Dhurandhar

The speaker discusses the impact and success of the film "Durandar" and its sequel, focusing on why it stands out in the film industry. They highlight the film's authenticity, clear objective, and respect for the audience's intelligence. The podcast discusses how the movie avoids common pitfalls of sequels, engages the audience through trust and subtlety, and respects viewers by not over-explaining. The chapters in the podcast cover topics like visual storytelling, staying true to the plot, effective marketing strategies, and the complexity of characters in the film. "Durandar" is praised for its honesty, engagement with Gen Z audiences, and unique approach to storytelling. The podcast emphasizes the film's ability to stand out by being itself and not pandering to mainstream expectations. Hi everyone and welcome to my podcast in my head. You know yesterday marked one month since Durandar 2 came out and I still can't stop thinking about it like most people. Genuinely I can't even remember the last time I was this obsessed with a film, let alone its sequel. But I think I'm finally starting to understand why. It's because it doesn't feel like a film anymore. It feels bigger than that. Almost like a cultural phenomenon but not in the obvious performative way like we're representing something. Because it's far from that. It's more authentic. It knows exactly where it comes from. And that's something we as audience are constantly looking for. A clear consistent voice. Something that doesn't get lost as the story expands, as the stakes get higher, as the characters evolve. Because the truth is, the scale has never been the problem. We've seen massive franchises especially in Marvel Studios pull off insane ambition. Huge budgets, larger-than-life worlds, multiple installments, cutting-edge VFX, all of it. And yes, the outcome is often spectacular. But even then something feels off. Because if you look at how follow-ups usually go, they don't always land. In fact, they often dilute what made the original work in the first place. Take Saul for example in Avengers Endgame or the Jaime and Cersei Lannister arc in Game of Thrones. For a lot of people, the emotional payoff doesn't match the build-up. And as an audience member, that disconnect is hard to ignore. You want to feel invested. You want the story to follow through on what promises. And that's exactly where Durandal gets it right. It has a clear objective. It knows its world. And most importantly, it stays true to it. It doesn't try to smooth out its edges to appeal to everyone. It leans into where it comes from. And that's what makes it so easy to root for. It feels unapologetically local. And in the end, almost everyone walks away feeling like a hero. Even someone like Jameel Jamali who doesn't even fit that conventional archetype. And I think that's because Durandal isn't trying to sell us escapism in the form of superheroes who'll save the world. There are no capes here. No glorified hero shots just for the sake of it. Instead, it honors people who'll uphold their dharma. Who'll go above and beyond. Not because they are invincible, but because they believe in something larger than their own existence. The unsung soldiers. The spies. The men in the shadows. The ones who have every reason to go rogue, but choose to stay. People who don't fight with superpowers, but with restraint. Now, logically, shooting two films together should make things messier, right? The expectations are higher, the pressure doubles, and most sequels struggle under that weight. But here, it almost feels like the makers have bet on themselves. Even down to decisions like not giving in to an early streaming deal by Netflix for the sequel, there was a certain confidence that this story would find its audience in theaters first. And we showed up. Not once, multiple times. Going for the re-release of part one, attending the extended preview for part two, and revisiting back and forth, because let's be honest, we're skeptics. In a world where memes and spoilers travel faster than any reviews or news, for us Gen Z audiences, FOMO is real. So before we find out anything related to the film, we have gone the extra mile by going in the wee hours of the morning, or even late night shows for that matter. We sat through countless ads, previews, even Mukesh ki Kahani. And yes, we also paid for the overpriced popcorn. Because when something truly connects, all stars align. Theaters sell out easily, SNBs finally recuperate with revenue, and the movie-going experience finally gets restored for the audience. As for the makers, the film becomes one of the highest grossing of the generation. If anything, all of this just goes on to prove one thing. There is an appetite for good content. With the way content is consumed these days, where it's always just one more episode, the one thing Durandar does really well is structure itself like episodic chapters. And that's a very intentional choice. Similarly, I've also made a conscious decision of structuring my episode into chapters. So the title of my first chapter is Show, Don't Tell. Most films in this genre specifically, which is the spy or the espionage genre, they are praised from fear. They're constantly worried that the audience won't get it. So what do they do? They over-explain. They repeat information. They spoon-feed emotion. They make sure you know exactly what you're supposed to feel at every single moment. Durandar just doesn't do that. It throws you straight into the world. It moves seamlessly between timelines, character motivations, different narrative trajectories, and it trusts you to keep up. And that trust changes everything. By subverting the linear form of storytelling, Durandar has framed the audience as the main character, rather than amateurs who need to be fed endless exposition. You're not sitting there passively consuming. You're actively piecing things together. And that's exactly what we want. This generation, the Gen Z, doesn't want to be told what to feel. We want to arrive at it. There's something deeply satisfying about figuring out an emotion on your own, instead of being guided into it. And when a film respects you enough to do that, you respect it back. And you really see this in the visual storytelling. Not in the loud action, but the quiet details. Like the cops, for example, who showed up exactly when Hamza was getting thrashed by the Arshad Pappu gang. There's no dialogue, no explanation, but it subtly suggests that it was probably Alam who tipped them off. Or Major Iqbal, stubbing his cigar on that makeshift tower, literally foreshadowing his fate at the These are some blink-and-miss moments, but they say so much without saying anything. Even something as small as Hamza's lock of hair falling just enough to cover the wound he gets right after the fight with Binda. That's not random. That's the film trusting you to notice, or to come back and notice later. And this level of, as they call it, peak detailing from Aditya Dhar is exactly what makes the world feel so lived in. Moving on, the title of my next chapter is Don't Lose the Plot. When you look in most Bollywood spy films, they tend to digress. They start off strong, but then slowly fall back into safer, more familiar trajectory. You'll have a RAW agent and an ISI agent falling in love, or the classic damsel in distress, who, let's be honest, has no real identity beyond her sexuality, which is then conveniently used as a distraction or a mere plot device. Durandal stays far from it. In fact, it's rooted in the story, in the discomfort, in the reality of these characters. There are no item numbers trying to balance the narrative, no unnecessary detours just to make things more palatable. It doesn't suddenly soften itself just so you feel more comfortable watching it. And weirdly, that's exactly what's making it more engaging, because it is honest. It feels like the film knows exactly what it wants to be, and it's not negotiating that with the audience. And I think we respond to that more than we realize, because we're so used to content that's trying to please everyone and competing for attention, that when something just exists as itself, without trying to win you over, it stands out. It doesn't beg for your attention. It earns it by simply doing its job well, which is telling a story properly. The title of my next chapter is a slogan most advertising companies swear by. It's called, Say it. Say it again. Say it one more time. One thing about us Gen Z's, if you shove something in our faces, we will instantly reject it, almost instinctively. You do not tell me what to do is basically a personality trait at this point. And Durandal's marketing understood that. It wasn't everywhere. It wasn't loud. It didn't feel like it was trying too hard to get your attention, which made it intriguing. You started hearing about it. You got glimpses, a scene here, a line there, but it never got overwhelming or felt forced. So instead of being pushed towards it, you went looking for it. And that shift is everything. Because curiosity is a much stronger driver than persuasion. You're choosing to engage. You're not being told to. And when the payoff actually matches that curiosity, that's when something clicks. That's when it becomes something you go back to. In fact, even the title track ended up doing more heavy lifting than traditional marketing. And that says a lot about how audience behavior is shifting. Durandal wasn't just two films shot together. It went a step further and planned their release back to back. And that decision is more important than it looks on the surface. Because one, it respects the audience's memory. Let's be honest, our attention spans are questionable, at best. If you leave too much time between installments, we forget emotional beats, character motivations, even entire plot lines. And two, it keeps the rage alive. Because Durandal 2 is where everything actually pays off. That's where the purpose of the infiltration, all that emotional and ideological buildup, finally finds release. It's what we call catharsis in storytelling. There's this one line by Ajay Sanyal that captures it perfectly. Tumhare is Indran ko chingari ki zarad hai aur mai wo chingari hu. Durandal 2 for us was what Sanyal was for Jasgirat. My next chapter is called White or Black? No, Grey. I had this fleeting thought when I first observed Hamza and Jasgirat, capable of inflicting the similar kind of brutality and violence as Rehman Dikeyath or Major Iqbal. But I didn't fully sit with it at the time. Then I heard Ram Gopal Varma talk about it, and it just clicked. Because if you do strip away the countries, the geopolitics, and the sides that we pick, how different are these men really? They're all violent, they're all operating from morally grey spaces. And yet, we gravitate towards Jasgirat. Now why is that? Partly because we're Indians, so we're already aligned with him. But more importantly, we see his journey. Jassi had every reason to go rogue, but he chose to stay, to serve a purpose bigger than himself. And that choice is what saturates him. There are obvious parallels you can draw, such as the man in the shadows, the personal loss, and the singular mission, which is very Batman quoted. But even that heroism is rooted in realism. Because at the end of it all, after the violence, the sacrifice, the almost Jesus-like suffering, he still needs Danyal to bring him back from the dead. He's not untouchable, he's not above it all, and that's why we stay with him. We celebrate his wins like they're ours. His victory feels national, but his loss, that's deeply personal. That belongs to him, and somehow we carry that with him even after the mission ends. That final moment when he looks into the camera, it almost feels like a submission. And I think it's that feeling of not fully belonging anywhere, of existing in that in-between space, that really stirs something in us. And here we are, on my final chapter, called Boys Will Be Boys. Since we're on the topic of violent men, it would be remiss of me if I didn't discuss how the film is a testosterone-pumping, hyper-masculine roller coaster, with absolutely no space to accommodate women with equal footing. But honestly, I'd rather take this over the crass, unrealistic portrayals of women we've seen over the years. At least there's no misogynistic lens just for the sake of it. Yes, the bar is low, but even within that, Durandha still chooses a cleaner, more sensitive depiction. Because at its core, the story is about men. They are dharma, they are balidan, about an absent, toxic father and his abusive relationship with his son, which manifests into a bloodthirsty, vengeful monster who'll stop at nothing until he gets what he wants. There's this pattern, you see. Boys who are bullied early on often internalize it. They start believing that whatever they inflict on others is justified because they've had it worse. They become desensitized, and this turns into something darker, something sadistic, even narcissistic. And that's what the film taps into. It doesn't excuse it, but it doesn't simplify it either. And weirdly, this reminds me of a dialogue by Kristen Scott Thomas in Fleabag. It goes, Women are born with pain built in. It's our physical destiny. We carry it within ourselves throughout our life. Men don't. They have to seek it out. They invent all these gods and demons and things just so they can feel guilty about things, which is something we also do very well on our own. And then they create wars so that they can feel things and touch each other. And when there aren't any wars, they can play rugby. And we have it all going in here, inside. We have pain on a cycle for years and years and years. Hence why I feel Dhurandar is an extension of this idea. It's men trying to process pain the only way they've been taught how. And so I think it sounds like a fitting place to end my podcast today. Thank you so much for listening. I'll tune in soon. Bye.