FJ Kashmir

inam ul rehman Baramulla is a haunting thriller and different from The Kashmir Files . We know Pandits were driven out from Kashmir, but produced and written by Pandits, the movie itself is empathetic to characters. It does not weaponise that deracination.   Any Muslim who stands for Pandits in the movie is shot dead.   The director weaves the story with supernatural and psychological elements, reminiscent of Ram Gopal Verma ’s Raat movie, but does not match its eeriness. It is an emotional, socio-political allegorical movie directed by Aditya Suhas Jambhale. The film uses the allegory of ghosts and families to depict the inner conflict of Kashmiris struggling with its past. Set in 2016, it shows the complexity of Kashmiris where the father fights against militants, but his own daughter terms him traitor to the Kashmir cause, an MLA takes oath on the Indian constitution , but his own son is against the same system. The father and daughter, father and son duo, divided ...

  inam ul rehman   I think the last film I reviewed for any newspaper or portal was Vishal Bhradwaj’s Haider. And it was in 2014. One of my colleagues at that time, and one of the brilliant journalists of Kashmir, Mir Hilal , on reading it said that it is a rant rather than a review. I disagreed and published it. Now I agree with what Mir Hilal said.   Eleven years later here I am reviewing “ Songs of Paradise ” of Danish Renzu . A Kashmiri filmmaker’s inspirational take on the melody queen of music, Raja Begum. Remember, it is not a historical take, but an inspirational one. It is historically as correct as Salim-Anarkali stories of Bollywood , or Padmawat , the Kashmir files, Chhaava movies .  Getting sponsors for a female protagonist film is tough. In Indian cinema only a few commercial films have succeeded with a female lead. These have mostly been driven by the star power of an actress. And some even needed male star power to get wide release. Alia...

inam ul rehman It is a mid-summer afternoon. People are mostly scattered to their workplaces and for labourer class it is lunchtime. Hardworking labourer parents are taking their lunch when their four-year-old child wanders on the street alone. He has taken to this street multiple times along with his parents. The kid believes the street belongs to him. It is safe to move around. Suddenly a stray dog comes in front of him, the innocent child smiles and keeps walking. The dog barks at him again, which startles the child. The kid does not know what to do as the stray dog is joined by a few more dogs. Then one dog pushes this child on the ground. A dog gnaws its teeth in his yet to be developed flesh, the other dog catches his limb and tears away his soft flesh. A few puppies also enter into the frame. The child is screaming but urban noise dwarfs his. The dogs drag him beneath the bonnet of the car. Then we see his body in a hospital bed. Mauled .   The child was just another num...

 inam ul rehman  On August 3, I visited a book fair titled Chinar Book Festival organised by the National Book Trust of India at the expansive SKICC lawns. The moment I stepped into the shamiyana erected at the back lawns, I was hit by suffocating heat, stale air, posters of politicians, and hundreds of government schoolchildren darting about — not for books, but for keychains and snacks. I kept wondering: why do politicians need to inaugurate a book fair? Why must everything be politicised? Inside, the heat was unbearable and the chaos created by school children worse — stall after stall lined with pirated books. I don’t know why school children were dragged into this? Is it for footfalls to show that the book fair attracted everyone? To put this book fair into perspective, the weekly book market at Mahila Haat, Daryagunj in New Delhi outmatches this in size and genuine offerings.  Apart from a handful of genuine stalls mostly run by the locals, the rest were f...

inam ul rehman  On Saturday, July 19, I went to the Tourist Reception Centre ground to watch a soccer match played in the floodlights.  Both the entry and parking are free. As I entered the ground, the stadium was packed with people of all ages, but only a few women and girls were present. People were cheering for their favourite teams, I could sense by their diction that the crowd consisted of people from rural areas as well.  It was a different experience to see a huge number of people watching a local soccer match. Children as young as five to 10 years old were moving up and down the aisle, cheering and jubilant in their parents’ company.   As my eyes scanned to spot a place to watch the match my mind went to the 2008 event, when thousands thronged to the same place, which at that time had not yet been bifurcated into two playgrounds. Then also it was called TRC ground . In 2008, as a rookie journalist I went to cover an event, where thousands of people cong...

inam ul rehman  After watching the trailer of Sitaare Zameen Par , I instantly thought Aamir Khan is going to rock it with this movie.  However, what piqued my curiosity was to see the comment section where a few pointed out that the actor-producer has again made a remake ¬¬¬- this time of the 2018 Spanish film “ Champions ”! While his last two films were duds at the box office, particularly Laal Singh Chaddha , an official remake of the beautiful Hollywood movie, Forrest Gump , which meandered due to his histrionics.    So, the next thing was to find the Spanish film online. Obviously, YouTube is the first stop. There I found out this Spanish film has been remade in many languages, but sadly, couldn’t locate the movie. I sought help from my sophisticated colleague who directed me toward a website with rich content in high quality. There I saw the original version.  And man, Aamir Khan has chosen a gem of a movie.  The original movie is not didactic abou...

  inam ul rehman   On April 22, I was with my colleagues in the interiors of Kupwara shooting a documentary. From 9am to 4:30pm we shot nonstop, not even taking a tea, lunch, or loo break. We got exhausted and decided to pack up, as is our wont we switched to social media to see what was happening around.    One of my colleagues informed me that a grenade attack had taken place in the tourist resort of Pahalgam , resulting in many injuries. We were hungry and didn’t pay much heed to it. As we were busy locating a place where we could have lunch-cum-supper, we had to travel a further half an hour to finally zero in on a roadside dhaba.    After satiating our hunger, we logged into our social media and were shell shocked to find out 26 tourists had been murdered by militants! For a moment, we all looked at each other in askance. Not knowing what to say. We quietly boarded our vehicle.  It was the driver of our hired vehicle who broached the topic. ...