Meher Manda

New York

Culture Critic, Writer and Editor at Freelance

Writer. Fierce Atheist. "Busted Models" (@nodearmagazine). Writer @jamunkaped. 📚 rep’d by @daniellechiotti & @kan_writersside

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Articles

Before ‘RRR,’ There Was ‘Anniyan’

1 week ago | thejuggernaut.com | Meher Manda

Recently, while doom-scrolling through Instagram, I came across several videos of young Indians braving waterlogged streets during monsoon showers. They head out to buy groceries, only to find their roads flooded. Cue: the sad lullaby music from Shankar’s the 2005 vigilante anti-corruption drama starring Vikram, Sadha, and Prakash Raj. In the movie, a young girl falls into knee-deep water with loose electrical wires and is electrocuted to death.
What’s Really Killing Bollywood

1 month ago | thejuggernaut.com | Meher Manda

“Recession ho raha hai. That’s why they’re re-releasing everything!” actor Kalki Koechlin says in a painfully honest podcast interview. “There’s no content! Everything is stalled, everything is stuck.”Bollywood is over! I’m not saying it — everyone else is. Look around you: on Reddit, YouTube, social media, or wherever die-hard fans of Hindi cinema are found. The sentiment (and frustration) feels ubiquitous. The stars are registering like PR-generated brand placements.
‘Sabar Bonda’: A Marathi Queer Drama Triumphs at Sundance

Feb 7, 2025 | thejuggernaut.com | Meher Manda

In India, death’s aftermath can be a fairly ritualistic affair, almost clinical to a fault. In Rohan Parashuram Kanawade’s Sabar Bonda, 30-year-old Anand (Bhushaan Manoj), a Mumbai call center employee, loses his father after a prolonged illness. Before he’s had a chance to process the loss, he must visit his native village of Kharshinde with his mother Suman (Jayshri Jagtap) and his father’s body for the customary 10 days of mourning.
‘All We Imagine As Light’: Sisterhood and Survival in Mumbai

Oct 18, 2024 | thejuggernaut.com | Meher Manda

Over a decade ago, on the Mumbai local, I would play a game. Rubbing shoulders with others exhausted from a full day of work, I would stand at the train’s open door, gaze at buildings zooming past, and count every apartment playing the Amitabh Bachchan-hosted game show Kaun Banega Crorepati on TV. This little ritual allowed me to see the connections that tied us together in a city as disparate as Mumbai.
‘Haider’ Revisited: The Tragedy of Kashmir

Oct 2, 2024 | thejuggernaut.com | Meher Manda

Ten years later, Vishal Bhardwaj’s elegy for a land ravaged by violence remains as haunting as ever. Meher Manda. October 2, 2024. 11 minread“Do you remember what you used to say as a child?” Ghazala (Tabu) asks her son Haider (Shahid Kapoor). “What?” Haider asks. His mother wears bridal red with fresh henna on her hands; she is set to marry Haider’s uncle, Kuram Meer. The Indian Army in Kashmir, after all, has snatched and killed his father on suspicions of militant sympathy.
‘Hum Aapke Hain Koun..!’: Two Weddings, One Funeral, and 14 Songs

Aug 6, 2024 | thejuggernaut.com | Meher Manda

For what seemed like an indeterminably long time — a year? — the Ambanis, India’s richest family, forced us to witness them celebrate the wedding of their youngest son, Anant, with Radhika Merchant. Several pre-wedding parties across continents culminated in an overwrought July wedding weekend in Mumbai. Yet, despite the vulgar excess, the Ambanis also fronted traditional values. Anant and Radhika married according to Gujarati Hindu rituals. Mukesh Ambani teared up at his daughter-in-law’s vidaai.
‘Kalki 2898 AD’: A Future We’ve Seen Before

Jun 28, 2024 | thejuggernaut.com | Meher Manda

Nag Ashwin’s sci-fi universe pays homage to Indian mythology with a superstar cast, but its all-too-familiar presentation dampens its ambition. It is the year 2898. A truck of refugees floats across deserted land to the world’s last remaining city: Kashi. As one character remarks, “Kashi was the first city on Earth” and likely its last. But the Ganga, the holy river that traces Kashi’s spiritual backbone, has dried up, as has its religious tradition.
‘Highway’ and the Making of a Star

Feb 21, 2024 | thejuggernaut.com | Meher Manda

How the 2014 Imtiaz Ali film set the stage for Alia Bhatt’s dominance. A young woman is plucked from the sheltered ecosystem of privileged life and held captive on a working-class tour of India’s hinterland. She is deprived of vanity, wearing and re-wearing the same clothes as a hostage, swapping it for clothes devoid of brand value, shorn of makeup.
‘Highway’ and the Making of a Star

Feb 20, 2024 | jgnt.co | Meher Manda

How the 2014 Imtiaz Ali film set the stage for Alia Bhatt’s dominance. A young woman is plucked from the sheltered ecosystem of privileged life and held captive on a working-class tour of India’s hinterland. She is deprived of vanity, wearing and re-wearing the same clothes as a hostage, swapping it for clothes devoid of brand value, shorn of makeup.
Why Are We Still Talking About ‘Animal’?

Feb 2, 2024 | thejuggernaut.com | Meher Manda

Sandeep Reddy Vanga’s paean to violence, misogyny, and daddy issues is a laughably poor film, one that benefits from endless discourse. A bloody battle unfolds in a hotel. Flanked by Sikh henchmen, a man plows through hundreds of men sporting shiny animal masks. Using an ax, he slices their bodies with easy brutality, their blood splattering the walls of the hotel and his white kurta like fresh paint.