ugly movie review in hindi

Ugly (2013)

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Ugly review: A dark, gripping movie that is a must watch

Watch ugly for its cinematic brilliance; for a simple, touching and mind-blowing message. watch it for ronit roy, rahul bhatt and vineet kumar singh. but skip the movie if blood and shootout are all you want to see in an anurag kashyap venture..

Ronit Roy, Rahul Bhatt, Surveen Chawla, Tejaswini Kolhapure

Anurag Kashyap

Ugly won't make your Christmas merry: it is a simple, hard-hitting and dark movie. It shows you how we mess up our own lives because of ego, jealousy and misunderstood notions of people around us.

Director Anurag Kashyap earned critical acclaim two years ago for Gangs of Wasseypur, a movie about greed and violence in small-town India. Ugly is set in Mumbai and if not more powerful than Gangs of Wasseypur it is definitely worthy of featuring somewhere on top of Kashyap's best films' list. For a film written and directed by Kashyap, actors like Ronit Roy and Vineet Kumar Singh (Gangs of Wasseypur) are added advantage.

Ugly does not have over-loaded music, loud background or any of those cliches most Bollywood films survive on. And, without the help of any of these formuale, it still manages to put across its message. Ugly traces a week into the lives of people around a ten-year-old girl Kali (Anshika Shrivastava) who is kidnapped. Unlike Kashyap's movies, Ugly does not have too much of political and social innuendos. This one is about human follies and emotions.

Ronit Roy plays Shoumik Bose, a character who is indifferent to the people he loves the most. He is brilliant in the movie and for once he is not playing an alcoholic (Udaan) or wife-beater (2 States).

Rahut Bhatt is convincing as the bashed-up unmployed man, waiting for the big break in Bollywood and losing all of his personal relations (wife and the kid) in the process. The character of Surveen Chawla, on the other hand, looks forced. Ugly was meant to be her debut movie as well but due to delay in the release, Sushant Singh-Jay Bhanushali-starrer Hate Story 2 was what hit theatres earlier. Chawla is a little over-the-top as a model-actor who is happy changing her partners for the sake of money and is forever decked up in startling blue lipstick and eye-shadow. Tejaswini Kolhapure plays a battered wife and brings out the pain of a barren life perfectly.

Unlike the Kashyap-style that we know, Ugly does not have excessive violence. Rather than blood and gunshots all over the screen, all we see is the turmoil of a character just before violence. By using blank screens and abrupt cuts, Kashyap manages to keep the suspense alive and bring across crucial twists.

SPOILERS AHEAD

Sample some of the characters where Kahsyap brings out the worst human follies:

A struggling actor's wife and child leave him because he cannot provide for them well. He is allowed to meet his daughter only once a week. He also happens to be the one who left her all alone when she is kidnapped. The scenes of father's pain and struggle with guilt prove Kashyap's brilliance as director. When the father rushes to the police station, he is told, "Humein kya pata, tune apni beti ko gayab karwaya hai." The man cannot be expected to think rationally but he does. Because for once, he might be able to pull off his responsibilities towards the estranged wife and kid. Painting the man's struggle with one's own follies to prove to himself that he is not worthless is what Kashyap achieves with Ugly.

A woman is married to a top police officer but all she has got is the social benefits of getting married. She is well provided for, but does not have money of her own. His husband taps her phone and listens to her conversations along with his colleagues. The suffocation of a marriage that happened out of convenience and has now turned into a liability. A husband who tells you, "Do peg laga ke so jaao," when you tell him you feel alone is scary.

A friend who has never really been much of a friend and yet has been tagging along all your life. A friend who does not think twice before using your problem to solve his issues, even if it means trouble for you.

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Directed by Anurag Kashyap

A team of the best cops in Mumbai is dispatched to find a girl who has gone missing from her father's car. As the hunt for the kidnapper begins, fingers suspiciously point to closer home.

Ronit Roy Rahul Bhat Vineet Kumar Singh Tejaswini Kolhapure Girish Kulkarni Surveen Chawla Siddhanth Kapoor Abir Goswami Anshika Shrivastava Madhavi Singh Saharsh Kumar Shukla Alia Bhatt

Director Director

Anurag Kashyap

Producers Producers

Anurag Kashyap Vikramaditya Motwane Vikas Bahl Madhu Mantena Varma Vivek B Agrawal Arun Rangachari Vivek Rangachari

Writer Writer

Casting casting.

Mukesh Chhabra Mandar Gosavi

Editor Editor

Aarti Bajaj

Cinematography Cinematography

Nikos Andritsakis

Assistant Directors Asst. Directors

Karuna Dutt Saqib Pandor Vyshakh RV

Art Direction Art Direction

Mayur Sharma

Stunts Stunts

Sham Kaushal

Composers Composers

G. V. Prakash Kumar Brian McOmber

Sound Sound

Mandar Kulkarni Pranit Purao

Costume Design Costume Design

Divvya Gambhir Nidhi Gambhir

Phantom Films DAR Motion Pictures

Primary Language

Spoken languages.

Hindi Marathi

Releases by Date

17 may 2013, 26 dec 2014, releases by country.

• Theatrical A

128 mins   More at IMDb TMDb Report this page

Popular reviews

Review by Michael James ★★★½ 2

A gripping dark thriller from Anurag Kashyap, who smartly takes a straightforward kidnap situation, throws in some interestingly written ambiguous characters and manages to hold the suspense throughout, while at the same time reflecting on the various dark shades of emotions. The whodunit setup isn’t about its investigative thrills, but rather an exploration into the ugly moral psyche of humans, making it a much more interesting watch.

Review by Arsaib Gilbert ★★★★ 6

[ Favorites—2010s ] [ Anurag Kashyap: Ranked ] [ Indian Cinema: 2010s ]

It would be an understatement to say that Ugly more than lives up to its title. The latest from Anurag Kashyap, one of the finest Indian filmmakers working today, is set in a dark and decadent world filled with immoral, selfish and spiteful people, each desperately tying not only to outdo the other but also to overcome his or her own past failures—by any means necessary.

There’s Ronit Roy’s police-chief Shoumik Bose, a chauvinistic and brutal individual who records his wife’s phone conversations and hasn’t forgotten about a slight he experienced years ago in college. There’s Rahul Bhat’s Rahul Kapoor, a struggling, indebted actor who is always willing to take his frustrations out…

Review by su_sain ★★★½ 12

Can we say, Bagal mai chhora (chhori) , aur gaon mai dhindhora ??? 🤧

Review by Milez Das (Rohit Shivdas) ★★★★ 3

Anurag Kashyap is right now Bollywood's most influential director. His last few films have changed the image of cinema in India. Independent movies are being made and even appreciated by the audience.

Even as a Producer he has brought many great films to light. But Ugly is not a light movie...

I missed the chance to watch this movie on the big screen. so I had to wait for a month and half to watch it on blu ray alone.

Ugly is a story termed with selfishness, ego, money and politics. For the runtime of 140 minuted the movie revolves around it. It just get deeper and uglier and I had to accept that sometimes human's forget who they really…

Review by HBSpade ★★★★½ 4

It is probably a testament to Kashyap and his team’s film-making skill that Ugly remains gripping throughout its 2hr runtime, despite every. single. fucking. character being the kind that makes you immediately want to take a shower after coming into contact with them. It helps that he populates this film with a greater percentage of actors over mere children of actors.

A 10-yr old girl goes missing, setting off a web of interlinked events involving the people in her immediate periphery.

The father, a deadbeat wannabe actor, washed up before he ever began, taking his frustration out on everything around him; the mother, a soulless husk of a woman completely defeated by constant abuse from the men in her life…

Review by Homelander ★★★★

the way this film explores the greed inside every human is disgusting and so fuckin true at the same time, the ending broke me, this is what cinema is.

Review by Abhinav C ★★★★

The ugliest truth about Bollywood cinema industry is that this movie never got the appreciation of anyone's eye .

This movie is an art of how ugly we all are!! Anurag Kashyap's Underrated Masterpiece!

Review by Shahzaann ★★★★

There has never been a title so accurate.

. Filled with amazing performances.Humans are so ugly. . This is Kashyap in his truest essence. . Kashyap as a writer is brilliant. . Such a powerful climax.Absolute chills.Excellent music. . Well there are some loop holes to the plot, and it gets messy at places, still a worth watch for people who love thrilers.

Review by Mike Apps🍿 ★★★★½ 5

This review may contain spoilers. I can handle the truth.

Mystery thrillers suck these days! The "mystery" in question lacks real intrigue, and the "thriller" lacks suspense. The problem seems to be directors failing to engage their audience. We roll our eyes at the obvious red herrings, waiting for the director to arrive at the conclusion we've already seen coming a mile away. A good mystery sows doubt, makes us question the characters we've come to know, until we form a theory in our heads that is then flipped like a burger. Writer-director Anurag Kashyap understands this better than most.

His film Ugly is basically a story about a kidnapped girl and the attempts to find her and nab the kidnappers. But that's all on the surface - the real…

Review by nik0teen ★★★★

mfs be like "fuck i lost my kid" and then just forget

Review by olivia ★★★ 9

crazy how the most messed up and abusive person in this movie is also the least evil out of all the characters ... a truly illuminating case study of the "ugliness" of the world, hence the reason for the movie title, i'm guessing. the plot is convoluted and there are entirely   too many subplots and characters to remember, but the emotional beats still do hit like they're supposed to, and the conclusion will haunt you in the end.

Review by Goliwadekar ★★★★ 8

Of kidnappings, desperation and ugliness.

An ugliness that seeps beneath all the glitter and glow of a metropolis is what we get to see a lot of here. A child of ten vanishes into thin air in broad daylight. What follows is a journey into the underbelly of Mumbai. The chief subject matter itself is not a pretty topic, but the film goes beyond just that and is more interested in its characters. The first big twist comes fairly early into the story as it subverts expectations.

During my first watch, although I liked the film, it felt very nihilistic with no redeeming value as everyone seemed ugly. My feelings are still is the same, except the fact that there…

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Ugly Movie Review - Morbid beauty

PUBLISHED DATE : 26/Dec/2014

Ameet Bhuvan

We all are inherently bad people who hide our ugliness behind social ties and bedroom doors. Nothing brings out the worst in us than helplessness and desperation.  It is in this space that Anurag  Kashyap's 'Ugly' resides and shines bright as his most accomplished work. Ugly is dark damp morbid and disturbing yet unflinchingly arresting.

A small girl all of ten years is kidnapped. Her father a failed actor, an alcoholic depressed divorcee mother and a regressive pretentious police officer husband are looking for her. There are other scum bags for characters who inhabit this dirty nasty universe. Each one of them are trying to extract their own personal rewards from a situation without being bothered about the lost girl. The entire film in fact is less a whodunit and more en exploration of the ugly sides to each of these people. 

As is his style Anurag shows no respect for any rules of how a Hindi film is meant to be : there is gore (all of it hinted at but enough to send shivers down your spine ) the treatment irreverent filled with dark satire that shocks and makes you uncomfortable. The ten minute scene between the father and police officer especially is funny but eventually makes you jolt and realise this is how real life is too. The electric eclectic background score accentuates the sense of despair and doom. 

So do the powerhouse performances. Bhat as the father. Ronit as the police man, Tejaswini as the mother everyone is pitch perfect. Vineeth and Surveen shine even in the limited screen time they have.

Ugly is not the usual cinema we are so used to. It is not entertainment. It is cinema that is not escapist and does not shy from disconcerting and disturbing you. The haunting climax stays long after one leaves the theatre. If this is your kind of cinema go for it. Ugly is a delight.

Rating: 3.5 / 5

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Ugly Hindi Movie Review (Anurag Kashyap)

Ugly  Rating:  3.47/5  From All the  reviews on the web Showing Top 9 Reviews

Ugly Hindi Movie Review

Rajeev Masand didn’t gave a review for this movie but called this 3rd best movie of 2014  Ratings :4/5  Review By:    Meena Iyer    Site:Times Of India (TOI)

Writer-director Anurag Kashyap is in top form in this suspense thriller that has you by the b…ls from the start. While the pace does dip in the second half, what makes Ugly tick is the searing honesty with which it is told. It’s not for the faint-hearted, but for those who are willing to let the morally decrepit live.

Visit  Site  for more Ratings :3/5  Review By:    Saibal Chaterjee   Site:NDTV

Ugly is about a bunch of perverse people fishing in troubled waters as the mystery of the missing girl deepens. The screenplay and the directorial methods are direct and realistic. Ugly works best when it focuses on the depression-afflicted woman who contemplates different ways of committing suicide. This may not be Anurag Kashyaps best film, but it is infinitely and indescribably better than all the muck that mainstream Bollywood passed off for entertainment this year.

Visit  Site  for more Ratings :4.5/5  Review By:    Raja Sen   Site:Rediff

Ugly is a tale of torment, masterfully woven around the universally urgent trigger of a disappearing minor €” and yet where, in the larger scheme of things, that kidnapping itself becomes, I daresay, a minor detail. Genius.

Visit  Site  for more Ratings :2/5  Review By:    Shubhra Gupta   Site:Indian Express

Ugly takes that darkness to an extreme, even more so that his first, unreleased Paanch’: a little girl goes missing, and what happens subsequently (and consequently) does not just flow from the fear and anguish that result from the disappearance, but also from anger and old resentment and twisted feelings and present torment. Kashyaps point is to show up the ugliness that all humans have within them, that no one is innocent. But the plot starts to get a little too busy and begins to shoot off here and there.

Visit  Site  for more Ratings :2/5  Review By:    Bollywood Hungama   Site:BollywoodHungama

A film like UGLY is not meant for the wide section of Indian audience that patronizes fun, entertaining escapist cinema. When the reality is so ugly for them why would they want to spend money on buying a ticket for UGLY. On the whole, technically brilliant with some wonderful performances, UGLY strictly caters to a niche audience. Moreover the choice of releasing it during a festive period isn’t a great idea either. Watch it if you are an Anurag Kashyap fan, else avoid!

Visit  Site  for more Ratings :4.75/5  Review By:    Sweta Kaushal    Site:Hindustan Times

Watch the movie for brilliance and for its simple, touching and mind-blowing messaage. Watch it for Ronit Roy, Rahul Bhatt and Vineet Kumar Singh. Do not watch the film if you do not like being subjected to the dark and intense feelings of guilt, realisation and loss. Skip the movie if blood and shootouts is all you want to see in an Anurag Kashyap venture.

Visit  Site  for more Ratings :3/5  Review By:    Rahul Desai    Site:Mumbai Mirror

This isn’t an easy film to watch, and not each of its 127 minutes is entirely purposeful. Everyone is an antagonist; there’s not a moment when they are not driven by oppression and greed. Look closely enough, and the mystery is offered on a platter early on, when we’re still figuring out who is who. This isn’t exactly a whodunit, but more of a tragic whydunit€”a cracked mirror held up to reflect the trappings of our fractured society. I disliked what I saw, and I dislike thinking or even writing about its familiar environment. And this vile aftertaste is perhaps Mr. Kashyap’s most significant achievement.

Visit  Site  for more Ratings :4/5  Review By:    Rohit Khilnani    Site:Headlines Today

Ugly is the last release of 2014 but qualifies to be one of the best films of the year.Hirani’s PK may be the flavor of the season with a positive social message but even Kashyap’s Ugly gives you a reality check and hence should not be missed.

Visit  Site  for more Ratings :4/5  Review By:    Kaushani Banerjee    Site:Deccan Chronicle

‘Ugly’ takes steep turns that will leave you confused as to who to root for in the end. The ending is a haunting final shot, which pummels the moral centre of the movie. The film begins and ends with intentional violence which simply accentuates the ugliness instead of serving as a shock-value.

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(Taran Adarsh is no longer reviewing movies while Anupama Chopra will not review this movie )

Cast: Girish Kulkarni, Ronit Roy, Tejaswini Kolhapure, Vineet Kumar Singh, Surveen Chawla and Vipin Sharma Director- Anurag Kashyap

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Film Review: ‘Ugly’

Anurag Kashyap's grittily stylized crime thriller is a more scattershot and pedestrian outing than his brilliant 'Gangs of Wasseypur.'

By Maggie Lee

Chief Asia Film Critic

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Neither Mumbai’s streets nor her morally bankrupt citizens are a pretty sight in “ Ugly ,” the latest crime thriller helmed and written by Indian auteur Anurag Kashyap . Coldly scrutinizing the shadowy motives at play during the investigation of a young girl’s kidnapping, the grittily stylized film boasts a scattershot narrative that frustrates as much as it illuminates. Kashyap’s brilliant five-hour-plus epic “ Gangs of Wasseypur ” is a hard act to follow, and this more pedestrian outing may well disappoint some critics. Still, as genre films go, it’s punchy enough to enjoy a charmed life on the fest circuit.

Dismay permeates the film from the very first frame, in which Shalini (Tejaswini Kolhapure), wife to powerful police chief Shoumik (Ronit Roy), contemplates various methods of suicide before she’s interrupted by her 10-year-old daughter, Kali (Anshika Shrivastava). It’s Kali’s scheduled day out with her father, Rahul (Rahul Bhatt), whose pipe dreams of becoming a movie star caused Shalini much grief during their brief, troubled marriage.

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Still vain and negliigent as ever, Rahul leaves Kali in his car to go to an audition. By the time he’s caught up with his casting agent and sidekick, Chaitanya (Vineet Kumar Singh), his daughter has disappeared. Rahul and Chaitanya’s search for police assistance soon devolves from Bollywood-referencing farce to noir nightmare, when the case is turned over to Shoumik. His henchmen take turns interrogating and torturing Chaitanya and Rahul, intending to pin the blame on them; though this is only the first of many scenes of sickening brutality, it’s the film’s most shocking, revealing how much the police will abuse their authority to serve their personal ends.

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The “suspects” prove more slippery than expected, however, and they’re temporarily let off the hook. As Rahul takes a different tack to save Kali, possibly less out of concern for her than out of a desire to defy Shoumik, their clashes reawaken old grudges that date back to their college days. Meanwhile, Shalini has an axe to grind with both her ex and her current husband, though it comes to pass that she’s no docile, chaste wife herself. Kashyap’s tone of sneering cynicism drains the potentially kitchen-sink material of any sentimentality or uplift, placing the characters in sordid scenarios that reveal their unsavory sides; the mind games between Rahul and Shoumik in particular lend the procedural its most gripping drama

However, as the web of deceit spreads out to include Shalini’s spendthrift brother, Siddhant (Siddhant Kapoor), and her unhappily married friend Rahki (Surveen Chawla), the plot becomes too busy and intricate for its own good. The haziness of certain events and reversals may reflect the murky nature of the personalities involved, but it also dilutes most of the suspense built up in the film’s first half. Aarti Bajaj’s editing crosscuts neurotically among the large cast, heightening the sense of crisis, but also making it very hard to follow what the characters are after. Add to that a slew of abruptly inserted flashbacks, and the viewer loses all awareness of chronology.

As with his other social exposes, Kashyap loves to toy with audience reactions; no matter how venal, all the characters are in underdog position at some point, but just as one softens a little toward them, their greed and egotism kick in. The key thesps embrace these qualities wholeheartedly in their animated performances. Roy is particularly masterful as a vengeful, despotic  police chief who seems right at home in a corrupt bureaucratic system. Kolhapure plays Shalini with shrill theatricality, which sometimes enlivens the film’s downbeat progress; she generates real pathos in scenes in which she’s treated like a virtual hostage, as if echoing Kali’s captivity.

Visually, the film is no treat; it’s set mostly on the mean streets of Mumbai’s poorest areas, though even the bourgeois homes of Shoumik and Rahul look drab and dull. Tech credits, however, are adequate. The chase scenes and in-your-face violence are all effectively choreographed, and as in many of Kashyap’s films, the music offers a raw, spunky remix of Hindi pop-rock.

Reviewed at Cannes Film Festival (Directors' Fortnight), May 17, 2013. Running time: 126 MIN.

• Production: (India) A Dar Motion Pictures presentation of a Phantom Films production. (International sales: Elle Driver, Paris.) Produced by Madhu Mantena, Vikas Bahl, Vikramaditya Motwane. Co-producers, Vivek Agrawal, Shahnaab Alam.
• Crew: Directed by Anurag Kashyap. Screenplay, Kashyap, Akhilesh Jaiswal, Rohit Pandey. Camera (color, widescreen, HD), Nikos Andritsakis; editor, Aarti Bajaj; music, Brian Mcomber; art director, Mayur Sharma; costume designer, Divya Gambhir; set decorator, Manoj Panda; sound (Dolby Digital), Mandar Kulkarni; re-recording mixer, Alok De; visual effects supervisor, Balakrishna P. Subbiah Nadar; action director, Sham Kaushal; line producer, Vijay Joshi; assistant director, Karuna Dutt; second unit director, Neeraj Ghaywan; second unit camera, Krishna Bhanjan; casting, Mukesh Chhabra.
• With: Ronit Roy, Tejaswini Kolhapure, Rahul Bhatt, Anshika Shrivastava, Vineet Kumar Singh, Surveen Chawla, Siddhant Kapoor, Girish Kulkarni. (Hindi dialogue)

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Watched the movie Ugly by Anurag kashyap. I have some questions regarding the movie. Can anybody please explain?

It is one of the most brilliant movies I have seen. But I have the following questions. It would be great if somebody can clarify it.

What happened to Shalini (Kali's mother) at the end? Any mention in the movie as to where she went?

Why did Shalini shoot her police husband Showmik?

Why did Showmik even marry Shalini when he seemed to despise her?

In the version I watched, Rahul kapoor would just make a call to Showmik at the end and cut the call when Showmik asks about Kali. But, in other review and explanation pages, they say that he killed his friend and that that scene has been edited out in some versions.

Did he really kill his friend? If so why? Then does it mean that Rahul found out that his friend was playing him?

5. What was the relationship between Rakhi and Rahul?

6. All people were selfish and egoistic, but of all the people Showmik seemed to be the only guy who truly cared about Kali. Did you feel the same way?

Thanks in advance.

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Ugly Movie Review: Ugly Movie

Ugly review 2/5 & rating. watch ugly official trailer video, listen songs, movie news updates, movie review and checkout public movie reviews soon., ugly review {2/5} & review rating.

Anurag Kashyap revels in portraying Real characters who mouth expletives, kill-like-animals, and the actresses in his movies have to glorify the no-makeup-look to such a degree that they start looking abhorable. UGLY lives up to Kashyap's world view perfectly. As a viewer you are left with disturbing images that continue to bother you long after the movie ends. Yes if you are a pseudo intellectual then you'd start decoding the hidden nuances but for the ticket buying aam janta there's very little that holds attention.

The find of the movie is Girish Kulkarnj who as the inquisitive police inspector asks some really quirky questions about why actors adopt screen names from a struggling film actor (Rahul Bhatt) and his hapless friend (Vineet Singh). Kulkarni's queries about mobile phones is equally engaging and entertaining.

The plot of UGLY revolves around Bhatt's 10 year old girl Kali's disappearance from his car. Kali's mom (Tejaswini Kolhapuri) is lost in her world of alcohol and pills. Her second husband (Ronit Roy) is a tough cop who has a propensity for tapping her mobile phone and he also relishes torturing Bhatt. Ransom calls start doing the rounds with inexplicable participation from various characters in the film. The free flowing usage of expletives and gory torturing starts to bother after a point of time.

Technically the film is brilliant. Nikos Andritsakis' (Dibakar Bannerji's SHANGHAI and LOVE SEX AUR DHOKHA) cinematography is brilliant. It's moody, psychedelic and extremely engaging with a very minimal usage of lights. Soundtrack by GV Prakash and Brian McOmber is outstanding. The usage of Rock music in key sequences is simply fascinating. The song 'Papa' sung by Shilpa Rao will leave you with a lump in the throat and moist eyes.

Rahul Bhatt made a failed presence with the forgettable NAYEE PADOSAN but as a failed actor he has given a riveting performance in UGLY. Tejaswini Kolhapure as the lonely beleaguered wife brings out various shades in her personality leading to an ambiguous conclusion about her persona. The wife, who slept with her husband's friend, or a hapless suicidal woman with absolutely no hopes from life, she excels. Surveen Chawla as the item girl who oscillates between Bhatt and her producer husband brings in spice to the proceedings but she also brings more ambiguity about some of her actions which are never explained. Vineet Singh is excellent as the friend who could be a villain and a victim. Ronit Roy is in great form and his performance reminds you of the raw hardened fiber of UDAAN.

Anurag Kashyap is the quintessential rebel. He has had a disturbed childhood and it shows in the choice of his movie subjects which turn out to be disturbing for the aam janta. The patrons of Hollywood and European cinema are inherently far detached from the harsh poor realities of life. Patrons of Indian cinema go through the grind of hardships every single day. Movies for them is more of an escape and in many cases the only mode of good entertainment. A film like UGLY is not meant for the wide section of Indian audience that patronizes fun, entertaining escapist cinema. When the reality is so ugly for them why would they want to spend money on buying a ticket for UGLY.

On the whole, technically brilliant with some wonderful performances, UGLY strictly caters to a niche audience. Moreover the choice of releasing it during a festive period isn't a great idea either. Watch it if you are an Anurag Kashyap fan, else avoid!

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Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) About Ugly

In this Ugly film, Ronit Roy , Tejaswini Kolhapure played the primary leads.

The Ugly was released in theaters on 26 Dec 2014.

The Ugly was directed by Anurag Kashyap

Movies like Deva , Bad Newz , Ulajh and others in a similar vein had the same genre but quite different stories.

The soundtracks and background music were composed by G V Prakash Kumar for the movie Ugly.

The movie Ugly belonged to the Thriller, genre.

Ugly User Review

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jessie 3507 Days Ago

bakwas movie :( waste of time

Moviezadda 3518 Days Ago

Ugly Movie Review - 'Less Distressing... Expectations : If only Anuraag Kashyap's debut film'Paanch' would have released at its scheduled time, our Hindi cinema would have experienced a very bold and dark film with some fantastic performance atta..

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Vedaa is a 2024 Indian Hindi-language action drama film directed by Nikkhil Advani and produced by Zee Studios, Emmay Entertainment and JA Entertainment. The film stars John Abraham, Sharvari (in the titular role), Abhishek Banerjee and Ashish Vidyarthi. The film is inspired by true events.Vedaa was theatrically released on 15 August 2024. The film received mixed reviews from critics and grossed over ₹7 crore at the box office.

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India box office: ‘stree 2’ scores top hindi film opening of 2024.

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The latest Hindi film, 'Stree 2' has made a record breaking start at the ticket windows.

Producers Dinesh Vijan, with his Maddock Films, seems to have cracked the code for Hindi blockbusters - their latest movie Stree 2 had a grand opening on Thursday, August 15, and the film has earned more than $9.6 million globally on the first day of the release. In India alone, the film managed to score a record opening of $7.7 million gross collections. On the second day of the release, Friday (a working weekday), Stree 2 is expected to cross $13 million dollars globally.

The figures include the paid previews that were held a day before on Wednesday. The film reportedly made nett collections of $6.5 million in India on Thursday. The paid previews of the horror-comedy accounted for more than $1 million, out of the $7.7 million opening in India.

Directed by Amar Kaushik, Stree 2 is a sequel to the 2018 horror-comedy Stree which emerged as a surprise hit at the ticket windows. Rajkummar Rao, Shraddha Kapoor, Pankaj Tripathi, Abhishek Banerjee and Aparshakti Khurana reprise their roles in the new film.

With the grand opening score, the horror-comedy is now the top opening Hindi film of the year 2024. The collections surpassed those of Hrithik Roshan-Deepika Padukone-starrer Fighter and the Hindi version of the Telugu epic sci-fi Kalki 2898 AD . Stree 2 is also the second-highest opening Bollywood film ever, after Shah Rukh Khan's Jawan which made an opening of $8.9 million. The film is also the biggest opening film ever for Kapoor and Rao.

Stree 2 , the fourth film in Maddock Films’ supernatural universe, brings village boy Vicky (Rao) and his friends back to tackle the new evil facing them - the headless spirit that threatens every woman with a modern outlook. After the successful box office run of Stree in 2018, the producers have had two horror-comedy releases before Stree 2 - Varun Dhawan-starrer Bhediya in 2022 and the recent one, Munjya that hit theatres earlier this year.

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Stree 2 succeeds in recreating the magic of the first film, if not better. The punches are perfectly aligned, the twists well set in a narrative which is painstakingly woven into a seamless story meant to win hearts and entertain them. The entire cast needs to be credited for their brilliant work in the movie. While the story offers Rao and Kapoor better scope for strong performances, it does not fail or sideline the characters. Well-etched characters being played by actors who ace their game enhance the entire movie experience.

Laced with humour and entertainment, Stree 2 also highlights gender and social issues that plague the society. Right from addressing judgemental views to pointing out gender-biases, Stree 2 does it all with the perfect dose of entertainment.

Stree 2 released with two other Hindi films that also had a wide release. John Abraham's Vedaa and Akshay Kumar-starrer Khel Khel Mein also hit theatres on August 15, Thursday. Kumar faced yet another box office disappointment as Khel Khel Mein made an underwhelming opening of mere $950,000 on Thursday. Abraham's Vedaa made an opening collection of more than $1 million.

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'Double iSmart' Review: Ram Pothineni-Sanjay Dutt's film is a slap to your senses

'double ismart' review: director puri jagannadh's film starring ram pothineni and sanjay dutt is an uninteresting sequel. with shallow writing, the film makes you question if a sequel was needed in the first place. .

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• Actor Ram Pothineni and filmmaker Puri Jagannadh have reunited for 'Double iSmart'
• Sanjay Dutt plays a gangster with brain tumour
• The film reeks of crass humour and weak screenplay

Release Date: 15 Aug, 2024

Actor Ram Pothineni's ‘iSmart Shankar’, which released in 2019, turned out to be a career-defining film for himself and filmmaker, Puri Jagannadh. The movie, despite being too loud and jarring, had a man who would be cancelled in today’s times. Yet, ‘iSmart Shankar’ struck gold, thanks to some inventive sci-fi angles with commercial elements. Almost five years later, Puri Jagannadh and Ram Pothineni are back with ‘Double iSmart’, a spiritual sequel to an already superhit film.

Big Bull (Sanjay Dutt) runs an international drug and weapons cartel. He arrives in India to avenge the murder of his mother, Pochamma (Jhansi). In a sudden turn of events, Bigg Bull is diagnosed with glioma (brain tumour) and wants to achieve his mission. A scientist called Thomas (Makarand Deshpande) suggests ‘memory transfer’ and finds Shankar (Ram Pothineni) suitable, as he has a USB port in his head.

Meanwhile, Shankar falls in love with Jannath (Kavya Thapar) who relocates to Hyderabad from Delhi. Shankar and Bigg Bull’s paths (and memories) cross, and the consequences form the crux of the story.

Director Puri Jagannadh is back after a massive dud, ‘Liger’, and is on a quest to redeem himself. What better option to bank on the success of his hit film and one of the most celebrated characters, ‘iSmart Shankar’? The thought process assures great prospects IF (and a big IF) the director manages to crack a good story for the sequel. Sadly, that’s not the case with ‘Double iSmart’. The film feels like a slap on your senses.

The first part establishes that there is no question of morality in the world of ‘iSmart Shankar’. Below-the-belt humour, objectification of women, and loud and jarring dialogues are plenty. With ‘Double iSmart’, it is double the test of your patience. There’s a separate comedy angle featuring Ali as ‘Boka’. It’s single-handedly the crassest, most cringe-worthy and cheap humour you have ever seen in your existence!

If you manage to get past that, there’s Puri Jagannadh’s shallow and redundant screenplay that will hold you down. Ultimately, it boils down to Ram Pothineni who tries to salvage what’s left. Sanjay Dutt appears in yet another gangster role after ‘Leo’ and there’s nothing striking in his characterisation.

‘Double iSmart’, yet, again, makes you think if a sequel is necessary, just to capitalise on the success of the first part. 1.5 out of 5 stars for ‘Double iSmart’. Published By: Anindita Mukhopadhyay Published On: Aug 15, 2024 ALSO READ | Puri Jagannadh's 'Double iSmart' gets A-rating from censor board, check run-time

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The TOI Entertainment Desk is a dynamic and dedicated team of journalists, working tirelessly to bring the pulse of the entertainment world straight to the readers of The Times of India. No red carpet goes unrolled, no stage goes dark - our team spans the globe, bringing you the latest scoops and insider insights from Bollywood to Hollywood, and every entertainment hotspot in between. We don't just report; we tell tales of stardom and stories untold. Whether it's the rise of a new sensation or the seasoned journey of an industry veteran, the TOI Entertainment Desk is your front-row seat to the fascinating narratives that shape the entertainment landscape. Beyond the breaking news, we present a celebration of culture. We explore the intersections of entertainment with society, politics, and everyday life. Read More

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Warning: Full spoilers follow for Alien: Romulus.

Alien fans can breathe a sigh of relief. Fede Álvarez’s Alien: Romulus lives up to the hype , delivering a real back-to-basics, claustrophobic sci-fi horror movie that doesn’t completely cut ties with other recent Alien sequels like 2012’s Prometheus. There’s just one fly in the ointment here in the form of a distractingly bad and completely unnecessary cameo character.

Let’s take a closer look at why that cameo almost derailed a perfectly good Alien sequel, and why Hollywood needs to knock off this trend of using CGI to bring dead actors back to life.

Again, beware of full spoilers for Alien: Romulus ahead!

Alien: Romulus Gallery

Alien: Romulus’ Unexpected Cameo

Alien: Romulus is set 20 years after the events of the first Alien movie but decades before Aliens. Because of that, there’s not a lot of room for Romulus to bring in familiar faces from the franchise’s past. Sigourney Weaver’s Ellen Ripley is still frozen in suspended animation, and the rest of the Nostromo crew were killed by the Xenomorph.

But Romulus finds a way to bring back one of those characters in a new form. Midway through the film, we encounter the battered remains of Rook, an android synthetic who shares the likeness of Ian Holm’s character, Ash. Similar to how Rogue One: A Star Wars story digitally recreates the likenesses of the late Peter Cushing’s Grand Moff Tarkin and Carrie Fisher’s Princess Leia, Romulus uses CGI to simulate Holm’s performance.

Perhaps it’s fitting that computer technology is used to bring an artificial person to life, but there’s just one problem here - Romulus’ digital Holm doesn’t look good at all. It’s a distracting and, frankly, unnecessary addition to the film.

A Brief History of Hollywood and CGI De-Aging

Hollywood studios have a long history of relying on CGI technology to either de-age actors or digitally resurrect dead performers. 2006’s X-Men: The Last Stand is a notable early example, opening with a flashback scene featuring de-aged versions of Patrick Stewart’s Professor X and Ian McKellen’s Magneto. What’s most surprising about that scene in hindsight is how little the technology has improved over the years.

We saw that de-aging tech employed on a much bigger scale in 2010’s Tron: Legacy, which features Jeff Bridges in dual roles as an aged Kevin Flynn and the youthful Flynn simulacrum known as CLU. Even at the time, Legacy’s de-aging tech was somewhat less than convincing, betraying a real Uncanny Valley effect that mars an otherwise enjoyable Tron sequel.

There’s also the aforementioned Rogue One, which digitally resurrects Cushing’s Tarkin by superimposing Cushing’s likeness over a performance by Guy Henry. Similarly, The Mandalorian and The Book of Boba Fett use CGI to introduce a young, Return of the Jedi-era version of Mark Hamill’s Luke Skywalker. In both cases, the thrill of seeing an iconic Original Trilogy Star Wars character given new life in the 21st century was marred by the fact that the finished effect simply wasn’t good enough. These characters look like what they are - digital zombies sharing space with flesh-and-blood actors.

The Problem With Alien: Romulus’ Rook

And now, with the release of Alien: Romulus, we can see that this tech still hasn’t progressed to the point where it can escape the Uncanny Valley. And to be fair, given Romulus’ relatively modest $80 million budget , maybe it was never realistic to expect this film to succeed where so many more expensive projects have struggled. Using CGI to brute-force your way into resurrecting a dead actor is not a cheap or easy process.

The Alien Movies' Long History of Recycling Rejected Ideas

Regardless, the point stands that Romulus’ Rook is every bit the eerie, distracting CGI character CLU and Tarkin were before him. Similar to Tarkin, Rook was created by superimposing Holm’s likeness over actor Daniel Betts. Also like Tarkin, while the end result sounds great (whether because the film uses AI to simulate Holm’s voice or because Betts’ Holm impression is just that good is unclear), it looks pretty hideous. Rook looks like what he is - a digital mask pasted over another person’s face. His facial movements are clunky and robotic. At times his mouth has no depth, which suggests the film is relying on AI deepfake technology. Rarely does this digital Ian Holm look very convincing.

So once again, Romulus is guilty of the exact same sin as those Star Wars projects. It recreates an iconic performance but does so in a way that is utterly distracting and takes viewers out of the moment.

What’s especially frustrating about Romulus is that it’s not even clear why the film needed to go through all this trouble to digitally resurrect Holm. It’s not as if the film is specifically bringing back Holm’s character Ash from the original Alien. Rook is simply a synthetic of the same model and purpose as Ash. Why does Rook need to look like Ash? It’s empty fan service - a callback to an older movie in a sequel that already has plenty.

Yes, the Alien universe has established a precedent for synthetics of the same model sharing identical features. The David and Walter androids are both played by Michael Fassbender in 2017’s Alien: Covenant, and there are multiple incarnations of Lance Henriksen’s Bishop in the franchise. But do all scientist synthetics need to look the same or be the same model? Rogue One can at least be forgiven because there was an actual, story-based need to have Tarkin appear. That need doesn’t exist in Romulus.

Does it even make sense for Weyland-Yutani to have an army of identical Ashes and Rooks, given what we know about Ash from the original movie? Ash is planted by the corporation as a sleeper agent, one intended to ensure the Xenomorph is brought under company control. No one on the Nostromo crew recognizes Ash as a synthetic until he gets his head knocked off. But if there are numerous versions of the same model in operation, wouldn’t that greatly increase the odds that someone on the crew would recognize Ash for what he is?

But even assuming there’s a valid need to make Rook into an Ash duplicate rather than a completely original character, did Romulus need to rely on shoddy CGI tech to do so? Why not go the path of least resistance and simply cast an actor who looks and sounds reasonably similar to a young Holm? That’s the approach director Mike Flanagan took in 2019’s Doctor Sleep. That sequel to The Shining simply cast new actors to play a young Wendy Torrance and Jack Torrance, rather than try to digitally recreate the likenesses of Shelley Duvall and Jack Nicholson. The new actors may not have looked 100% the part, but it’s a lot easier to accept an actor who looks slightly different than a character who isn’t entirely real.

Romulus makes the same mistake as The Book of Boba Fett. That latter series features actor Graham Hamilton as the physical base for young Luke Skywalker. But looking at behind-the-scenes photos of the episode in question, it’s clear Hamilton is already about 85% of the way to looking like a young Mark Hamill. Would it have been such a crime for Lucasfilm to simply cast him in the Luke role and leave it at that? Star Wars fans have accepted Genevieve O’Reilly’s Mon Mothma just fine. Similarly, couldn’t Álvarez and his team have simply found a Holm lookalike and saved themselves the time and expense of trying to will a posthumous Holm performance into existence?

That doesn’t even get into the ethics of casting choices like this. No doubt Holm’s estate signed off on allowing his likeness to be recreated. But would Holm himself have done the same were he still alive? Would Cushing have approved of his likeness being used in Rogue One? It’s clear that today’s actors are going to have to get used to leaving very specific stipulations in their wills about how their likeness can be used after death. It’s the only reason Disney hasn’t released a fourth Aladdin movie starring Robin Williams. Because with the advent of modern technology, practically any Hollywood icon can be revived on the big screen. It’s more than a little frightening.

Will we eventually get to the point where these CGI recreations can be seamlessly inserted into new movies without triggering the Uncanny Valley effect? Perhaps, but the tech certainly hasn’t evolved as far as many might have expected a decade or two ago. The same basic problems remain. Incredible amounts of work and budget go into creating characters that are, ultimately, more distracting than anything else. Alien: Romulus is just the latest example of a Hollywood problem that doesn’t need to exist.

Do you think Alien: Romulus should have relied on a digital recreation of Ian Holm’s likeness? Cast your vote in our poll and let us know your thoughts in the comments below.

Should Alien: Romulus have used CGI for the big cameo character?

For mroe on Alien: Romulus, find out how the series has recycled old deleted scenes and learn how the Alien universe is secretly connected to Blade Runner .

Jesse is a mild-mannered staff writer for IGN. Allow him to lend a machete to your intellectual thicket by following @jschedeen on Twitter .

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