Priyanka Chopra, Varanasi and the question of a Telugu debut; was the Ram Charan starrer Thoofan forgotten?

The Varanasi team’s widely circulated interview with Screen Rant features a rather awkward moment. When the interviewer asks Priyanka Chopra about her Telugu debut in Varanasi, the actor says she cannot remember when she last did a Telugu film. Mahesh Babu quickly steps in to add, “This is her first Telugu film.” But that is not entirely accurate. Priyanka Chopra had, in fact, featured in the Telugu version of the Amitabh Bachchan classic Zanjeer in 2013. Titled Thoofan, the Ram Charan starrer had Priyanka playing his love interest in what was admittedly a small role. At the time, Chopra had expressed considerable gratitude to the makers of Thoofan, as opportunities in Bollywood were scarce for her then. A senior member of the Thoofan team views her current statement as a case of selective amnesia. “When we signed her for Thoofan, nobody in the Hindi film industry was willing to sign her. We ourselves felt the role was not substantial enough for a future global star like her. But s...

Emilia Perez review – Jacques Audiard’s gangster trans musical barrels along in style

A thoroughly implausible yarn about a Mexican cartel leader who hires a lawyer to arrange his transition, but is carried along by its cheesy Broadway energy

Anglo-progressives and US liberals might worry about whether or not certain stories are “theirs to tell”. But that’s not a scruple that worries French auteur Jacques Audiard who, with amazing boldness and sweep, launches into this slightly bizarre yet watchable musical melodrama of crime and gender, set in Mexico. It plays like a thriller by Amat Escalante with music and lyrics by Lin-Manuel Miranda, and a touch of Almodovar.

Argentinian trans actor Karla Sofia Gascon plays Juan “Manitas” Del Monte, a terrifyingly powerful and ruthless cartel leader in Mexico, married to Jessi (Selena Gomez), with two young children. Manitas is intrigued by a high-profile murder trial in which an obviously guilty defendant gets off due to his smart and industrious lawyer Rita (Zoe Saldana); she is nearing 40 and secretly wretched from devoting her life to protecting unrepentant slimeballs, who go on to get ever richer while she labours for pitiful fees. Manitas kidnaps Rita and makes her an offer she can’t refuse: a one-off job for an unimaginably vast amount of money on which she can retire.

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