Diljit Dosanjh plays the titular character, a quirky sleuth with charm and wit. While he brings his trademark likability, the character often slips into caricature, which takes some weight away from the mystery. Diana Penty’s role feels underwritten.

French Cambodian director Rithy Panh has often cited the genocidal regime of the Khmer Rouge, which killed his family and from which he escaped, as the reason he’s a filmmaker. His movies aren’t always directly about that wretched time. But when they are — as is his most memorable achievement, the Oscar-nominated 2013 documentary “The Missing Picture,” which re-imagined personal memories using clay-figurine dioramas — one senses a grand mosaic being assembled piece by piece linking devastation, aftermath and remembrance, never to be finished, only further detailed.

His latest is the coolly observed and tense historical drama “Meeting With Pol Pot,” which premiered last year at Cannes. It isn’t autobiographical, save its fictionalization of a true story that happened concurrent to his childhood trauma: the Khmer Rouge inviting a trio of Western journalists to witness their proclaimed agrarian utopia and interview the mysterious leader referred to by his people as “Brother No. 1.” Yet even this political junket, which took place in 1978, couldn’t hide a cruel, violent truth from its guests, the unfolding of which Panh is as adept at depicting from the viewpoint of an increasingly horrified visitor as from that of a long-scarred victim.

The movie stars Irène Jacob, whose intrepid French reporter Lise — a perfect role for her captivating intelligence — is modeled after the American journalist Elizabeth Becker who was on that trip, and whose later book about Cambodia and her experience, “When the War Was Over,” inspired the screenplay credited to Panh and Pierre Erwan Guillaume. Lise is joined by an ideologically motivated Maoist professor named Alain (Grégoire Colin), quick to enthusiastically namedrop some of their hosts as former school chums in France when they were wannabe revolutionaries. (The character of Alain is based on British academic Malcolm Caldwell, an invitee alongside Becker.) Also there is eagle-eyed photojournalist Paul (Cyril Gueï), who shares Lise’s healthy skepticism and a desire to learn what’s really happening, especially regarding rumors of disappeared intellectuals.

With sound, pacing and images, Panh readily establishes a mood of charged, contingent hospitality, a veneer that seems ready to crack: from the unsettlingly calm opening visual of this tiny French delegation waiting alone on an empty sun-hot tarmac to the strange, authoritarian formality in everything that’s said and shown to them via their guide Sung (Bunhok Lim). Life is being scripted for their microphones and cameras and flanked by armed, blank-faced teenagers. The movie’s square-framed cinematography, too, reminiscent of a staged newsreel, is another subtle touch — one imagines Panh rejecting widescreen as only feeding this evil regime’s view of its own righteous grandiosity.

Only Alain seems eager to ignore the disinformation and embrace this Potemkin village as the real deal (except when his eyes show a gathering concern). But the more Lise questions the pretense of a happily remade society, the nervier everything gets. And when Paul manages to elude his overseers and explore the surrounding area — spurring a frantic search, the menacing tenor of which raises Lise’s hackles — the movie effectively becomes a prison drama, with the trio’s eventual interviewee depicted as a shadowy warden who can decide their fate.

Journalism has never been more under threat than right now and “Meeting with Pol Pot” is a potent reminder of the profession’s value — and inherent dangers — when it confronts and exposes facades. But this eerily elegiac film also reflects its director’s soulful sensibility regarding the mass tragedy that drives his aesthetic temperament, never more so than when he re-deploys his beloved hand-crafted clay figurines for key moments of witnessed atrocity, or threads in archival footage, as if to maintain necessary intimacy between rendering and reality.

Power shields its misdeeds with propaganda, but Panh sees such murderous lies clearly, giving them an honest staging, thick with echoes.

Director Phanindra Narsetti’s 8 Vasantalu possesses attributes rare for most Telugu films lately — ambition, conviction, and a distinct sense of originality. It seeks to be a meditative tale that charts the evolution of a girl through love. Mounted on a dreamy canvas, set in a mist-laden Ooty, narrated across seasons, Nature remains witness to her story, and the film aspires to be poetry in motion.

The protagonist, Shuddhi Ayodhya (Ananthika Sanilkumar), is also a 17-year-old poet who learns martial arts from an ailing guru. The director flips the gender dynamic in an opening sequence reminiscent of a quintessential mass film. Shuddhi puts a brash US-returnee, Varun (Hanu Reddy), in his place after he claims that embroidery is a woman’s domain and martial arts are best left to men.

His sexist remark is met with a sharp thud, the message is clear. Yet, she also reminds him that real strength lies in self-restraint. And, the boy is smitten. But Shuddhi isn’t your average teenager. She’s already the author of a bestselling poetry collection and is on a two-year journey across India to write a book, a plea to the world to appreciate a woman for her virtues rather than her appearance.

Other characters also make their presence felt. Shuddhi’s friend Karthik (Kanna) has a passion for shoe design, much to the disapproval of his orthodox father. Varun, while leading the life his father had only dreamt of, is crumbling under the pressure of fulfilling that wish, securing admission to Berklee. His father takes a loan from a friend to fund his son’s luxurious lifestyle.

Barring an underdeveloped female character named Anita, the director makes a sincere attempt to flesh out his characters’ ideals and inner worlds. While the stories of the men (Karthik, Varun and Sanjay who appears later) are endearing and display some vulnerability, Shuddhi is too idealistic, sorted, and overachieving for a teenager. Almost no setback dents her spirit.

While the plot has all the ingredients of a sweeping romance told through the lens of a woman who is worthy of admiration, the storytelling lacks grounding, and the impact is diluted by self-indulgent dialogue. Every event becomes an excuse to reinforce Shuddhi’s unwavering spirit, a pursuit that grows tiring after a point.

It’s hard not to appreciate the pre-interval sequence where Shuddhi speaks of how her mother raised her like a queen, and why she deserves to be treated with dignity (in a breakup). Moments later, at a funeral, she questions the patriarchy, pointing out the irony of a woman, capable of giving birth, being barred from performing final rites.

Pertinent points are raised throughout the film, but they often land flat cinematically. The film finds its footing in a striking action sequence in Varanasi, where Shuddhi unshackles the beast within. All hell breaks loose as the motifs of a tigress and Durga roar to life. Her profound reflections at the Taj Mahal are potent in thought, but their impact is dulled by excess dialogue.

Shuddhi’s love stories with Varun and the Telugu author Sanjay (Ravi Duggirala) have interesting parallels. However, with Sanjay, the director goes overboard in validating his ideas and belief systems.

The metafictional subplot around Sanjay’s novel Rani Malini (about a prostitute who reclaims her agency) is ideologically compelling but disrupts the film’s momentum. The narrative eventually regains some lost ground with Sanjay’s poignant backstory, with a surprise twist, offering a nostalgic nod to the era of love letters and providing insight into the title.

Amid all the tall standards the protagonist sets for herself, it’s difficult to imagine why she would entertain her mother’s idea to marry into a wealthy family, albeit reluctantly. Despite its shortcomings, 8 Vasantalu isn’t a lazy effort. It has a surreal visual texture (cinematography by Vishwanath Reddy) and a story that has a lot to unpack; just that the balance doesn’t come through effectively.

For instance, the parallel shots of Varun and Shuddhi spending sleepless nights as they come to terms with their feelings for each other are a sight to behold. The imagery of a fallen rose petal, symbolising how love breaks and heals Shuddhi, is quietly poignant. Even the title credits, where her journey is shown in reverse, linger long after the film ends.

Much like the director’s earlier film Manu, it doesn’t know where to stop. While his debut effort was way more cinematically rich, the bloated writing in 8 Vasantalu, where the conversations sound like discourses, dents the overall impact.

Conceptually, the film’s characters, at times, feel like figments of the writer’s imagination rather than beings of flesh and blood, ones we struggle to identify with. Though the little details that complete their world are impressive, more effort could have gone into integrating them with the narrative seamlessly. Even the visuals of Ooty, Kashmir, get a tad too touristy.

Ananthika Sanilkumar gracefully embodies the fiery spirit that Shuddhi is, making every attempt to internalise her resilience and trauma. Hanu Reddy, as the hopelessly lovestruck teenager, has a raw, captivating screen presence. Ravi Duggirala’s character graph is impressive, though his performance has scope for improvement. Kanna Pasunoori is a fine find, and Sanjana Hardageri shows promise in an underwrought part.

It’s surprising that a love story with a plethora of emotions has only two songs, composed by Hesham Abdul Wahab, as part of its album. ‘Parichayamila’, sung by K. S. Chitra, is a melody for the ages. The vibrant, varied costumes, in sync with the film’s mood, are another high point.

Despite its merits, 8 Vasantalu is like a poem that’s too conscious of its style, overstuffed at times, right in its intent but lacking in warmth.

Published – June 20, 2025 03:52 pm IST