“Bhakti Is A Matter of Fire and Blood’: Jerry Pinto on Translating Bhakti Poetry, Its Challenges, Rewards, and Cultural Bridges
It is hard to find a form of writing that Jerry Pinto does not revel in. He started as a poet. His 2006 biography of the Bollywood dancing star Helen (Helen: The Life and Times of A Bollywood H-Bomb) changed that. These light-hearted literary avatars were pushed aside by the tender
Filmmakers Vikramaditya Motwane and Dibakar Banerjee are Playing a Tricky Game of Hide-And-Seek with Their Messages
A subtle film is also a misunderstood film. While speaking to the director Vikramaditya Motwane at a Q&A session after a screening of Indi(r)a’s Emergency—his documentary on Indira Gandhi and the clamping of both freedom and sperm ducts under her and her son Sanjay Gandhi’s forceful thumb between 1975 and
Baba, Bollywood, Bishnoi and Brand Mumbai: How a Politician’s Murder Shook Mumbai’s Power Corridors
In this photograph taken in July 2013, then Congress leader Baba Siddique is flanked by actors Salman Khan and Shah Rukh Khan at an Iftar party in Mumbai. | Photo Credit: PTI This story has all the elements of a crime thriller. Former Maharashtra minister Baba Siddique (66) was killed
Book Review of 2024 JCB Prize Longlist The Distaste of the Earth
Exotic Landscape (1910), oil on canvas by Henri Rousseau. | Photo Credit: Wiki Commons Kynpham Sing Nongkynrih’s enigmatically titled new book, The Distaste of the Earth, retells a Khasi folktale of star-crossed love. Similar to Funeral Nights (Context, 2021), which offered a documentation of the Khasi people’s traditional stories and cultural practices tied around
How Watching Films Influences Perceptions and Emotions: The Impact of Cinema in Society
Watching a documentary film about a wrongly incercerated man caused participants in a study to be more supportive of reforms to the US criminal justice system. | Photo Credit: STRF/STAR MAX/IPx/picture alliance Storytelling is about changing minds. Film is no different: since the first moving pictures in the 1890s, filmmakers