It’s naive to assume that the makers of Pati Patni Aur Woh didn’t predict the backlash to the rape joke. Like the success of Kabir Singh shows, in 2019, every denunciation is actually a win for a film. The fact that we’re rewarding Pati Patni Aur Woh with our attention is its own payoff.

Despite its glaring flaws, Amar Kaushik's Bala stands out for packaging its grand ideas in the language of small-town India. The film underlines how incapable men are to withstand the cruelties of unreasonable beauty standards that they have heaped on women for centuries.

On the surface, Rajshri Productions’ Dosti is an endearing tale of friendship between two plucky physically-challenged teenagers. But look beyond and the 1964 classic also speaks of the society we still aspire to be – empathetic, educated, and equitable.

There is really no reason to be a SRK fan in 2019. Except to serve the myth of Shah Rukh Khan, the guy who charms on demand and romances with abandon. But is there all that is left of him?

Shah Rukh introduced us to the world of see-through shirts, and if his matching fluorescent T-shirt and track pant sets in “Chance Pe Dance Maarle” from Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi didn’t inspire the philosophy of athleisure, I don’t know what did.

Drive seems to be either completely unaware of its sub-standardness or weirdly boastful about it. It’s a nightmarish love child between the Dhoom series and the Fast and Furious franchise.

For an industry as distracted by, and obsessed with stars, it’s hard for senior actresses to find age-appropriate roles that do justice to their talent. Worse, when there arises an opportunity for a movie to cast them – like Tushar Hiranandani’s Saand Ki Aankh, that revolves around two sharpshooters in their sixties – they lose out to young actresses more likely to have box-office pull.

Saand Ki Aankh's translation of female emancipation suffers from a case of “being written by men”. By which I mean that it doesn't realise that it is mocking its two leads in the guise of celebrating them. The film would have been easier to write off had it not been for the distinctive, affecting performances by Bhumi Pednekar and Tapsee Pannu.

Housefull 4, much like its predecessors, is a collection of crass jokes stitched into a completely brainless plot. From the first frame to the last, everything about the movie screams “why”. It’s pointless to ask why Bollywood is still making such atrocious films, but why on earth are we still watching them?

Made in China is far from genuine. Its plot is a lot like Vicky Donor, there’s a school monologue that has a solid 3 Idiots hangover, and the film’s abrupt commentary on sexual health is a cheap knockoff of Shubh Mangal Savdhaan.

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Laal Kaptaan, a period revenge saga starring Saif Ali Khan, is dull and frustrating. The performances are caricaturish. Khan plays a Naga Sadhu chasing a cruel Mughal lord across Bundelkhand. He looks the part but never acts it.

The Sky Is Pink feels less like a biopic of a dead teenager and more like an unabashed tribute to the two fighters who volunteered to a losing battle for over two decades. It’s predictable and familiar yet affecting and tender, especially as an examination of unconditional caregiving.

Years later, Munnabhai MBBS and most recently, Gully Boy, did what Vaastav set the trend for two decades ago – give Bollywood dialogues a coloquial veneer. Phrases like “pachaas tola” and words like “ghoda” remain a snapshot of what Mumbai is really like beyond the Queen’s Necklace and plush skyscrapers.

When boys come of age, they enjoy the freedom that permits them to make mistakes. But patriarchy doesn’t afford the same luxury to young girls. Rima Das’s Bulbul Can Sing argues that when girls come of age there is some trauma attached to it.

Siddharth Anand’s War, starring Hrithik Roshan and Tiger Shroff, is at once pulpy, stylish, racy, and surprisingly intelligent. It’s been a while since a Bollywood film has made action look this inviting.

Five years ago, when Haider released in theatres, the ruling government was still in its early days and the mood of the nation was nowhere close to what it is today. It is practically impossible to see the film make it past the censors in the current political climate.

In many ways, Dream Girl feels like an antidote to the brashness of Kabir Singh. It is a film that confronts the vexations of modern-day masculinity. It briefly imagines men who listen, who empathise with vulnerability, and who must learn to relate to each other in ways that have long been socially assigned to women.

Here’s the thing about Yash Chopra – despite the cliché that he is associated with, he never could be pinned down to a stereotype. Even as he defined the romantic canon, he went about redefining it with each film. Chopra was to India what Mills & Boon was for the rest of the world.

Aradhana might seem like yet another run-of-the-mill film about a self-sacrificing woman, but it’s much more than that. It’s a movie that brought taboo subjects such as pre-maritial sex, adoption, and single motherhood to the mainstream.

You can be divided on whether Gully Boy is the finest film of the year, but it goes without saying that it is the best choice for the Oscars. An Oscar entry for Best International Feature Film doesn’t have to be an accurate representation of Indian cinema, it just has to have the financial might to sustain an Oscar campaign.

The Lunchbox is a film that thrives on the various little ways we forge connections in Mumbai, a city that works overtime to alienate us. How we envelop care in the confines of a dabba, our longing within the folds of a letter, and our concern through recipes yelled out from windows.

The Zoya Factor is equally let down by the terrible casting of Sonam Kapoor, whose portrayal of the “klutzy heroine” is now bordering on the offensive and its director Abhishek Sharma's insistence on taking refuge in crowd-pleasing spoofy filmmaking.

Chandni is the quintessential male fantasy in motion; except with Yash Chopra behind the camera, that fantasy translates as adoration and appreciation, instead of overt sexualisation. Every shot feels like a gentle caress, like the gaze of an admirer or a devotee.

Dream Girl suffers from a visible Vicky Donor hangover and says nothing new in its greed to say a little bit of everything. But perhaps the biggest downside of Dream Girl is that it looks like the first sign of Ayushmann Khurrana being held prisoner by his own reputation.

Section 375 is a sneaky, smug, and ignorant proclamation of "Not All Men" that comes at the expense of the Me Too movement. It doesn't just argue that the system is corrupted to a point where justice is a foregone conclusion. But that women seek revenge by filing false rape charges and the system enables them.

In 2019, twisting your homies’ nipples in public is a flagbearer of inappropriate behaviour. But in the hallways of my school back in 2001, a time when we boys lacked foresight and sensitivity, “pungis” were all about brotherhood.

In a post-Section 377 world, Bollywood has evidently taken major leaps. I was recently brought in as a consultant for a film script when the production team felt that the straight men writing a story about queer lives lacked insight.

Nitesh Tiwari's Chhichhore is a pleasant entertainer elevated by the strength of its supporting cast. It's also an unabashed acknowledgement of male failure. If Dangal eulogised individual glory, Chhichhore contradicts it, attempting to universalise an oft-neglected fact: Even losing is a sport.

Saaho is essentially Race 3 with a Harvard education and a family inheritance. It resembles an unholy trifecta of a haphazard screenplay that parodies itself, a confused storyline that springs up new threads without resolving the previous ones, and atrocious acting.