revelations. Each episode unfolds systematically, in coherence with its name. The miniseries is the brainchild and reportedly a ‘passion project’ of Mike Flanagan, who has had a proven track record of scaring the audience with horror stories like “The Haunting of Hill House” and “The Haunting of Bly Manor,” both available on Netflix.

Although both his ‘Haunting’ horror series had some religious connections, with Midnight Mass, Flanagan directly enters the realm of the Christian Bible. For someone not so acquainted with the inner workings of Christianity, deciphering the conversations in the series could be a problem though. It was the same for me and I had to use Google to get some of the references. And the film also shattered my lifelong belief of what an ‘angel’ would be like. A bit of a spoiler because it’s necessary—Midnight Mass’s angel is no friend of humanity and has no feathery wings and a halo around its head. 

Who should watch it?

With each episode around the one-hour mark, Midnight Mass is slow and even snoozy at times. But that’s only when you stop paying attention to every detail and projection. Otherwise, the series gives you all the expected thrills and chills. So, for lovers of the genre, some Catholic horror right after Dashain would be a good watch.

Midnight Mass 

Rating: 3.5 stars
Genre: Horror
Actors: Rahul Kohli, Rahul Abburi, Samantha Sloyan
Director: Mike Flanagan
Run time: 7hrs 40mins

Romance isn’t my thing. In real life and in books. But I’m more than willing to make an exception for Talia Hibbert. She is a magician. She takes tried and tested tropes and comes up with absolutely stunning masterpieces. I read ‘Get a Life, Chloe Brown’ because so many of my friends were talking/posting about it. Despite my initial skepticism of the genre, I got sucked into the story and it was a happy time. I read the second book in the three-part series this Dashain and it really helped me cope with festival-induced stress.

I was in a good space mentally, constantly thinking about Danika or Dani and Zafir, the main characters of Hibbert’s ‘Take a Hint, Dani Brown’. This charming story about a young woman who agrees to fake date her friend after a video of him ‘rescuing’ her goes viral was named one of the best romances of 2020 by Buzzfeed, Amazon, Bustle, Washington Post, NPR, Kirkus, among many others. Indeed, it’s an exciting story, with some really steamy scenes and heartwarming instances that leave you with the happy kind of butterflies-in-your tummy feeling.

PhD student Danika Brown thinks romantic partners are distractions. She prefers friends-with-benefits. She prays for it too—a sign from the universe that a particular someone could be that person. When a security guard at Dani’s workplace, Zafir Ansari, rescues Dani from a fire drill gone wrong, Dani thinks there couldn’t be a bigger and clearer sign. Then the viral video has the two ‘pretending’ to be romantically involved but feelings run deep on both sides. However, neither is sure of the other’s feelings and doesn’t want to do anything to sabotage their ‘fake’ relationship. Dani fears being in an actual relationship will shift her focus from work. Zafir is a hopeless romantic but he has issues of his own that stop him from getting too close to anyone.

Also read: I’m Thinking of Ending Things book review: Feels like a fever dream

The ending is predictable (obviously, and you wouldn’t want it any other way) but it’s the journey that has your heart racing. Dani and Zafir’s shenanigans made me giggle, roll my eyes, and laugh out loud. The friends-to-lovers trope is so well executed that it doesn’t feel cliché at all. And Dani and Zafir are such loveable characters. You want them to be your friends. No other characters, of the romance genre at least, have had such an impact on me till now. (Wait, did I say that for Chloe and Redford from ‘Get a Life, Chloe Brown’ as well?).

And no, you don’t have to have read Get a Life, Chloe Brown to pick this one up (though I recommend you do) as it is a complete novel in itself. I’m super excited about ‘Act Your Age, Eve Brown’, the story of the youngest Brown sister, but I have a strong feeling that out of the three sisters, Dani will always be my favorite.

Take a Hint Dani Brown

Four stars
Fiction
Talia Hibbert
Publisher: Avon
Published: 2020
Pages: 400, Paperback

Would you laugh at me if I said I bought ‘I’m Thinking of Ending Things’ by Iain Reid because I just loved the book’s cover and feel? The slim volume felt so nice in my hands. I was holding the book the entire time I was browsing at the Pilgrims Book House in Jhamsikhel, Lalitpur. When it was time to pay for the other three books I had selected, I couldn’t put I’m Thinking of Ending Things back on the shelf. So, I had the cashier ring it up as well. I had already watched the film adaptation by the Oscar winner Charlie Kaufman and it hadn’t made much sense to me. I hadn’t enjoyed the dark and dreary setting. But the book was a lot better than the movie, albeit as confusing.

The story is about an unnamed woman who has been dating a dullish man called Jake for about six weeks when the two decide to go visit Jake’s parents. Now, she doesn’t really know why she’s doing it considering she’s thinking of ending things. She feels like she has sleepwalked into it all and that the two of them, despite the initial attraction, aren’t meant to be together. But still, she finds herself in the car, on a road trip. Here we get to see what she likes about Jake and the two talk about things like memories, faith, the importance of relationships, and how everything is multifaceted. Their conversations give you a lot to think about.

Also read: The Silent Patient book review: Absolutely riveting

Throughout the trip, the woman keeps getting phone calls. But she doesn’t answer them. She keeps making excuses—it’s just her friend calling, she’ll talk to her later or the battery is about to die—and lets the call go to voicemail. You get the sense something is off long before the actual horror begins. There are no other cars on the road, and when they finally reach their destination, all the houses are burnt out or dilapidated.

Though Jake says his parents are expecting them for dinner, the house is in complete darkness. It all feels chillingly sinister. Jake displays awkward behavior time and again. There were times when I felt that had I been in the narrator’s place, I would have jumped out of the car and run screaming. Then, Reid also makes you question the narrator: Is she reliable? The novel takes a horrific turn when the couple stop for dessert (in the middle of a snowstorm) on their way back and then make a detour (to dump the empty containers).

I’m Thinking of Ending Things feels like a fever dream. The claustrophobic setting makes it frighteningly good. Reid’s sparse prose and a dialogue driven narrative keep you hooked. What you know gives you goosebumps yet you wish Reid had told you more. They say you shouldn’t judge a book by its cover but just this once I’m glad I did.

I’m Thinking of Ending Things

3.5 stars 
Fiction
Iain Reid
Published: 2016
Publisher: Scout Press
Pages: 216

YouTube is a strange place. Here, a video of someone eating a bowl of noodles (mukbang) can get over two million views while a gem of a movie, made using a considerable amount of time, resources and artistry fails to get even a fraction of that attention. Viewership is unpredictable and were it not for its algorithm that leads the user towards videos based on their past preferences, I for one would not be spending as much time on it.

On the long list of works of art that have not gotten the attention they deserve is the 2015 Hindi-language drama “Ankhon Dekhi.” Released on Shemaroo Movies’ official YouTube channel more than a month ago, the film has just over 80,000 followers while the channel itself has over 17.8 million subscribers. So criminally undiscovered.

Written and directed by Rajat Kapoor, who has an amazing filmography of offbeat, unorthodox, low-budget treasures, Ankhon Dekhi is another feather in the cap of the filmmaker as well as its entire cast of talented actors. Unlike most Bollywood movies banking on their lead actors, the film is a team-effort of an ensemble cast who won many awards and accolades for the film when it released.

Rajesh aka Bauji (Sanjay Mishra) is a patriarch of a big, extended family living in congested confines of a small house in old Delhi. An event in his life leads him to decide that from then onwards, he would believe only what he sees. But the figurative “believe only in your own eyes” becomes literal and his new-formed eccentricity starts making life difficult for him and his family.

Bauji takes his family and friends on a new adventure in life with his only-believe-in-what-you-see theory as he starts denouncing God and everything he previously believed in. Basically a summation of comedy of errors, the film has its darker sides and an ending left to the audience’s interpretation.

Also read: Kate movie review: Old wine in new style

Veteran actors Sanjay Mishra, Rajat Kapoor, Seema Pahwa and Saurabh Shukla join a lesser-known ensemble of actors to create magic. The storyline gets absurd and abstract at times but the natural performance of actors and honest storytelling do not let the film lose its realistic shape. Every character is given a specific role and their combined contributions culminate in what has to be one of the finest Hindi movies.

Ankhon Dekhi is not only a film that entertains but also a visual treat that shares an idea with the audience. As a society, we have been so used to taking small bits of information for granted that we do not even question the integrity of the source. For us to believe someone is good or evil, we do not even need to see the person for ourselves. We are fed this information by the people and society around us and nurtured to believe in collective thoughts and opinions. Bauji, our protagonist, tries to break this shackle of mis/information and finds himself in all kinds of troubles, at the same time liberating himself from what he sees as lies he had been believing all his life.

Another factor that adds to the charm of Ankhon Dekhi’s unorthodox storytelling is the music which is melodious yet unique and again, criminally undiscovered. Composed by Saagar Desai, lyrics written by Varun Grover and sung mostly by Kailash Kher, the film’s score is based on Hindustani classical music but with a fusion of modern rhythms. Composer Desai takes the storytelling knack of Rajat Kapoor to create music that co-narrates the story of Ankhon Dekhi. Granted that the songs are not catchy, but they were not meant to be. Not all good music is supposed to be consumed like cookies by the masses and Ankhon Dekhi’s score is a prime example of that.

Who should watch it?

Ankhon Dekhi is a beautiful film that deploys comedy to deal with an existential question. The storytelling, acting, cinematography and music are top notch, and typical of Rajat Kapoor and his team. So for anyone who’s enjoyed Rajat Kapoor’s works, it’s a must-watch. For the unacquainted, you will still thoroughly enjoy the film and go on to explore more of his works.

Ankhon Dekhi

4 stars
On YouTube
Drama
Cast: Sanjay Mishra, Seema Bhargava, Rajat Kapoor
Director: Rajat Kapoor