Del Toro’s newfound shape
mute young woman (Sally Hawkins) and an amphibian humanoid imprisoned at the government facility where she works as a janitor.
Determined to free the captured ‘asset’ (Doug Jones, under layers of prosthetics), she seeks the help of her elderly neighbour (Richard Jenkins), a middle-aged colleague (Octavia Spencer) and a rogue scientist (Michael Stuhlbarg).
The film is bathed in a luscious palette of reds, greens and dark blues, and constantly harks back to Hollywood’s golden era. The heroine lives above a fading movie palace of yore. There’s a dance interlude shot in black-and-white.
Production designer Paul Austerberry and music composer Alexandre Desplat do a stellar job, but it’s Sally Hawkins that makes the film gleam. In a year when the competition for Best Actress is particularly strong, she is a clear front-runner for the Oscar.
Maintaining ‘a tender balance of the beautiful and the different’, del Toro’s film is suffused with a humanism that is bracing, and sadly seldom seen in today’s films.
In space-starved Mumbai, two young people dream of owning a house.
Sanjay Chaturvedi (Vicky Kaushal) and Karina D’souza (Angira Dhar) are sharp, tactical-minded, quick-thinking Mumbaiites. For years, they have nursed their separate dream of seeing their names on a little brass nameplate.
A newspaper advertisement for a housing scheme for couples brings them together. For them, love, marriage and house happen in reverse order.
Netflix’s Valentine’s Day special, Love Per Square Foot, is an evocative tale of the value of family and love in the midst of a seemingly heartless concrete jungle. And it is far better than the usual Hindi film fare.
Director Anand Tiwari, a pioneer of Indian web series, lays out his subplots with unhurried ease. His focus on the little moments gives the film a sense of resonance and realness.